The answers to seven of our most pressing preseason questions

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2:08Robert Mays: Welcome to The Athletic Football Show, brought to you by the U.S. Bank Smartly Visa Signature Card. I'm Robert Mays. Little third of the way through the season check-in today. We did an exercise in the preview shows where we were asking, what do you watch in the first month of the season? with some of these teams. I wanted to revisit some of those questions. And I had our guest, Fran Duffy, put together a collection of his own questions that he had coming into the season. So that's what we did today, revisiting some of the biggest questions that we had from the offseason on today's show. Let's get to that conversation with our buddy, Fran Duffy, from PHLY and the All-City Network right now.

2:51Robert Mays: the timing on this isn't perfect we had some other shows that supplanted it uh over the last couple weeks we probably could have done it earlier given the original framing but for all of our preview episodes for each team we were we asked a question or just were a subject what do you watch in the first month of the season? And so I wanted to spend today revisiting some of those from my end and then bringing someone else in who could look at whatever his version of that was as we were heading into the season. So here to help me sort through our biggest questions heading into the year and what the early answers to those are, it is my friend from PHLY, from the All City Network, a friend of the show in the truest possible sense.

3:33Robert Mays: It's my buddy, Fran Duffy. How so much for having me. Nothing really happening here at Philly Sports. It's been a quiet few weeks. So, no, I'm excited to dive into this with you. I'm glad I can allow you to step outside of that for just a second. The fact that this is a chance for you to unload some thoughts that are neither Eagles-related nor draft-related. And those are boxes that you typically have to live in for much of the year. So, hopefully I can give you a little bit of reprieve from whatever this has felt like. I look forward to it greatly. And look, I'm open to talk. You want to talk about LeBron?

4:09We can talk about LeBron. But outside of that, like I'm kind of tapped out.

4:13Robert Mays: This is fun because we always say this, like a lot of these podcasts are just in real life conversations that we're not having on the microphone. This is actually true. Like you and I have been kicking around some of this stuff. I called you in a panic like two weeks ago to talk through one of these subjects, which we'll get into. But you are the guest here. I want you to kick us off. What is the preseason curiosity question that you had that you feel like has had one of the more interesting answers over the first six weeks of the NFL season? Yeah, I mean, obviously, look, there's been so much over the like the buildup to this season from a NFL draft standpoint was about the quarterback class.

4:49And we talked about it last year and a bunch of those guys went back and the same kind of the same conversation was recycled here for the 2026 season. And that's the excitement about next year's quarterback crop. and it looks like we might be in for repeat history with a lot of those guys potentially going back to school again. But I was interested in kind of the way that we talk about some of these guys late in their rookie contracts. And it was namely Bryce Young and C.J. Stroud. This is kind of make it or break it. It's probably too strong, but these teams are going to be pushed towards making a decision.

5:22And to an extent, Jaden Daniels as well, but obviously he's a year behind from a calendar standpoint. So it was really on Bryce Young and C.J. Stroud. And obviously those guys, if there were any questions about them coming into the year, and they're doing it a little bit differently, they are passing any tests with flying colors so far this season through six games.

5:40Robert Mays: I don't think you could be happier with what you've seen from either one of them if you are a member of those organizations. What did we want to see, and have we seen it? They have performed as well as you possibly could have imagined. Obviously the situation with Bryce Young is different than it is with C.J. Stroud. With C.J. Stroud, it was where is that step from where he was as a rookie? It was that he had plateaued and then kind of just completely melted down in the playoffs. But for the vast majority of the 2025 season, the Texans were an above average passing game. I mean, they were like 12th in EPA per drop back during the regular season last year with pretty abysmal offensive line play, a first year play caller.

6:16Robert Mays: And C.J. Stroud was still keeping that thing afloat, just ended in a weird way. With C.J. Stroud, I think it was a question of how much is he going to get paid on the next deal? with Bryce Young, it was, is this guy going to be the Panthers starter moving forward? And so it seems kind of quaint that we were asking those questions in August, considering how both of those guys have played so far this season. Yeah. I think when you look at it, it's like, uh, both guys are playing with such confidence right now and it is showing in slightly different ways. You know, I think with CJ Stroud, he's leading the NFL right now in completion percentage over expectation, like just making such ridiculous throws and it shows up basically every single week he was in the bottom half of that stat a year ago back in 2025 he's playing fast when he needs to play fast he's playing more methodical when he needs to play be methodical um there's kind of like a nonchalantness to like the way that he's playing this year which i don't like he was always like a little bit to me like when you saw like the worst versions of him it was he was playing a little bit tight a little bit robotic and this year like you know there was the play a couple weeks ago like the third was a third and 11 uh to Kayshawn Booty where he rolls to the right and it's just like oh he's like he's he's throwing this away it's like no he's actually just like making a perfect spot throw like on the run and like just beautiful ball uh outside uh along the sideline to Booty and it's like it shows up time and time again and the numbers were there last year like he was like he was 10th or just outside just outside the top 10 in EPA per drop back a year ago um but you never like felt it this way like where it was just like consistent week over week over week so So you're seeing him play that way.

7:48And then with Bryce Young, where it's most showing up is like the under pressure stuff. You know, obviously the Eagles just played the Panthers. So I studied a lot of Bryce Young a week ago. And the big thing that stood out was like a lot of quick pressure. And the thing is, he wasn't getting like going in the tank in those situations where it's like, oh, like he can kind of get rattled. He's making quick decisions. I talk about the decisiveness and the confidence that he's playing with. I went through and I looked at who are the top five in terms of who is facing the most quick pressure. It's like, yeah, here are the quarterbacks that are facing the most quick pressure.

8:21The Panthers are still in the top four in terms of success rate against quick pressure. And then I look at who are the top EPA per dropback quarterbacks against quick pressure right now. It's Josh Allen, Joe Burrow, Bryce Young, Rock Party. They're the only four quarterbacks that have positive EPA per dropback when they're pressured in two and a half seconds or under. That's from NextGen in terms of the definition of quick pressure. Purdy and Allen have seen half as many total quick pressures this year, and Burrow hasn't seen nearly as many as Bryce Young. So he's seeing a ton of it, and he's just executing over and over, and it's just like that confidence really pours out.

8:56So it's been great to see it with both of these guys.

8:58Robert Mays: And you'll be able to speak to this, obviously, because you studied them so much as prospects. And while I watched both of them, I wasn't intimately familiar with what Bryce Young and CJ Stroud were as prospects. I had enough to make, to have an opinion coming in, but I wasn't intimately familiar with exactly the style of play and all that other stuff. But when I think about what they are this year, to me, it is their ability to tap into what we thought made them special when they were either prospects or in CJ's case for me really was what he looked like as a rookie. Some of the stuff that CJ was doing as a thrower, as a rookie, where he would make these flat-footed throws in the pocket and still be able to get the ball off at these kind of very strange arm angles.

9:37Robert Mays: In the moment, as I was watching him that year, I really, really thought that CJ Stroud was going to be a special player after that rookie year. Just because of some of the pure talent as a thrower of the football to me just really jumped out at a super high level, like the highest level. Like what you're talking about with the little flick of the wrist type things and the trajectory and the way the ball can change and just all the clubs he had in his bag purely as a thrower. I was like, man, this guy is something else. And you got some of that over the last couple of years, but you weren't really seeing it show up consistently.

10:15Robert Mays: It had drifted into the background. And there was part of me after the way I talked about him as a rookie, I was like, man, I guess I just was wrong in how excited I was about what physically this guy could do from the pocket. It just felt rare. Like all of the, again, just the shots, the clubs, and it's a fitting description considering all the sports he plays pregame. like all of the different things that he was able to do as a passer I was so excited about it and then it really did drift away as we went through his second and third seasons and now is back in full force and with Bryce his ability the quick pressure stuff is a good thing to point out I have just been amazed this season at what he can do finding just enough space to get these throws off like where the way that he's built he needs just a little sliver to get these to get to operate that way and he can find it so incredibly well and his release is so fast that if he can find just that little tiny window that ball is gone and so there are his like the spatial awareness that Bryce Young brings to the position and how that's his superpower and then CJ just the incredibly unique collection of throws in his bag and the accuracy that was always his superpower.

11:30Robert Mays: And so to see them both be able to tap into those things again and really remind us of what made them special as really young players or even as college prospects, it's just been incredibly cool. And you've said confidence with CJ. I think Bryce is the same way. Like when you watch the way that they're playing right now, and that's just something that we'll never be able to fully understand or talk about like why guys play a certain way is often because they're feeling a certain way about themselves they have a confidence in the game plan they have a confidence in the coaching staff and that's stuff that in the summer came up a lot in conversation with staff with both of these staffs and when I was talking to them it's like all right what are some of the intangible things that can allow these guys to really tap into the best versions of themselves and I think with Bryce, working with Brad Edzig and working with him every day and what that would look like, they were betting that that would matter, and it absolutely has mattered.

12:26Robert Mays: I think even the spot where it's really shown up to me is the willingness to throw the ball to the intermediate middle of the field. He was able to do it last year. I went back and I watched a huge chunk of early season Bryce Young yesterday, or 2025 Bryce Young yesterday, after just some of the conversation online and I was really impressed with when they were doing it he was able to access those throws they just weren't doing it a lot especially in the back half of the season and now you watch it he's thrown 22 passes in between the hashes or to the seams 10 to 19 yards down the field per next gen he threw 42 all of last season and I think some of that is on a lot of these concepts he's like I want this guy on this throw I like this it is really just a belief and I think some of the things they're calling and why he's throwing the ball to those areas.

13:14Robert Mays: And with CJ, I think that they really see both of these guys, I think are kind of more reserved personalities, right? I think that's, that's how both of them are wired. And I think that both of these staffs, there was kind of a charge and kind of a push this summer of like, I want you to really grab this thing by the reins. I want to hear what you like. I want you to take ownership of the offense. I want you to decide I want this play in this moment because this is what I think I'm good at and to vocalize some of that stuff and to hear it from those places I think we've gotten a lot more of that from those guys this year and again that's the type of shit we can talk about when things are going well but when you watch both of these guys play I think you're feeling that from each of them and but and the the big thing and you talk about like the the working hand in hand with the coaching staff, like the continuity is key here, right?

14:05I mean, you go back to 2025, you know, Houston and Carolina were both in the bottom half of the league in EPA per play, success rate, like a lot of the key metrics you look at, not great offenses, right? And, you know, they get into the postseason, both teams playing in two of the worst divisions in football. There were reasons that there were questions with both of these guys coming into the season, even though like they varied depending on the, on the guy, but you know, Bryce Young working with Dave Canales and Brad Idzik, I'll give them, look, David Tepper has caught a lot of heat and rightfully so in a lot of reasons.

14:36I'll give them some credit here in that they did not hit the eject button after year two where it maybe didn't reach expectation there. And you have conversations, and these guys have talked about it publicly, but even like the private conversations with people in that building, ownership is one of the things that definitely came up. It's like, yeah, this is something that we wanted to emphasize with Bryce Young was just finding what works for him. And when you are in year three or year two in C.J. Stroud's case with Nick Kelly, when you have that continuity there, it's easier to have those conversations as opposed to year one and it's like install for the first time.

15:13And really, you're just trying to get your feet under you. By the time you get to year two, year three, year four, that ownership really comes to the forefront.

15:20Robert Mays: And I think the idzig young thing, we've talked about it a lot over the first six weeks of the season. The fact that they have the play caller now is somebody that is in every single one of those meetings. They can refer back to conversations that they had on Monday when they're talking about certain ideas on Thursday. Like, I think that that proximity has mattered. And I think that you really have felt that and what those offenses have been like. And look, I mentioned Jaden Daniels before, like it's a, it's kind of where he's at right now. And I mentioned he was like a year behind from like the calendar standpoint.

15:49It looks like this season is kind of painting it to be what it was for those guys last year, where this, this offense in Washington is probably not going to be in the top half of the league in a lot of these major categories. You lose Tunsell. You lose McLaurin now on Monday night. They came in. They tried to revitalize this. We're going to go under center play action. Well, they're under center, third lowest rate in football. The question is, will that continuity be there? I don't know. It doesn't seem like it's headed that way, but time will tell.

16:18Robert Mays: It's going to be really interesting. It's going to be really interesting who they hire there. Do they think it's worthwhile to look at keeping some of the offensive staff? If they like whatever that relationship with Jaden and David Blau look like, it's going to be a conversation we're having in the second half of the season. All right, my first one here, and I alluded to this last week on a show that I wanted to spend some time really talking through some of this. One of the questions I had coming into the season was about the Dallas Cowboys and about essentially can Christian Parker do this?

16:46Robert Mays: Can he turn this unit around and get them to a place where the defense is good enough combined with the offense where this is a really scary team? a lot of things a lot of elements of that haven't really fallen into place like the offense is not what we thought it was going to be in Dallas either but the Christian Parker thing I do want to talk through this the first thing I want to mention about just how all this has gone and this is not to make any sort of excuses because we'll get to this stuff the personnel is has been so bad like it has just been so bad and it was tenuous coming into the season where you're thinking all all right, they've made so many changes.

17:23Robert Mays: Can we just get average play on a lot of these guys? And can the staff really maximize whatever that talent looks like? The second part of that has not happened, but the talent hasn't even been at a workable level. Losing Jalen Thompson as early in the season as they did, even losing P.J. Locke as safety depth. So now Marquise Bell is out there more than you want him to be. You're having to move Caleb Downs back to safety because you're so banged up there. That's been a huge issue. You combine the injuries that they've dealt with, even losing to Maureen Overshawn, having to play Dee Winters, Dee Winters has been borderline unplayable for the Cowboys for a good chunk of this season.

17:58Robert Mays: And so you've got guys at every level that are barely getting by, and then you combine that with the fact that some of the highest-paid players on the roster have looked like some of their worst players. The four highest-paid defensive players in terms of AAV on the Dallas Cowboys roster are Quinnen Williams, Deron Bland, Rashawn Gary, and Kenny Clark. Daron Bland and Rashawn Gary have been not even zeros. They've been negatives in a lot of situations for this team. And so when you look at just how you're allocating your resources, and in Gary's case, not only did you pay him on an extension, you traded a fourth-round pick to get this guy, and he has been a defined negative for the defense.

18:38And so I think any coordinator would have a hard time doing much

18:44Robert Mays: with the current status of the personnel for the Dallas Cowboys. that being said they are also not having these guys play at a higher level than you might expect the talent might play at and I want to just I think my biggest thing with this is the lessons that I've learned from how I approached it in the preseason and this is not to say that I don't believe I believe I think Christian Parker is a good football coach I think that he has a bright future I think that they can even turn this around by the end of the season have it look better They've already gotten better in some areas over the first six weeks.

19:16Robert Mays: This was probably their best week, right? I mean, against Green Bay. And obviously, like the Packers dropped two touchdowns and whatever. But I think that the run defense has gotten considerably better than it looked like in the first half of the season. A lot of the really big, embarrassing communication issues have gotten better. But they're still really trying to just find their footing in a lot of ways on that side of the ball. When you go out on a limb the way that I did before the season, and it was so funny. I remember the moment we were talking about this and people in the discord, because so, so often for the most part, when we have these new coordinators, I'm in wait and see mode because we don't know who's going to succeed and who's going to fail for the most part.

19:52Robert Mays: We have no idea, especially with guys we've never seen before. And I treat it that way almost all the time where it's like, well, I don't know. Like, like when we're evaluating this team, I think we should just say we don't know. That's OK. With this one specifically, I was so excited about it that I was like, no, I think it's going to work. That's how I'm treating this. And so when you get it that wrong, I think it would be crazy not to take a step back and be like, all right, what went wrong and what should I do about this moving forward? And I think the reality is I think it's best to treat it the way that we usually do with this stuff where it's like we should be in wait and see mode.

20:29Robert Mays: And the other part of it is this is all just kind of based on hunches. Like you're working with incomplete information, even if you've had multiple conversations with these people in the past. And I have. And so I think it is a reminder to me that really my job, even in talking to a lot of these people and talking to coaches around the league and getting to know them and how they think and how they want to do things is to provide context. Right. When who is a guy? How does he think? What is like how what is his value system? What does he want his defense to be? Provide that context before they get the job and going into the season.

21:02Robert Mays: and if it succeeds or fails, try to provide context around that. I do not have a better sense of who's going to be good at this stuff and who's not. And acting as if I did in any way was probably a mistake. And so I think that's the lesson learned is that my job is context, is to provide context to these situations. I don't have any sort of special insight for the most part into how this is going to go in most buildings. And I think that is a lesson learned on my side. That said, I do think that like the, your, your propensity to be optimistic about this. I think it was found well-founded. And a lot of people were.

21:41Yeah. And that's what I mean. Like, I think it was well-founded and also it's not over yet, but you know, I think that I do think that there's a lot that you can point to and say, all right, like especially if he's, if there is some continuity here and it's not just like a one and done type of situation. You know, I think of, you know, honestly, you'd be familiar with this, obviously, you watching it kind of unfold in Chicago, I remember when Vic Fangio got hired here in Philadelphia, a big talking point was like, all right, well, it's usually like a three-year burn, where it usually takes time to kind of institute the system and for the guys to really get inculcated into it where they feel comfortable, especially on the back end.

22:19So there's that element. And there's also like those defenses typically tend to be slow starters and kind of like groove into it a little bit. So there's that element. I do agree that the personnel has not been great. especially on the back end, some of that injury related, but some of it not. I'll be interested to see what they try and decide that they're going to do with Deron Bland here moving forward, just because to me, like, I mean, he had that huge year, it was a couple years ago before the injury, where he, you know, had 100 interceptions, but a lot of that, like he was working in the slot, you know, working inside.

22:51Is that kind of the long-term thing? And then what does that mean for downs? I actually think that might be better for downs, like putting him on the back end, allow him to be like the traffic cop in that split safety scheme. So I think that that would be something interesting just to kind of track here moving forward. But, you know, the other one that's interesting, too, and, you know, I was I was thinking about this actually thinking about Carolina. Jero Evero, like similar kind of path where it was like, oh, like a lot of reasons to be excited about him. And it wasn't all sunshine and rainbows early on.

23:20And they took their lumps and they had personnel issues. And now I like this is a this is a pretty frisky defense. I'm liking what I'm seeing down in Carolina. And while he still has a lot of the bones that, you know, make up a Vic Fangio quote unquote, like style defense, he's going to, you know, put his own spin on it where they're second in the league in zone, zone blitzes only behind Brian Flores, who's playing a different sport. Like I think when you're looking at the way that Christian Parker can kind of evolve into this, you know, I think that that's a good thing. The Mike Patton thing of it all is, is tough because if that hire had happened in January or February, which they wanted to, by the way, and that's,

23:55Robert Mays: that's the optics of that are tough. Like I think that they wanted him to be a part of the staff going back all the way through the off season. Yep. And that's what like, uh, you've, and lots of play callers have talked about this defensively and offensively when it comes to their assistance and, you know, taking on a new responsibility and becoming play callers for the first time. Maybe we're seeing this in Denver as well on the offensive side of the ball, but it's one thing, like you might know the system in and out, but to have your finger on the button and to like make the play calls on a, you know, drive by drive basis.

24:26Like that's a whole different animal that you had kind of have to grow into. It's a whole job you have to grow into. So I think there's an element of that, like, you know, to kind of give some room for growth there. So when I take all of that into account, like, like, all right, like I'm willing to let this play out. The question is, is like, is Jerry Jones willing to let it play out from the, from that standpoint? And that will be fascinating to see.

24:46Robert Mays: I want to be clear. I'm not selling my stock here in, in, in the person in the coach. I'm not at all. I think that I just think it's to show some accountability for the way this has gone over the first six and fixed first six weeks and how I talked about it in the preseason. Like that's only fair. Like when you when you have when you talk about something with as much just certainty is probably the wrong word with so much confidence. And then it goes this way. It should kind of put you back to the drawing board a little bit and cause some self-reflection. And I just want people to know that has happened, right?

25:21Robert Mays: Like, I'm just I'm not pretending that this hasn't gone on. And I think everything that you said is right. For any first time coordinator, it can be a bumpy road. And some guys are good right away, right? Some guys aren't. It's a little mix of everything. And so and I think when you combine the personnel concerns with a first time really young coach, it's easy for some of the stuff to get on top of you. And it's only six weeks, right? Like this season, they might be better by the end of the season than they are right now. And I firmly believe that might be true because for some, especially with this system, like you said, it can take a while to get this thing right.

25:58Robert Mays: It absolutely can. And I hope he gets the time to do that. But to pretend like I didn't say I thought the defense would be middle of the pack because I really believed in the coach. And then for this to happen, it had to be addressed at some time in some way. And I felt like this show was a good time to do that. But overall, he's an incredibly he's an impressive guy. He's a really good football coach. I was far from the only one who was excited about this. I literally I've been talking to people that know him over the last few weeks. And I was like, you guys also saw a lot of the same stuff, right?

26:30Robert Mays: Like there was a lot of reason to be enthusiastic about this. And I still think there is reason to believe that it can get worked out in the long run. But we can all admit that it has been a trying for six weeks of this experiment. it. And I would say like the, the last thing for me with it is the, um, you know, we talk about, and this kind of, honestly, it touches a couple of different things that we've hit on here, where a first time coordinator, first time position coach in the off season, when you're instituting the scheme, it's not just like the X's nose of it, but it's also like working with the personnel staff to properly voice exactly what I need with every single spot on this roster to make this whole thing go right and some teams or some coaches rather are more rigid than others with that uh to a fault and then others you know can you know maybe a little bit uh like outside the lines where it's like yeah like i said i needed this but i really needed this like aren't able to properly like vocalize exactly what they want or maybe aren't feeling quite as uh convicted to stand on a table for i know like yeah this tight end isn't quite a good fit or like this pass rusher.

27:35And so when I look at it, especially the issues they were having against the run, I'm like, all right, you know, this is a defense that typically, historically, wants to play from like light boxes. They don't have the guys up front to be able to play that way. You know, especially when I look off the edge and some of these guys, you know, they drafted Malachi Lawrence in the first round this year. Like I didn't look at him as like, oh yeah, like light box defensive end. It could be able to help, you know, in terms of defending the run. When you look in Philly, you know, like Nolan Smith is a guy that got compared to Malachi Lawrence from like a body type standpoint, Nolan Smith is like a killer inside in the run game.

28:04Like it's a whole different type of archetype there from that standpoint. And so when I look at, you know, just like player acquisition and again, it works on both sides of the ball. That's another aspect for first time coordinators, first time position coaches, because we know it's just like anything else. Like, you know, when you and I, if we have a work meeting, like there are some people who are really good at being able to voice their opinions and like say what they want and say what they need. And there are others like aren't as good at it. And it's the same thing with football. when it comes to coaches, scouts, like the whole deal.

28:33Robert Mays: And when you have a young staff, and it's not just the coordinator, there are a lot of college coaches on the staff that are in the NFL for the first time. Like there are a lot of people in new roles and sometimes it can take some a while to figure out exactly how to do your best job in that role. And I think that that is what is currently happening down there. And we'll see what it looks like over the rest of the season. Again, far from giving up hope, I do think that there's absolutely a chance this gets better by the end of the year and certainly could get better in year two, but it has been a concerning start.

29:03Robert Mays: And I think there's, that's, I don't think that anybody down there would disagree. All right, let's take our first quick break and then come back and chat about a few more of these questions. The NBA season is here. When you turn on the games, turn on The Athletic Live on YouTube. Become part of the show in the interactive chat along with hosts Zach Harper, Kofi Oboa, and the Athletic Slam Dunk NBA staff. The Athletic Live is presented by Google Gemini. Check it out now and subscribe on YouTube. Football season has arrived, and with the U.S. Bank Smartly Visa Signature Card, you earn an unlimited 2 % cash back on every purchase, including at the stadium or at home watching on a brand new TV.

29:38Robert Mays: Score big with unlimited 2 % cash back on every purchase. Visit usbank.com slash smartlycard to learn more. The creditor and issuer of this card is U.S. Bank National Association, pursuant to a license from Visa USA, Inc. Some restrictions may apply. I have a five-year-old and a three-year-old. I work, my wife works. And so what does that mean? It means that we got four people who live in the house who are often in four different places during the day. So when we all come back home after we're done with school, after we're done with work, dinner, it can be, you know, kind of tricky, maybe not exactly the thing that anyone is jumping to immediately go and do.

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32:23Alright,

32:26Robert Mays: what's your next one here? Your next big preseason question You wanted to hit Yeah, and this one Was like one of the big Talking points Throughout the course Of the entire offseason Based off how the second half Of 2025 went And for me it was would teams put their mouth where their money was with the tight end position, right? And it was a huge talking point going into free agency. It then became a huge talking point going into the draft, but more so coming out of the draft because we saw a bunch of tight ends go on day two and then early day three. It was record numbers that tight end. And part of that was a function of the class itself, but then also the way that teams want to play.

33:01So I'm like, all right, everybody wants to get into this. What is it going to look like? How is that going to manifest itself? And so, you know, one of the things I did just kind of preparing for this conversation was like, all right, like, let's look at across the league. Have the like multi tight end sets. Have they risen at all? They on average, they rose three percentage points from last year to this year. But I wanted to see because we know how this goes. Right. There are teams that like chase trends and like, you know, kind of maybe like jump in with both feet and it doesn't go well. Then there are some where like they stick their toe in and like, yeah, like it's not that's not really us.

33:34but at least we can kind of like check the box and say that we did it. So I wanted to say like, all right, who are the teams that are really living in this world? Like in this like multiple tight end set, we want to try and dictate to the defense, like get them into base, you know, into base personnel, you know, and kind of try and take advantage of some matchups there. So who are the teams that have played at least 40 % of their snaps in either of the last two seasons in multi tight end sets? So two, three, 12, 22, 13, like right down the line, 20 teams, total nine from last year, 11 from this year.

34:04A couple of takeaways. Number one, the big transition from last year to this year, teams are tightening up. Everyone's condensing the sets a little bit more than what we saw from previous years. So spread formations have dropped from these multi-tight end sets and the condensed sets have jumped actually considerably by seven percentage points, up to 55 percent here this year. EPA per drop back. And that's like this is actually one of the biggest jump from 0.01 last year to 0.11 this year. So roughly below average, every Geno Smith drop back this year to Drake May, who's 11th in EPA per drop back right now at.11.

34:39So a huge jump that way. And then the correlation I noticed from a run game standpoint, high success rate, low EPA. We want to be efficient, even though we're not going to be explosive. And that's what you're kind of seeing with a lot of these teams. Again, the ones that are living in that world, not necessarily like, oh, yeah, when everyone lines up in multi-tight end sets. So I do think it's interesting to just see how it kind of manifests. I will say, too, I don't know. Like when I look at it and you say, like, all right, who are the coaches that are leaning into this? It's typically like you kind of want to be at that party.

35:08And then when you look at the teams that are going the other way, it's like, oh, like, yeah, there's, you know, some coaches here and there that they, you know, like Sean Payton isn't going to like live in that world. But some of the other coaches that are in that area are like, yeah, like I'd rather be on the other side of the pool here. So that's one of the interesting takeaways, just kind of diving into that.

35:25Robert Mays: I'm looking at it right now. Now, so the teams that lead the league in 13 personnel usage this year, there are one, two, three, four, five teams that are doing it over 15 % of the time. Those teams are the Rams, the Bills, the Cardinals, the Bears, and the Ravens. It makes total sense. I mean, when you look at those teams, the Cardinals were already doing a lot of it when Petsing was there just because they have the personnel for it. And those teams have always been multi-tight end teams going back to like, I mean, the Browns were a 13 personnel team in the early Stefanski days before anyone else was doing it.

35:56Robert Mays: When they had Harrison Bryant, David and Joku and Austin Hooper together. And so Petsing was already doing. And then obviously with LaFleur being there now, just kind of incorporating some of the Ram stuff, the bills, that transition made total sense. You could see that coming from a mile away in the offseason because they let Reggie Gilliam go to New England. they had a fullback on the roster in training camp but it's it's always seemed iffy whether they were going to keep him or not and now you look at what they can do they have a perfect 13 personnel pairing by using Kincaid as like that move piece that is almost like a supercharged version of what Terrence Ferguson was for the Rams last year the Bears drafted a tight end in the third round after already having to that they were playing all the time that was again from a mile a million miles away it was clear they were going to lean into this more and Declan Doyle sitting there in fifth, where does he come from?

36:44Robert Mays: So it's all the teams that you might expect. And then the Jags have done a little bit more of it, which we could see that coming from a distance, considering the fact that they drafted Borkutcher in the second round and like what he is. And so I think in a lot of ways, it has unfolded how I might expect. I guess I was wondering if there would be more teams that would do it just because it was a trend, even though it wasn't necessarily central to their identity and who they wanted to be, there's been less of that than I might have expected. For the most part, the teams that have fully embraced it are the teams you might expect to fully embrace it.

37:21I just, to me, I would agree with that point. And when you mentioned some of the teams that have seen that spike, and Buffalo was the one that comes to mind because I think that, and this was such a big talking point, coming out of the draft when we saw the tight ends go and people are trying to pair some of these guys up and say, like, all right, well, this is how they're going to deploy this player or this player. And when you talk about Dalton Kincaid, and we heard, you know, coming out of Buffalo, like the 11-and-a-half personnel, you know, when they first drafted them, and it was like, yeah, this is what we want to be.

37:50And I feel like there's this antiquated thought, and this isn't, like, just, like, the media. I do think even, like, talking with people in the league, it's like, oh, yeah, well, if we come out in 12 personnel, if you've got your inline guy and you've got your move guy that's not really a blocker, teams are going to just respond in base. Like, yeah, you're in 12 personnel. and teams have shown over the last few years that's not the way they're going to go um so you have to earn base in those moments no question you have to earn it so but what teams have found is now it's like all right if we come out in 13 now now they got to do it right and so like dalton kincaid and 13 personnel is what they thought dalton kincaid was in 12 personnel three years ago uh and so you're getting like those those favorable matchups that uh you know you weren't getting a couple you know the first couple years of his time in buffalo you're finding some of that now.

38:35But I think the other big one, and this is, this is, uh, this really popped up with like some of the fantasy analysis over the last, uh, 12 months with this is that people think of, you know, Oh, we want to get these tight ends on the field because we want to get, uh, the tight ends matched up on linebackers and safeties. It's like, well, what it actually does is it creates playmate, uh, creates space for the other playmakers in the offense, like, uh, the target share for JSN and for Puka Nakua and for all those guys, like when they are the lone receiver out there, or if it is 12 personnel and those guys are one of the two receivers out there, those tight ends, especially if they've got that vertical element to them, that creates space for others.

39:09And so I think that that's another undersold element to it, is that it's not necessarily about, oh, we want to find the favorable matchup with the tight end going up against the linebacker. It's also, hey, we're trying to get them to line up in base defense so then we can find more space against lesser athletes for our athletes out in the open field.

39:28Robert Mays: It's really interesting to look at the percentages associated with all these teams. So when you look at 13 personnel percentage use compared to 12 personnel percentage use, the Rams, and they did this in real time last year, they just bypassed 12 personnel. They were just like, we don't need – and you can understand why they did it this way. Because I think whenever – and people in the league said this for years and years and years. And the Bills are a good example, but this was a popular talking point anytime you would talk about 12 personnel usage. Teams would say, well, if we go line up in 12 and they line up in nickel, we'll just grind them down.

40:03Well, will you?

40:05Robert Mays: Like if your tight end is truly like a pass catching option and all you're asking him to do is like block the nickel consistently. And that nickel now weighs 215 pounds on a lot of these teams and your tight end weighs 230. Is that really that much of an advantage for you? And I think teams weren't really seeing that advantage. And so if you're not going to have any sort of advantage created by playing in 12 personnel, why play in 12 personnel? Like you might as well just bypass that and go straight to a place where 13 gives you base defense. The Rams operate that way. The Cardinals operate that way, which makes sense.

40:41Robert Mays: Like teams are going to play nickel when McBrides on the field to 12. I totally get that. But then you look at teams like Buffalo, the Bears, the Buffalo and the Bears specifically. in Buffalo if Knox and Hawes are out there together and 12 personnel you should be able to run the ball if they try to play nickel to that like that personnel does give you that and I think the Bears the best example the Bears are in 12 more often than any team in the league other than the Raiders right now and that shit is fake you're right yes like that's that that is we might as well stack that under 11 and Brock that's like the Bengals 12 personnel same thing yes yeah exactly like it's a Broward is a receiver like we don't need to keep playing this game.

41:20Robert Mays: We'll get into that in a sec. The Bears lead the league in 12 personnel usage. It's 33.5 % because the Bears with the guys that they have, Loveland and Komet are credible blockers. And so if you want to play nickel to that, they will be able to theoretically run the ball because of the types of tight ends that they have. Not every team has two of those tight ends. Very few teams do because you're building the room mostly with a guy who is that move piece and one guy who's more of a traditional lie. And so it's not necessarily surprising to see what those percentages look like based on how some of these tight end rooms are built in a lot of these buildings.

41:56And then I'm also interested, and this is not necessarily like a burning question for the season, but now I'm like looking ahead to, you know, to February and March already. I think it's still a value play in the pro market as well, because it's always kind of been that way, right? Like at the top of the market, the Travis Kelsey's, the Rob Gronkowski's, like compared to their wide receiver counterparts were always vastly underpaid. You know, Trey McBride right now is the same price point APY standpoint as Jerry Judy. Like it's like it does the value, like the skill. Romeo Dobbs. Yes, exactly right.

42:28So to me, it's going to be very interesting to see where that price comes in for a guy like Brock Bowers in a couple of years when it's his time. But that has always been the problem at the tight end position is that you don't have enough of those ceiling raisers to kind of like hit their head on the roof and make it go up. Right. And so you've already got a number of these guys that kind of helped to raise that. Bowers is next, and that's not going to be for another year or two, so who else will be there? But I actually am looking at the next tier of the market, and Brenton Strange just got paid this offseason.

42:58Huge part of what the Jags do. A really, really important part of that entire offense because of his versatility, and then you draft Borkutcher in the second round, and that allows you to move him around, and it unlocks everything else. Now you can line up Myers and Parker Washington slot because you've got his ability to line up out wide. It's a whole thing. but would you rather have you because he's at the same like level as literally like jahan dotson like would you rather have brenton strange or it's not even a conversation and the brand strange yeah like jaylen naylor uh don'tavian wicks josh palmer like these are all the receivers that are paid at like that same tier darnell washington just got 10 and a half apy different archetype of player but like same thing in terms of like all right this is the huge impact on our offense the way we want to play, Wondell Robinson got seven more APY.

43:43And it's just like, what skill set is harder to find in today's game? Who's got a bigger impact on what you do? So the tight end market, I think there's still like some evolution that's required there, even though like, you know, there was so much discourse around it in the last 12 months, eight months.

43:57Robert Mays: Strange is such a perfect example because, and the Jags are a team that's also using a lot of 12 personnel, but I think you have to be really thoughtful about what you ask that move tight end to be as a blocker. And I think they've done such a great job. And I remember watching it in camp and just some of the things they were asking him to do from backfield alignments and just some of these like sift blocks across the formation. That's what some of these guys who are a little bit smaller but still powerful players can do for you. And that's exactly how the Jags use Brenton Strange. And so not only is he a capable receiver in a bunch of different ways, he's a capable vertical receiver.

44:28Robert Mays: He's never going to be a guy who has a thousand yards in a season based on the other options that they have. But he's a really important ingredient to the passing game. And the thing we did not mention, the 12 personnel stuff, if you have a guy you feel good about putting in the backfield and you're getting to some of these two back runs against nickel, that's a different conversation. Like that actually does give you an advantage to run the ball, even if you have a more traditional archetypal build with your tight end room. And I think the Jags are a really good example of that. And that's possible in part because of the multifaceted impact a guy like Brenton Strange can have on your team and on the season.

45:06Robert Mays: I just don't think Jay Winneller is giving you that multifaceted impact in a way that a guy like Brenton Strange is. It absolutely to me is a market inefficiency that teams have been able to exploit 100%. Yeah, that's going to be fun to track by the time we get through next offseason. My next one here, the question I had coming in was, how are the Packers going to get by without Micah Parsons on defense? The answer so far has been pretty well. Yeah. Rough start. Rough start. Rough start. Rough start. And then, you know, the Atlanta game, obviously, we all watched that. But we're sitting here now, six weeks in, and all caveats about small sample and whatever, you know, worth mentioning here.

45:46Robert Mays: The Packers are fourth in defensive DVOA. Fourth. second second passing 27th against the run which i think does make sense considering you know the state of their front seven and some of those guys but overall fourth and that game against dallas is easily their best and most impressive performance of the season when you consider the quality of the opponent and what they did to them and i you're a perfect guest to have on to have this conversation because i didn't know what jonathan gannon would do as a defensive coordinator i i really just didn't know what this would even look like because the last time we saw him, that 2022 Eagles defense was specific.

46:23Robert Mays: That's the word that I would use. They were a specific sort of defense. They played a lot of quarters. They rushed five a lot. And there just wasn't a lot of crazy shit going on. And Sean Syed, who does a great job covering the Eagles, but also just does great work for Sumer Sports overall and looking at the schematic stuff around the league. He had a tweet earlier this week that I thought was a perfect way to describe some of this stuff. So here is Jonathan Gannon's defensive percentage and some of the usage from 2022 compared to 2026. The blitz rate has gone from 25.2 % to 32.2. I would even say, just in terms of identity, that's not even a proper telling of the story because a lot of those blitzes in Philly were just, we got five down guys, we're going to bring five down guys.

47:04Robert Mays: The second level guys, DB blitzes, all of that stuff, that was not a part of what the Eagles were doing in 2022. No, no. And they've been really good at it too, by the way. Really good at it because they have the horses to do it. Like those guys, and we'll get to the players in the back end are so f***ing good. but middle of the field disguise period 27.8 % of the time in Philly 40 % of the time with the Packers obviously that pick that Evan Williams has is the best possible example of this yeah but they're moving guys essentially on every snap like I'm pretty much every snap even if they're going from like a one high alignment to staying in a one high alignment who's the post safety is moving and so there's just so many moving parts on the back end that I think has made them really difficult to play against.

47:48Robert Mays: And so that's a change from what we saw from him in Philly. They went from a 13.5 % stunt rate with the Eagles in 2022 to 31.4 % this year with the Packers. The movement up front is just so much different. And then the amount of cover two that they play with the Eagles compared to what it is now, 5.6 % to 22.7%. And there's some of this stuff that is incorporating ideas that they had in Arizona, even though a lot of those were Nick Rollis-based ideas, but Gannon obviously had a front row seat to it. I think I've talked about this a lot. I was impressed with his willingness to give Rollis the keys to that defense as a defensive-minded head coach.

48:27Robert Mays: I think it takes a lot of humility to do that, but obviously he watched what worked, what didn't. And so you have some blending of like the Cardinals ideas with what Gannon wants to be, but even in Arizona, this team is sending six guys or more on 10.3 % of opponent dropbacks. It was five and a half percent in Arizona and three and a half percent in Philly in 2022. And so how much they've cranked up the blitz rate and just how aggressive they're being, we've never seen him do this at any single stop. And so it being just such a moving target of what Gannon would be and their ability to make it work with the guys in the front seven, the pressure rate, even with they're only bringing four has been so much better than you ever could have hoped in the top five, combined with the fact that those guys on the defense, on the back end, those guys at safety specifically can play.

49:18Robert Mays: And they've just done such a great job. Like, I just, I'm so impressed with what it has looked like so far. Yeah, I mean, just going through and watching, like, some of the explosive plays they've created, like, in terms of, like, sacks and turnovers. Like, some of the play from Evan Williams, the play from Xavier McKinney, you know, he's come up with a couple of outstanding interceptions. You know, Bullard is playing some really good football right now. So I think the versatility of the guys on the back end is certainly important. And that's the thing that's interesting. As you're going through the different hallmarks of that defense so far this year, right away my brain goes, that's a little bit of the stuff Marizona.

49:53You talk about the safety rotations and all the disguise. Yeah, that's a lot of the stuff they did down there. You talk about the cover two usage. Well, when Philly hired Gannon, he came from Indianapolis where he was the DB coach under Matt Iberflus, which is Zerod Marinelli. That's all the Tampa 2 stuff. they were they were a big cover two team in Indianapolis and then you look at like the blitz stuff it's like all right well he he came out he actually was a player at Louisville got it got got injured became an assistant coach and then followed Petrino from Louisville to Atlanta and the defensive coordinator was Zimmer and you know and he so he got with Zimmer and followed him around to Minnesota yeah yeah I went to Minnesota with Zimmer and so like uh when you start to see like yeah like it's kind of these through lines here with what he's kind of put together and I'll give him a lot of credit because yeah like that this is not what we saw in uh in here in Philadelphia and like one of the big knocks on Jonathan Gannon I would say like from the media side in during his time in Philly was that hey like they feasted on bad quarterbacks bad offensive lines like they were and they were it was huge production like huge sack numbers obviously they set the record for sacks that year and the personnel was phenomenal but when they went up against good quarterbacks, like the numbers plummeted.

51:03The Super Bowl was like historic, what Mahomes did in that game. When they went up against quality pass games, they were able to, you know, they were not able to get those stops when they needed. And when I look, you know, what he did, and now you mentioned it earlier, like the offense in Dallas has not been what we expected, but you don't typically see Dak get fooled the way that he never looked, he never looked settled, like at all. So many throws off his back foot, like phenomenal job from that, from that entire front seven, from that entire defense. And so, yeah, I've been surprised and impressed with what we've seen from that Packer defense, especially like two, they lose Edron Cooper.

51:38What was that, week two? And I'm like, yeah, that was a huge loss for them. So after losing Quay Walker this offseason. So, yeah, that's, I would say, one of the interesting storylines so far for me in terms of not what I expected has been the performance of that unit.

51:54Robert Mays: There's a big picture takeaway that I do want to hit from this, just about the types of defensive coaches we hire, what you are hiring when you hire those defensive coaches, but it actually bleeds into the next question that I wanted to talk about. So we'll talk about it after the break and after we hit that, but we are gonna take one more quick break. This episode is brought to you by Onnit. You know those days where your schedule is packed to the brim? You're jumping straight from managing work deadlines to squeezing in a workout, running family errands, and trying to handle a million things all at once?

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55:38Robert Mays: All right, what's your next one here, buddy? All right. So the next one for me, how high up the priority list in terms of premium positions is defensive tackle. And look, the way that I put together my big board for an NFL draft standpoint, it's like very like position value focused. And it's like, how do you kind of determine what position value is? I look at where teams put their money and it's like, all right, like in terms of like how many players at certain positions hit certain tier marks from a like an APY standpoint. in the salary cap. So, you know, it's like how many players at 18 million?

56:14How many players at 25 million? How many players at 35 million? And when you look at how many players are at 30 million plus, right? You have 17 quarterbacks, which doesn't include Kyler Murray and Tua. There are fake contracts coming off their releases, so you want to get that to 19, you can. 12 wide receivers, which doesn't include Brandon Ayuk, so maybe 13 there. Nine edge rushers. Then you've got six defensive tackles, which is equal to corner, and you only have one offensive tackle in that$30 million club, which I thought was kind of surprising as I was going through this in the summer. I was like, huh, offensive tackle, people would say, oh yeah, that's a premium position.

56:49That's not the way that those guys have been necessarily paid over the course of the last several years. It's really interesting.

56:56Robert Mays: It's really interesting. I think there's something to be said, and whether this is a conscious choice or not, about weak link versus strong link systems. There's something to be said about that. But even if that's the argument that you're trying to make, where it's like we can't pay one offensive tackle$40 million a year because we have to pay five guys that collected it on money, it still feels like that market has been a little bit slower to catch up to some of these others. Like if I were Tristan Wirfs' agent, whoever, I would just look at Will Anderson's contract and be like, I blocked that guy for 60 plays a game.

57:27Robert Mays: Like what? Explain to me the gap here. and the weak link system, you would point to the secondary and say, there are six corners that are like J.C. Horn is on the same part as Tristan Wirfs. It's like, all right, I don't know. There's something that's got to give on that one. Because even if when you go down to the next tier at 24 million, it's the same number at quarterback. There are 22 receivers, 18 edge rushers, 13 defensive tackles, offensive tackle catches up at 11, and then you have eight corners. But the point remains where you're looking at defensive tackle is in the top four in terms of how many guys are getting paid at that number.

58:04And I think it stands out like, I think it's probably rightfully so. Because when you look at the impact these guys have, you guys talked about this. I want to say, I think it was going into the Super Bowl. It might have been like the last preview episode of the Super Bowl this year. And you're looking at the Seahawks defense against the Patriots. You're like, yeah, like Byron Murphy, Leonard Williams. You have Milton Williams and Christian Barber on the other side. And when you think of these Super Bowl winners and Super Bowl games in recent memory, it's like, yeah, like Philly had Jalen Carter and Milton Williams and Jordan Davis and Mauro Ojomo.

58:30You had Chris Jones on the other side. You have Eric Armstead. You got Javon Hargrave with San Francisco, Aaron Donald with the Rams. Like you go down the list, a lot of these, the best teams, the best defenses have really good defensive tackle play. And then, you know, I think it was just last week, Jim Schwartz was on with Daniel Jeremiah on his podcast, and he said, like, oh, what's the most important position in your defense? He's like, it's harder to block an elite defensive tackle, and Jim Schwartz has been, you know, had elite defensive tackles where you go back to Tennessee with Hainsworth, he had Ndamukong Su in Detroit, he had Marcel Darius, he had Fletcher Cox, than it is to block an elite defensive end like Miles Garrett, because there's a lot of things you can do against the defensive end.

59:09Yeah, exactly. There's only one thing you can do against the defensive tackle, and it's slide that way. and you can dictate to offenses to get them to not slide that way. So to me, then that's with Schwartz. It's like, oh, all right, he's an attack front. Get to a spot on the other side of the line. Green light, get after the quarterback, play the run there. But even the light box, gap and a half.

59:31Robert Mays: I would argue they're more valuable in those defenses than they are in the Jim Schwartz defense, which is really interesting. Absolutely, because you need to be able to win in those light boxes. You can't just be one for one. And like, you need those guys to be able to account for more than that. And so, you know, those game wreckers in both phases are not easy to find. I do think that there is like a more so than other positions. I do think that this is one where I'm going to emphasize like the traits more than not. Right. Because I think if I'm for the guys that are getting paid at the top of the market and even like the tiers below that, you need to be like checking boxes.

1:00:05Right. It was like one of the week I came on before the 20, 25 draft. we were talking about that defensive line group. And it was like, you know, the Walter Nolan discussion. It's like, all right, this is a guy that can win with strength in terms of like holding his ground in the run game. He can win with power and push the pocket. He can win with athleticism, initial quickness, short area burst, the lateral mobility. He's effective in a lot of different ways as a rusher. He can win with technique. He can win with effort. Like that's what all of these guys on the top of the market, they check all those boxes.

1:00:32You get into like the Derek Browns, you get into Jalen Carters, and you go right down the line. Like all those guys can impact the game in those ways. It was one of the reasons why I love Byron Murphy as much as I did coming out of Texas a few years ago. And so, you know, to me, like thinking about defensive tackle, I think we probably have to start like just including that in with edge rusher, corner tackle. And we talk about like premium positions. I think defensive tackle belongs in that discussion.

1:00:54Robert Mays: I've been there for a couple of years. I really have been. And I think that's partially talking to people in the league. I remember there was a coach who's very involved in personnel that just said to me straight up two years ago, they're more valuable, period. period like they're just more valuable period and I think we have started to see the same there's there's two different things in my opinion we're talking about positional value in the NFL and some that these things can get muddled sometimes in a way that I think is counterproductive in these conversations there's impact and scarcity right if you can it's not that running backs don't matter it's that if you can find a running back who gives you 90 percent of the top five picks production in the second round, it ceases to become important to draft a running back in the first round.

1:01:37Robert Mays: That's different than the impact a running back is having on the game. But with some of these positions, offensive tackle being one of them, and some of this stuff becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because of that, they started getting overdrafted. Offensive tackle is the best example of that. But defensive tackle specifically, I think, is getting to a place where if you want the good ones, you're going to have to draft them probably in the first round. That's most likely where you're going to have to find a lot of these guys. And so I think it's already drifting that way. And I think what you said is right.

1:02:06Robert Mays: In the run game, you have two different ways you can affect this thing. You can affect it as a penetrator in some of these attack fronts, or you can affect it if you're eating up blocks. The Cincinnati Bengals this year are playing light boxes at the second highest rate in the NFL. 58.2 % behind only Vic Fangio. They have a league average run defense in terms of success rate. Why do you think that is? might be the guy that he spent the 10th overall pick on that i've been doing it at a high level her house and so the impact that guy can have against the run and like you said if you don't move your best edge rusher around it's when you chip a guy it's not double teaming him you that shipper gets out it gets into a route right and so whether it's as a flat controller as a check down, like you are creating stress on the secondary with that player who is affecting the defensive end on a play.

1:03:00Robert Mays: And so you're taking him out without really sacrificing all that much. If you're sliding to a defensive tackle, you are allocating an entire new other offensive lineman to that player. Like the downstream effects of that choice are more impactful than they are when you're chipping a defensive end like that. They just are. And so I think coming from a lot of different directions, we have reason to believe that those guys are just as valuable. I'll ask you this. The Jalen Carter game that he had against the Jags, right? And there are, I think there to me are just as many, if not more examples, other than like the truly, truly tippy top elite guys.

1:03:41Robert Mays: Will Anderson, Miles Garrett, people like that. Of defensive tackles ruining games recently than there are of edge rushers ruining games recently. because of what we're saying. It's so hard to take them out of the game in a way that you can take an edge rusher out of the game if you do it in a thoughtful way. Yeah, and to your point too about like, you know, everybody wanting to play with more of the light boxes and divert resources to the pass game on the back end, that does put more emphasis on those. And I feel like that's allowing us from like a football analysis community standpoint to shed light on the guys that are crushing it in that area.

1:04:16And so like, and that's the thing with a guy like Carter is that he's got that ability to do it in both phases, right? Like, you know, he just wrecked shop in the run game, whether it means like holding the point or whether it's just kind of getting in the backfield and, you know, being a bull in the China shop. He's able to do it in both of those ways. And that's, to me, like we talk, you know, end of August when you get into training camp and it's like roster cutdowns and you hear like, oh, more you can do. It's the same thing with player evaluation and projecting these guys to the NFL out of college.

1:04:44It's like, how many answers do you have to what the opponent is going to throw at you in a one-on-one matchup standpoint. Do you have multiple ways you can win? And so the more of those boxes you can check, the more value you've got. And obviously you get into scheme specificity and things of that nature, but yeah, you like the guy that can win in a lot of different ways.

1:05:04Robert Mays: Get to my last one here. And again, it's kind of tied into the previous question that I had. What was this version of the Raheem Morris defense going to look like? Like what was going to happen? And so why I think this ties into the Gannon thing, and this is understandable how we get here. Defense is a problem-solving exercise, right? Like on offense, you're in an attacking mindset. Like you have to be, right? And so you are always kind of on the front foot offensively. Defense is inherently reactionary to whatever offenses are going to do to you. And so with defense, this is all coaching, but I do think it's a little bit truer for defensive coaches.

1:05:42Robert Mays: Here are your pieces. You figure it out. right how are you going to solve problems with whatever pieces we're giving you and i think what we've learned from the gannon and morris things is that those teams hired coaches not systems that's what that's what they hired they hired defensive coaches and like you said with gannon he's seen the sport from so many different vantage points because the systems he's worked in and raheem is even more scheme diverse than that i mean like he was it it's the fangio system it's the Jim Hazlitt system, it's like he's seen football from every single vantage point.

1:06:15Robert Mays: And so I think having those guys who have that breadth of experience, that allows them to just have more arrows in the quiver when it comes to problem solving. It's like, if my job is to solve problems, I have seen so many different ways about how to solve problems on defense. I can try to find an answer. And I think that we have seen that with both Gannon and Raheem Morris being like the truest the expression of what a defensive coordinator really is for their teams. And when you look at the Niners specifically, a bunch of stuff sticks out. One, to me, it's the five-man front stuff. Like that, that to me is the most drastic when you're watching a Niners team with the guys in those uniforms and you watch this version compared to what the Niners have been essentially since Chris Kosurik got there when Kyle Shanahan took the job.

1:07:04Robert Mays: This is the truest four-down attack front team that you just think about it. Just imagine it in your mind. And last year, I think they were 76 % four-man front per next-gen. This year, it's like 50-50. It's truly like a 50-50 split for the San Francisco 49ers. And when you look at the guys that allow them to do that, Duggar is that sort of player. Romell Height is that sort of player. They have the right pieces for it. And one of my biggest concerns about the Niners coming into the year, how would you stop the run? You look at the bodies they had, especially in the interior of the defensive line, And this was even before the rookies from last year got hurt.

1:07:41Robert Mays: I was like, man, I don't know about this. Well, their answer is instead of because the problem when you play that four down front and you teams know you're going to play those four and down fronts, you're sitting ducks like you. You are just sitting out there as targets. And when you have horses, that doesn't matter. Right. Like if if if you have great players, it who gives a that the other team knows where they're going to be. But if you don't, that's where things can start to snowball a little bit. And to the Niners credit, they didn't just say, oh, we're going to line up with those four guys and see if we can get by.

1:08:13Robert Mays: When they play against base defenses, they are on five down fronts a lot. And they've given up like a 38 % rushing success rate when they've played against team when they've been in base. In nickel, it's worse. And that's understandable given their personnel. But again, they've solved that problem. The pressure stuff. The Bosa has been in and out. We were wondering who the other rushers would be. They're blitzing 30.4 % of the time with Raheem this year compared to 22 % last year. And if you look at some of the heavier, like on second down, they're bringing so much more pressure than they did.

1:08:44Robert Mays: And then they're combining that with some funky stuff on the back end. They're playing more cover six and less quarters. And so they're just taking away. It's harder to throw the ball down the field against this team. And similar to what we said about the Packers, their DBs are demons. They've allowed four explosive runs this year. four that when you watch the DBs tackle that it's not the least bit surprising and so just everything that they've done we said the Packers are fourth in defensive DVOA so far this year the Niners are third and so what those the answer those teams have given us is so incredibly emphatic and impressive you know the other day uh Derek was talking about this from like the offensive side of things when it came to like offensive identity and I I am very much in the same boat where it's like I prefer the coaches that like you know this is our identity on this side of the ball and you know I especially from like a draft standpoint I'm always that when I'm watching guys in college it's like oh like this guy feels like a team x type of player that you know this kind of scheme player and I really am attracted to the the coaches where it's like yeah like I can watch a player and be like yep this guy is a D 'Amico right this guy can play for you know play safety for the Houston Texans regardless of who the defensive coordinator has been in San Francisco, there is like a, a play style that is kind of like transitions all across D 'Amico Ryans, whether it's Robert Sala and now with Raheem Morris, like those guys just, they play like maniacs on the back end, you know, and especially at linebacker as well.

1:10:15And part of that might be like, Hey, you know what? Like you got Fred Warner in that locker room. Like this, you got to meet that standard. Right. And when you have those guys at that level of defense to kind of set that, I think that does help. But to me, the interesting part of it, it goes back to there was a, ironically enough, there was a Robert Sala interaction with someone in the Tennessee media a couple weeks ago. And he said, you know, defensive football, it's all right, are you going to be, you know, lean on your horses on one side of it from a coverage standpoint, and then you're going to complicate things on the other.

1:10:42So like, all right, if we've got a great front, then I'm just going to let those guys play, and we're going to be a little bit more complicated on the back end, and vice versa. If you're going to be, that you're not as talented up front, All right, that's when you've got to kind of scheme things up, going back to the Jonathan Gannon conversation. You know, Michael Parsons, all right, well, we've got to get a little bit more creative with what we're doing to get after the quarterback. If that's what we want to do, we want to centralize, you know, prioritize getting after the quarterback, we've got to find a way to do it.

1:11:06What is the creative solution to that problem? And so, yeah, I mean, the Raheem Morris fit here in San Francisco. And not that we necessarily, like, doubted that, because we know, like, he and Kyle Shannon go back for forever and ever. But I think that it's been good to see the talent kind of marry up with the new version of that scheme.

1:11:27Robert Mays: Yeah, again, it's just what is it going to be? What does he want to be? What is the identity of this? Is it different than what we've seen? And the answer has been yes. They are playing differently than what we had come to expect from the San Francisco 49ers, and they've done it in a way that has really benefited them. I was going back and watching the Washington game, and even some of those plays where Mustafa is the post-safety, he's stepping forward at the snap. And so when you watch them playing cover three, it almost looks like invert two because of where the post safety is playing. And so just even some of that, like the little tweaks about how they're playing some of the coverages is really good.

1:12:01Robert Mays: And that brings me back to the first point. If you the idea of hiring just a good defensive coach, right? Like the guy's just a good defensive coach, like throw the scheme shit out the window. And I'm guilty of that at times where it's like, yeah, this system is the right thing to chase. This system is the thing that you want. But on defense specifically, I just think that it's such a problem-solving exercise that hiring the coaches that are the best at solving those problems is often the right way to go. And so two hires that I don't know if either one of them were necessarily panned or their reviews were negative.

1:12:39Robert Mays: But I don't think anybody was doing jumping jacks in the media or among general NFL fans when Raheem Morris and Jonathan Gannon were hired in these jobs. And I think that is worth revisiting. Why and what can we learn from that? And I think that to me is my biggest takeaway. way. Yeah, it's especially like, too, I was thinking about it when he first got hired in L.A., taking over for Brandon Staley, and it was like, oh, like, he's running Brandon Staley's team. He's running, like, we are teaching him what he's going to do, and his ability to kind of adapt to that, I think was a fascinating thing to kind of draw back on, because it's a little bit of the opposite here in San Francisco.

1:13:15Robert Mays: All right, you got one more, right? Yeah, I do. This one's right up your alley. Because the question I had, and don't take this the wrong way, because well, I'll explain it. Could Ben Johnson do it again? And here's why. Every summer, we do an exercise over on the PHLY Eagles show where we draft over-under team win totals. And I was really torn on Chicago. The Bears sat at 9.5 coming into the year, and my brain said the under, and my heart and my eyes said the over. And I was extremely torn. Ben Johnson calls on the number one regression candidate coming into the year. They win 11 games last year.

1:13:51They're number one in turnover differential. There was a stat that Bill Barnwell had shared when he wrote a piece this offseason where before the Bears did it, there were 21 teams that posted a turnover margin of 20 plus since 1990. And those teams averaged between 12 and 13 wins that season. The following year, the turnover margin dropped to plus three and 20 of those 21 teams won fewer games the next year. So I'm like, yeah, I got that. Makes sense. You talk about like regression. That's that's what happens. The team also lost a couple of their big turnover makers from the year before. You lose Kevin Byron.

1:14:24You lose Nashawn Wright. It's like, all right, these were guys that found the ball. You had all the crazy endings to games. And I don't need to go through everything, but you had last-second field goals and Hail Marys and onside kicks and muff punts. So you had the whole deal. And it was a lot of different things that led to them having that win total. They caught people by surprise. There's also, this was an interesting stat too, kind of going through these exercises every year. There's a direct correlation between the amount of primetime games that teams have and the adjusted games lost due to injury.

1:14:52It's not automatic, but there is a correlation there. So you come into the year and you have the Kyler Gordon situation. You had the Kobe Bryant injury already encamped. Ozzy Trapillo coming off the knee. You had Roman Dunze's offseason comments about his durability. You should have warned me before you started doing this. Yeah, well, I'm trying to help your blood pressure here at this point. But to me, I'm like, I don't know. There was a team that was healthy last year. We had outrageous turnover luck. Would you be able to do it again? But then there's like the football side of my brain. And I've said this on my show.

1:15:22I just love Ben Johnson. Like, I just like, how can you not love Ben Johnson? Explosives, explosive, explosives. The scheme is like the perfect blend of finesse and physicality, where it's like everyone in the football watching community, you can be like the oldest of old heads and like, just like, you know, get off my lawn style. And, or you're going to say like, you're, you are the most analytically forward thinker when it comes to it. you're going to love what Ben Johnson does. It's just like everything that they represent, it's just very, very easy to love. And honestly, yeah, he did it again.

1:15:53They're well on their way to passing that over-under win total. Two years in a row, he's completely passed the Eagles defense, which was, you know, he's constantly a step ahead of Vic Fangio. I don't think we could say that about any other offensive coach in today's game. You know, coming into this game, they were the only team in the NFL to have a pair of 300-yard rushers with Swift and Mononga. But then you also look at what they do in the passing game. You get Caleb Williams missing half the year so far, having to play both backups and do it with a rotation at left tackle. And when you look at it, I was looking through some things, like in-structure throws.

1:16:30So you go to next gen, you filter out by in-structure. They're top five in success rate, still extremely efficient, but it's like, oh, yeah, they're also top five in average yards of separation at the catch point too. So it's like they just found such they find such a good way to create separation. Allow your quarterbacks to trust it. They're foreign to their second place in a loaded division. They're on their way to hitting you over. So, yeah, Ben Johnson is going to do it again. It's fun to watch.

1:16:53Robert Mays: It's funny because I watching the games back so far, it's obviously been such a strange season because the backup quarterbacks have played so much. One of the full games that Caleb played was in a rainstorm against Brian Flores. And I still don't think they've figured it out on offense. Like, I still think they're kind of searching for exactly what they want it to be. And they've already been their 14th in offensive DVOA, despite the backup quarterback starting three or two games, three games. And so when I say that, like their run game, they've obviously had gaudy numbers in some of these games.

1:17:21Robert Mays: They've rushed for 200 yards multiple times. They're like below average in rushing success rate right now. And I think part of that is because they're trying to do so much that it's not all hitting right now. like some it's little things here and there it's like darnell wright falling off a block he wouldn't like some guy going to the wrong guy like there's so many moving parts in the run game because it's so complex that it's not necessarily surprising to see them try to figure it out in the early part of the season it's the exact same thing that happened last year like over the first month last year the run game was not good and then it was the best run game in the league in the back half of the year and so i wouldn't be surprised if even if they're sitting at 38 right now we get to a point in the back half of the season where it's clicking up closer to 15 where they're one of the best run games in the league.

1:18:06Robert Mays: They still haven't found their footing all the way on the ground and they're doing what they're doing right now. And even in the passing game, like, the amount of screens that they've been throwing almost as, like, an extension of the running game. And I know there's been a hilarious amount of, like, Caleb Williams' ADOT discourse over the course of this week, which is, like, whatever. Yeah, because that was always a fear with Caleb Williams. It's always the concern. But you watch the way that game was going, and Atlanta was getting so much depth in some of these zone coverages, and they threw a shitload of screens, and then it was a lot of, like, crossers with yak opportunities with them.

1:18:40Robert Mays: And so that was, like, the entire way the passing game was constructed in that game. And, like, that isn't what they looked like last year really at any single point. And so I think that the willingness and the almost, like, really strong desire to try new ideas and to keep evolving this thing moving forward, they're still figuring out exactly what the best version of it is supposed to look like. And I'm excited for what that might be because they're already pretty damn good. And I truly still don't think they've hit their stride of what this offense is exactly supposed to look like when it's at its best, in part because the quarterback has really played like two games.

1:19:18Yeah. Yeah. Look, I would expect, you know, we talked at the very top of this about the young quarterbacks with the continuity with the coaching staff and what that can look like. And obviously we've only gotten that two-game sample so far with Williams healthy. I would imagine that he's going to be making a little bit of a jump here. I'm excited to say, what will that look like? That'll be one of the things to watch in the second half of the year.

1:19:42Robert Mays: Really curious to see what it looks like. We're recording this on Wednesday, the show will run Thursday. I'm going to the game tonight. the Patriots are playing a really specific brand of defense that they did not really see other than the Flores game. And again, that's just the weirdness of the conditions in that game. Atlanta did not bring a lot of pressure, and I thought that they might, and the Patriots will. And so, again, this is just another kind of like, what is the Bears offense question against a defense that's trying to invite this volatility in normal conditions. What do you look like?

1:20:13Robert Mays: Are you an offense that responds well to that volatility? Are you an offense that really does want to live the way that you were against the Falcons? Like, I still have a lot of questions about this team, but they're more questions of curiosity than they are questions of quality. Like, I obviously have so much inherent faith in what they've built and what they continue to build. To me, the question just becomes, as you answer some of these more granular questions about the offense, how good can you be over the rest of the year? And I am hopeful that the answer to that is an exciting one. Yeah.

1:20:42Yeah, I to me like the from like a structural standpoint and like the purposefulness with, you know, does that work? Yeah, like I just like to me, it always feels like a reasoning behind everything they're doing. I've got a lot of faith that that will continue. It's about the execution on the field.

1:20:57Robert Mays: One of the other things that they've been doing more of and we can. It's the last thing I'll say, but it just came. It jumped out to me when I was rewatching the game this week. some of the route concepts that they're doing in some of their drop back game like they'll have the way that they're creating some of the timing on backside throws where they'll have khalif raymond like hit like run to the flat and then bend back as the backside option like into a void in the zone and like they did a lot of that stuff last year where they'll have rome run what is essentially like a corner dig or a dig corner to like play with some of the landmarks and how defenses are reading these things and like some of these match coverages like they do so much weird shit like they just do so much weird shit if you watch them consistently and I think that it doesn't always hit all the time but as you tinker over the course of a season I do think that they are the type of staff and they are the type of team similar to last year where I'm not surprised or won't be surprised if they're playing their best football in December compared to what they look like at the beginning of the year.

1:22:02There was a there was a play and I can't remember it off the top of my head. It was early on this season. It kind of speak where you saw the defender playing in the middle of the field, like playing as like a middle hook. And he was like, oh, yeah, this is the route that's coming. I'm going to drop it. And the receiver was not there. Like, yep, that's exactly what I was speaking to your point.

1:22:19Robert Mays: Yeah, it's I still think that there's so much ideation and tinkering that there's going to be a little bit of unevenness that comes with that. But it's in service of what do we look like in the most important games of the year and so i can't say enough about the job that those guys are doing fran duffy sincerely appreciate the time sir please tell people where they can check out the work that you guys are doing yeah so i can check out my eagles coverage over with the phly eagle show myself bo wolf and ej smith but uh also if you're into the nfl draft uh i've got a draft guide that's out now you can become a diehard and get access to the draft guide i've written up full scouting reports on about 100 guys and it's like bios on hundreds of players at this point.

1:22:58So yeah, it's a nice like second screen experience for as you're watching college football on Saturdays.

1:23:02Robert Mays: Yeah, please go check out all the great work that Fran is doing. Obviously, we have our own draft guru over here that does a great job. But there's a reason that Fran and Dana are admirers of each other's work. All right, that is all we've got today. We will be back tomorrow with the week seven preview. For now, that's all we got. Appreciate you guys listening. 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. We'll see you next time.

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