Tristan Wirfs's Injury, Ruiz Vs. Diante’s Top-10 QB List, and More

22:10For being the people who are throwing cold water on this team as they were winning week over week. But God, that was such a chore. And like you said, you look at this depth chart now. I mean, if Kingsley Suamataia doesn't look as strong as he did in flashes towards the back end of last year, you could be looking at a rookie left tackle, a left guard that has already had problems over the first couple of years of his career. And now Trey Smith, who we're still not sure is going to be able to reclaim what he was in 2022. and a Juwan Taylor that you already don't trust. So you're talking about a quarterback and a center are the only two guys inside the box that you trust on a snap-by-snap basis.

22:44It's like a six-yard circle that you trust when he's on your center. 1 ,000%. It can very easily become non-viable even with all the optimism that I know I have and I'm sure that you share about what this offense can be. So definitely going to have my eyes squarely on what this offensive line looks like going into 2025.

23:04Steven Ruiz:Yeah, because we definitely didn't see the best of Patrick Mahomes. And I don't think it was his fault last year. I just think the situation he was in, he was just playing on hard mode. He was playing on all Madden all season long. And I don't think we saw the best of him. And I think like, there was discussions about him. Like, is he still the best quarterback in the NFL by the end of last year? I ended up putting Lamar at number one in my rankings just because I think he was playing out of his mind. He was the best football player in my mind. I still, like if I, I don't want to like, you know, spoilers, but I'm assuming that I'm going to put Patrick Mahomes as the number one quarterback going into the next season.

23:35Steven Ruiz:I'm very interested to see what your top three looks like after last year, after the just remarkable performances by Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, and then the down year for Patrick Mahomes. I really want to see how you order those guys. We'll do that after this break. We'll get Deontay's top 10 and I'll try to rip it to shreds. This episode is brought to you by Ethos. Buying a house is one of those moments where you realize, oh yeah, I have responsibilities now. And if you have a family, you want to know they could stay in that house if something happened to you. Ethos makes life insurance painless.

24:08Steven Ruiz:Get a quote in seconds, apply in minutes all online with no medical exam. Take 10 minutes to get covered today with life insurance through Ethos. Get your free quote at ethos.com slash ringer NFL. That is ethos.com slash ringer NFL. Application times may vary, rates may vary. All right, we are back. it is quarterback ranking graphic season on social media. You just throw the top 10 out there, no context whatsoever, and you feed whoever made the top 10 list to the commenters who are going to rip it apart. I'm going to play the part of the comment section in this section. I want to put your top 10 out on a graphic.

24:53Steven Ruiz:I want you to deal with what I deal with on a weekly basis during the season. I've got a couple that I'm sure are going to get me lit up. I'm positive of it. Honestly, do you know what would be a good bit? Is if we just made a top 10 for Shield? We just made up the most... Oh, man. That would actually be great. The most polarizing top 10 list and then he comes back from vacation. Yeah, so we got to put that on right before he comes back from vacation. Because I would believe anything that you put on a quote card, a graphic. That's probably why people get ball sack sports. Because you see, it looks official.

25:24Steven Ruiz:There's a picture of the guy. There's a quote. Of course he said that. So yeah, I would believe anything. Yahoo is so good at that, right? where they've got the great graphic design and you've got the big bold letters on the bottom, you can tell me anything about a player. You can tell me a player died with that graphic and I might believe it. Yeah, maybe that should be the punishment for losing our picks contest if we do it next season. The other two get to make a fake top 10 quarterback list with your name on it. You have to tweet it out. Yes, and defend it. You can't give up the bid and you have to respond to at least five comments.

25:58Steven Ruiz:I don't hate that. I don't hate that. That should be our fan duel punishment. We'll do a test by doing it for S.H.I.E.L. before he gets back. I'm going to make that list. I'm going to put like who's the worst guy we can put in the top five for S.H.I.E.L. that just offends all his sensibilities. But it's realistic. That's a good one. I would put like Baker Mayfield ahead of Joe Burrow. I was thinking Baker. I was thinking maybe Tua. Yeah. Trevor Lawrence in the top ten gets me a lot. Oh, Brock Purdy. Purdy will be a good one. That would get me wrong. I would know the bit. I'd be in on the bit and I'd still respond to him angrily.

26:35Steven Ruiz:But anyway, enough of that. Enough of Shield's imaginary top 10. Let's get to Deontay's actual top 10. And I didn't know whether to start with 10 and go to one or go to one and go to 10. But I feel like because the bottom five of a top 10 is more controversial, I feel like, than the top five. Let's start with one. Let's build up suspense to who you have in your top 10. Starting with the number one spot. I'm assuming I know who it is, but I'm really interested to hear who you have. I mean, we've talked enough about quarterbacks that I'm certain you can guess who was number one for me, right? Like, not a lot.

27:07And honestly, not a lot of suspense early in this if we're comparing it to yours. I've got Lamar Jackson at one for me.

27:15Steven Ruiz:I really wanted to get into a debate over Lamar versus Patrick Mahomes. But now I'm going to have to change my mindset because I wanted to argue for Lamar expecting you to do Mahomes. But now I can argue for Mahomes. So for me, right, like, and I tried to look at the last two seasons, right? I tried to create like a rolling average because, you know, sometimes guys get really hot in certain ways. We just talked about Patrick Mahomes' surrounding cast and how that influenced the way he played last year, right? So I kind of wanted to open up the sample to be a little bit more forgiving to guys who maybe dealt with a particular thing in one year that they didn't have to deal with in the year before.

27:50And like for Lamar, when you do that, it only helps this case, right? Like you think about how efficient he was last season within the pocket. And I think that when you're talking about him, when you're talking about Josh Allen, when you're talking about Patrick Mahomes, and those are three guys that I think exist in their own tier. And on any given, any one of those guys you can just throw out and say is number one. and even if fans of the other two don't like it, you all kind of have to nod in agreement. I just look at the way that he was operating from the pocket. I compared him to Matt Stafford working in structure, right?

28:18Like he's gotten to that point now where he knows how to get to the end of the progression and be just as aggressive at the end of his progression as he is at the beginning, right? And that's an evolution in his game. He's always been accurate. He's always known how to place the ball. I thought that he was really good vertically early in his career. I think the intermediate accuracy now has only grown year over year. And last year, I think, was the best manifestation of that. That's a big reason why Rashad Bateman had one of his most effective seasons since he's been a pro. It's a big reason why Isaiah Likely has now broken out as a tight end.

28:49It's because of what Lamar Jackson can do to manipulate guys in the middle of the field and get the ball to players as they're coming right out of their break. And then we get to the thing that actually makes him more unique than any other player we've ever seen at this position. It's what he can do outside of structure, right? After the first two and a half seconds, he's first in throwing EPA, third in success rate, first in the NFL in passer rating over the last two seasons. And even though his sack rate is low, I would say, well, here's how I'll appraise it. He loses a lot of EPA on sacks sometimes because he'll get into try to save the play, try to save the play mode.

29:24And we know that he has some fumble problems at times, but it's so hard to actually get your hands on the guy to get him down. so right so they're like there's a big delta between how much EPA he loses right it's a net positive because those disaster plays don't happen often enough for you to actually have to be concerned about them right whereas maybe it was like a Joe Burrell who we'll get to later get sacked a lot more often right he just has less disaster ones because he just gives his body up sometimes if the play's not there but those plays don't take away from what he does in terms of punishing defenses and the way that defenses warp their attention to him the second that plays extend past the first couple seconds once he gets outside of the tackle box that's why he can be so aggressive and push the ball downfield I don't think you can be wrong with anybody in the top three at number one but for me I look at how he's played over the last two seasons man it's hard to find a better guy on a down-to-down basis than Lamar was and like the thing about

30:17Steven Ruiz:Lamar that why I think he's the best player in the NFL right now is he gets the same looks and the same benefits as like the system quarterbacks like the guys we talk about like like to Brock they got these guys scheme these coaches scheming up looks for them and like it's easy because they're facing certain types of defense like you can make that argument just look at the stats you can make that argument for Lamar like he benefits from the scheme if you didn't watch any of the games you just look at the stats you would think that but he creates that environment himself. And we've seen that with two different coordinators now.

30:52Steven Ruiz:We've seen it with Todd Munkin, and he's taken it to another level with Todd Munkin. But we even saw it with Greg Roman, who, for my money, is one of the worst offensive play callers in the NFL today. And I don't know of another quarterback that does that because we talked about Patrick Mahomes' lack of supporting cast just now. But when you compare these two supporting cast next to each other, the Ravens and the Chiefs, I don't think there's much of a difference. There's really none. The best receiver is a tight end. The top target is a tight end. The receiving core, there's some talent there, definitely some athleticism and agility, but they aren't number one receivers who dominate and dictate looks on the defense.

31:38Steven Ruiz:Zay Flowers is like, I don't even know what to compare him to. It's like the wide receiver that Andy Reid is trying to draft every season, basically. He's an undersized speedster. Rashad Bateman has been up and down, in and out of the lineup. I mean, they've thrown like Walsh, Dez Bryant in there. DeAndre Hopkins is in there. Odell Beckham. And no matter what, it's explosive. No matter what. And it's not like that with Patrick Mahomes. I would still pick Patrick Mahomes if I had to win a game tomorrow. I had to pick a quarterback. I would pick Patrick Mahomes. but this is a different conversation.

32:15Steven Ruiz:This is like a full season. Who would I rather have and be guaranteed that I'm going to have a top five offense? It's Lamar Jackson. And whenever he's been healthy, the Ravens have had an elite offense without an elite supporting cast until really last year. So I just think he's a starter kit for a top five offense. And I think you could say it about Josh Allen because what he produces in the run game. I don't know if you could say that about Patrick Mahomes, but I think what you get with Patrick Mahomes is an elite offense in terms of winning, like contributing to a win. And I think that's what we saw out of Mahomes, which is why I still think that Lamar had a better season than him last year.

32:52Steven Ruiz:But in the long run, I still think Patrick Mahomes, I think I would take him to win a game tomorrow. It depends on what your standard is. So I don't know. How do you differentiate that? Would you agree that you would pick Mahomes to win a game tomorrow? I think so, right? If you use the Bill Simmons alien invasion, you've got to set up your roster for one game. It would be hard to leave Patrick Mahomes on the bench if he's available. I'm taking Mahomes. If it's up against the best defense that you could possibly design up against one quarterback, it's Patrick Mahomes. If we're doing a fantasy draft, not fantasy school, but just a fantasy draft like you're in Madden or you're just talking with your buddies, who do you want to start your roster with?

33:34It's Samar Jackson because I'm thinking over the course of a season, the problems that he solves is going to put defenses in such a bind just to prepare for that guy you there's nothing you can do really especially when he's passing at the level he's been passing at the last couple of seasons you're getting a run system unto himself right it's not just one game he solves his play actions yes scrambling all these things you know so like he's he is in a system unto himself right like it's derogatory now to make this analogy because of just what his career has turned out to. But I think of like peak James Harden, like early James Harden in Houston, when it's like him and Dwight Howard.

34:14And it's like, oh, wait, like not only is this guy a superstar unto himself, as long as he has a pick and roll threat, we have an offensive system that's going to be top five in points per possession, right? Like Lamar Jackson is very reminiscent of that in that regard. And unfortunately, because of the lack of playoff success, maybe the Harden thing is apt right now until he finally gets over that hump. but just in terms of like play-by-play season to season man it's hard to find a guy that's going to be more productive um regularly than he is and that's without having an elite supporting cast

34:45Steven Ruiz:and by and by the way the playoff loss he averaged over 0.2 epa per play and like right now you really can't compare him i know he had the two in that respect yeah but the guy was like amazing in that game outside of those two bumbles all right so i i guess this is we know who your number two is there's no way you're dropping mahomes three right well oh my god let's have that talk let's have that talk because for me i thought the way that i approached this or what i ultimately left with with the top 10 is like if josh allen and lamar jackson could share the one spot for me they would and the past one homes would be my two but if i'm taking what i've seen over the last two seasons to try to project out what i'll see over the next two seasons josh allen is number two for me right like it's the effectiveness as a passer again we're talking about guys that have limited supporting cast the most impressive thing to me about josh allen's evolution as a passer is that it happened as Stefan Diggs was losing some of his value as an outside receiver.

35:40And after he left the roster, it's happened with them playing more heavy personnel, having less guys that can beat man coverage on the outside. This is about him getting the ball out faster than defenses can react to him. This is about him being an unsackable force, like I said that week over week, when it became clear that he was a legitimate MVP candidate it down the second half of the season. I think about that Lions game is one of the best examples, right? And the Rams game as well. But like when he gets in that mode of we're getting this first down, nobody is bringing me down. We are moving the chains.

36:12There's nothing that anybody on defense can do, right? Like it's Cam Newton-esque in that respect. It's Dante Culpepper-esque in that respect where guys can just be hanging off his arms, hanging off his shoulders, got his legs tied up and he's still going to get the ball off or he's going to escape altogether. other. And I think that if there's one knock, right, it's just that we haven't seen the explosive passing game that we know that Josh Allen is capable of. And you look at some of the contextual stats in that regard, right? When outside of structure, when he's pressured, when they see more man coverage, all the things that rely more on wide receiver talent than the quarterback's ability.

36:46He doesn't perform as strongly in those stats, but I think it's very clear when you turn on the tape, it's because he does not yet have an outside receiver that can go win and allow them to be aggressive and vertical, but everything in just terms of what he's doing in the pocket, getting the ball out of his hands, navigating pressure, identifying what's happening before the snap and punishing defenses for it. Only Lamar Jackson to me has been better at that on a down by down basis than Josh Allen. So for me, he's number two, but I think that this cluster of top three guys are all really, really close.

37:17Steven Ruiz:Yeah. Let me preface what I'm about to say with this is relative to the other elite guys, not relative to the league standard, what I'm about I think Josh Allen is amazing and his progress, especially over the last couple of years, his game is really mature. But I do think he's kind of what Lamar Jackson skeptics think Lamar is. He is. That's fair. A little too reliant on chaos and the decision making can go out the window when he goes into chaos mode. Whereas Lamar, he's such a consistent problem solver. and the one thing about Lamar is like he is very good at throwing a check down and like creating a situation where the check down is like a potentially an explosive play and he knows when to throw him like situationally I just think he's a better decision maker than Josh Allen and I would put Patrick Mullins way ahead of both of those guys in terms of situational decision making which is why even though I think you can make the same argument I made for Lamar Jackson for being like the best football player you can make that argument for Josh Allen because he does so much for the offense but I do think there's a lack of consistency when he goes into playmaking mode and I think he can like it was way better last year I have to say the year before that there were decision-making problems at times and he lost them a game or two last the year before last year last year I think he really you know tightened the purse strings there and he wasn't like just giving up the ball to the defense but I still think he has some room to grow before he catches a Lamar Jackson and a lot of room to grow before he catches a Patrick Mahomes in that regard so I'm guessing Patrick Mahomes is three because if you drop him lower than three I'm going to fight you.

38:48Steven Ruiz:He literally can't be lower than three. He literally cannot be lower than three. Okay. Thank you. There's no way. He should be lower than two if I'm being honest. I was going to say honestly if people want to yell at me for having him lower than two then I'm okay with that. Especially because I think a lot of the reasons why I don't think of him as highly as Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson are really like conditions that are out of his control. Exactly. And we talked about that with Juwan Taylor not being the pass protector they thought they were paying for when they brought him in. It's the issues they've had at left tackle since Orlando Brown Jr.

39:20left, right? Like, it's the fact that they don't have a Tyree kill. It's the fact that Rasheed Rice was not available to them last season after tearing up his knee. It's the play calling, which can be an issue for as much as I love Andy Reid. I think that this marriage of their offense to the RPO game has actually caused them a lot of problems. I think sitting in the Super Bowl with you and Sheel, it was really instructive kind of watching them on first and second down playing up against the defense. That's just not going to give that stuff up. I think about that playoff game against Houston, right?

39:50Like another team that really kind of put the screws to them on early downs and didn't allow the cheap stuff with the RPO game on early downs. There's not very many answers. He does not get any relief really within this scheme to be the Patrick Mahomes that we saw from 2029 to 2022. Um, but the superpower is still there, right? That situational decision-making you're talking about is still there. The fact that he gets pressured as often as he does without being sacked is maybe like, it's one of the most confounding things in the league, right? Like if you were hitting the pause button based on when disaster strikes in this offense and putting and dropping any other quarterback into that situation that's not named, Josh Allen or Lamar Jackson, the offense immediately probably becomes one of the five worst in the league, right?

40:34Like because of the amount of pressure that he's having to work through with wide receivers that don't beat man coverage very well, with the tight end that's aging, right? There are a lot of things that are working against him. The fact that he's still third because of his, the way he performs on a down-to-down basis with all those things in mind, I can't say enough good about him, right? And I'm probably, I've probably been as critical of him as a quarterback of anybody in national media and of this offense period of anybody in national media. But you go back and you watch, man, and you watch with the eye of, here are all the things that were wrong before the play even started.

41:07Here's all the things that went wrong once the play started and there's Patrick Mahomes still getting this offense out of trouble, you can't have him any lower than third. And he is still very much the same superhero that we've been watching since he took over the job in Kansas City.

41:20Steven Ruiz:Yeah, I think our buddy Seth Kalina works for PFF who used to podcast with Too High Podcast RIP. I think he put it the best. He said when it's second and six, if it's second and six, Mahomes gets you seven. If it's third and seven, he gets you eight. Like that's what he does. And that's why I think like the stats don't really tell the story of how many problems he solved. I don't think it was his best showing, but I think he was playing the quarterback position at a very, very high level. I don't even know if any quarterback was really asked to do what he did last year in carrying that offense.

41:51Steven Ruiz:It kind of reminds me of, obviously, different playing style, but it kind of reminds me of post that first MVP Lamar when it was like Greg Roman was struggling to figure things out. The offensive line progressed and they didn't really have weapons. They were still like a fringe top 10 offense still like the Chiefs were last year and like in big games when they needed it they could score points but there was something rotten at the core of the offense and I think like we're seeing that right now but the quarterback is so good that it covers it up so yeah I mean for you is this is is this a 1a 1b thing with Lamar and Josh Allen then it is it is right now is it a 1abc thing or are you separating those two it should probably be one ABC thing.

42:32I think that the athletic potential, the aggression as a passer for Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson right now, I think that I just lean a little bit further in that direction. That comes back to like stylistically for me. I think that the way the way that Patrick Mahomes has been forced to play has a big influence on this, but it's just hard to watch the, it's hard to watch a passing game basically take on the identity of five yards in a cloud of dust as often as Kansas City's does and it not have at least a little bit of a negative effect on how you look at them on a down-to-down basis but that doesn't necessarily speak poorly of Mahomes I just got to take what I've been watching right like yeah I can't I can't fill the gap for him so to speak yeah right like we we can acknowledge all the things that create the gap that has nothing to do with Mahomes but I can only fill that gap but so much.

43:21I would say for me, like the way that I think about him right now is exactly how I thought about Tom Brady, maybe from like 2016 to 2019. Right. Oh my God. There are a lot of times where it's like the only guy he has outside of Rob Gronkowski is white, white, like, and they're still somehow putting up 24, 28 points on a week by week basis. And it's only because of the excellence of the quarterback. They're very much in that phase right now, offensively in Kansas City. So again, can't be worse than third based on how he's performing in the circumstances. But I just look at how unstoppable of forces that Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson have been.

43:56And it's hard to say that they haven't been better on a week by week basis. I'm just still not picking them if they've got to face off against 15 in a playoff game.

44:05Steven Ruiz:Yeah, I didn't expect any controversy with these top three, but like we, I think there was a little controversy there. I was really shocked that Mahomes was three, but I understand the reason. I kind of agree with it. I definitely had Mahomes third at the end of last year. But yeah, so I'm really looking forward to who you have from four to 10, because I think that's where most of the controversy lies when you put these out. And we're going to do that after the break. This episode is brought to you by ADT. One second, you're enjoying your day off. The next, your phone buzzes. A window's been broken at home.

44:36Steven Ruiz:You're miles away. In one second, everything can change. That's why ADT security systems can monitor your home 24-7. They're backed by the most company-operated monitoring centers in the industry, so you're always supported during an emergency. When every second counts, count on ADT. Visit ADT.com to learn more. This episode is brought to you by NOS Energy. Every ounce of dirt, sweat, and gears, every checkered flag and trophy raised, every lap, every race, every hard-fought place. They're all jammed inside every can of NOS Energy. High-performance energy for burning the midnight oil in the garage and pedal to the metal human horsepower for the streets.

45:17Go ahead, crack open a can of NOS Energy and get after it.

45:20Steven Ruiz:All right, we are back. We have gone through one through three, the usual suspects, Mahomes, Lamar, Josh Allen, although you put it in a different order. You have Lamar first, Josh Allen second, and Patrick Mahomes third. Who do you have fourth? I think this is where we're going to start disagreeing a lot more in fighting. I think that here's where the fights come, and this is the first time I've done this maybe since 2021. in the conversation with these quarterbacks. Number four for me is Joe Burrow. All right. I think this is the first time I've had him ahead of Justin Herbert in a long time for me.

45:53Let me say, this is the first time

45:55Steven Ruiz:that I don't hate that pick. I think before last year, I think you were objectively wrong if you had Joe Burrow ahead of Justin Herbert. I felt the exact same way. But Joe Burrow, he became how everyone talked about him last year. He became that brain He wasn't taking the bad sacks He was solving problems in protection Which I think he didn't get enough Not criticism, because he was a young quarterback Handling protections, I think any young quarterback Is going to have some Troubles with that, but there were times The Tennessee playoff game is one that gets brought up a lot He got sacked eight times, I think Go back and watch those sacks, those were protection issues Which can be solved before, they weren't blocking issues I mean, there were some blocking issues Because the Bengals offensive line wasn't good But they could have been solved by a better protection call is all I'm going to say.

46:40Steven Ruiz:Maybe that's a Zach Taylor thing, but I will let you continue. Yeah, no, I mean, this is the first year for me where I was like, like you said, Joe Burrow looks like the quarterback that everybody who is a Burrow fan is telling me that he is when we're having these conversations of where he lands compared to a Josh Allen, compared to a Justin Herbert, compared to the other guys that are in the MVP conversation on a year-by-year basis. And a lot of this was not just what you were saying in terms of solving problems pre-snap. I think he was always proficient to good at it. Last year in a lot of those games, because you know you're not getting help in the run game, that was the first time it looked like, oh, great to elite at times, right?

47:18He really checked that box of being a guy who can find you success before the balls even snap because he knows what defenses are trying to do to him and his receivers. And then to me, and maybe the biggest layer of evolution for me is the fact that things did not break down outside of structure. These did not break down as often when he was pressured. Things did not break down outside of those first two and a half seconds where he's just chucking and ducking to a T Higgins or Jamar Chase out on the perimeter. Seventh and passing EPA after those first two and a half seconds, six and success rate.

47:49His passer rating was one on 9.4. That's an elite number in the film. Back that up. I think that and for me, I think that this was probably the first year where even though I did not necessarily look at them as a playoff team when I would watch them in these tight games it was very clear that this wasn't just the Jamar Chase go turn a curl into an 80 yard game to keep us in the game. Although there was a little bit of that. There was a little bit of that still. I mean the Ravens probably caught it the worst right in those front-time games with it with that being the case. To me this was a lot of Joe Burrow you've got to chain together these 8, 10, 11 play sequences now where you're being right, right?

48:27First down is only going to get you two yards on the ground. And now you've got to go do the rest for us. You know, you can't take a sack on first down if we go with the early down pass. And I think that he was able to meet and exceed that moment more often than at any other point in his career. I think that because that's happening, the evolution of the offense is taking on naturally is even more effective now because Joe Burrow's doing better from the pocket, doing better when he's pressured, doing better when things break down and avoiding those situations more often. And as these things continue to grow, man, I would not be surprised at all if he ends up leading the league in most passing efficiency metrics next season, because if they're able to keep him upright, if what we saw in 2024 is an indication of what we're going to get over the next couple of seasons, he's going to look like the best guy that's not in that top three conversation for me.

49:13Steven Ruiz:Yeah, I think it, I think it became hard to fool him. I remember there was, you know, Mike Sando does his quarterback tears. I think it was the Mike Sando edition. It might have been the ESPN version that I think Jeremy Fowler does. Sorry if I'm getting the people wrong there. There was a defensive coordinator, obviously anonymous, because none of these guys put their names to any of this, that was saying you could show Burrow one look and then change the look after the snap and you could fool him. This was like two years ago, coming off the Super Bowl, which I think that was true then. I think it was true even the year before last year.

49:41Steven Ruiz:But this year, I think as a post-snap processor, he's gotten even better than he was before. And he doesn't get fooled. and I think he's less inclined to kind of go one and done. Sometimes he was guilty of like his first read wasn't open and then he went into scramble mode a little too quick, dropped his eyes and took some sacks. But no, I think you're starting to see that part of his game just get chipped away. He took a chunk out of it last year and really evolved. I still have Herbert ahead of him and I have Herbert ahead of him just because anything you can argue about Joe Burrow, like in terms of his skill set, I think Justin Herbert has a superior version.

50:17Steven Ruiz:He's the accuracy thing I think has been Joe Burrow's thing forever. I think Justin Herbert is just as accurate as him. I've never seen him struggle with accuracy at all. He puts the ball where he wants, no matter where the throw is. I think Joe Burrow still has some, if you look at the numbers, he still has accuracy issues when throwing those deep outbreaking routes. I'm not bringing up, I'm not using the baby arm Burrow nickname I used to throw around because I think his arm has gotten stronger, but you can still see it there, whereas Justin Herbert can throw anywhere on the field and doesn't lose any accuracy whatsoever.

50:45Steven Ruiz:That's what arm talent is to me. And I think that the office, I think that the office's evolution is also a recognition of that, right? Of like not trying to put him in situations where he's doing that so often. I think that's a lot of why Jamar Chase is being moved around more often. But the only reason why that works is if Joe Burrow is willing to work the middle of the field, if he's willing to throw in the tight windows, if he's willing to attack in the seams more often, and he's been doing more of that. right and again all of this is in an ecosystem where he does not have another option now what he's throwing to is as good as you can ever ask for in the league right this might but it's all said and done this might be the best number one and number two duo especially for his style like a pre-snap processor who where you have like these two point of reference wide receivers that dictate what the defense can do can be guarded one-on-one you're giving him the answers before the test.

51:38Steven Ruiz:It's almost a cheat code for him. And he's like the perfect quarterback to take advantage of that cheat code. And I think that last year was a great example of what it looks like when Joe Burrow is meeting those guys at their level. And it's not just T. Higgins and Jamar Chase making the best out of tricky situations from the offense. Not saying that Joe Burrow is causing the wide receiver problems, but just when the offense will break down, I think it will be more upon those receivers to go beat one-on-one coverage when they had it and just Joe Burrow to go recognize it when it was there. Last season felt a little bit different to me in terms of down-to-down quarterback play, where, like you said, he's not being fooled by changing pictures.

52:13He's not being taken advantage of by the blitz nearly as often. And I think that outside of structure, he's much more comfortable now because he knows himself as a quarterback better and knows that if he can just get the ball out to one of those guys, something special is probably going to happen.

52:27Steven Ruiz:Yeah, so I would say that, in my opinion, Justin Herbert's a better thrower in the football. Like, if you're combining accuracy and arm talent, I think he's a better thrower than football. And then we talked about Joe Burrow's processing and the leap he took last year. He was already good at it. He made it like an elite strength. Justin Herbert has never had a problem processing on time. That's why he doesn't take a lot of sacks. That's why he's able to solve problems as well as any, like Lamar Jackson solves like pressure problems, like a deteriorating pocket, as well as anyone has ever seen.

52:55Steven Ruiz:Justin Herbert might be second on that list. It's a totally different style because Lamar could just stop time and space and becomes, he's Nightcrawler from X-Men 2, that first scene in X-Men 2. Whereas Johnson Herbert's a robot. Like he takes a subtle step to the right and then gets a throw off. He had that one throw against, I think it was the Broncos. It was like an outbreaking route on third down. And there's like a guy in his face and it's like a crazy throw. I think Jim Harbaugh was like, he just like ranting over it in a press conference recently. But yeah, I think he solves, he has better processing time.

53:28Steven Ruiz:I think the one thing you could argue is Joe Burrow's a little more ambitious. He's not going to give up on a play. But that's why he takes so many sacks. There's a balance there. And I think what Justin Herbert has done over the last two years is struck a better balance. I still think he can take the restrictor plate off more so than he has. But I think the old criticism of him, which was very, it wasn't off base at all. I think it was very, you know, I agreed with it, was that he didn't scramble enough. He didn't try to make enough plays. I thought you saw him scrambling more often last year.

53:59Steven Ruiz:I think you saw him testing stuff and then throwing into tight windows more often last year, throwing out of structure, not defaulting to the checkdowns because they took away one deeper route. I think you saw that last year. So I would put the processing ahead of Joe Burrow there. The athleticism, obviously he's a better athlete than Joe Burrow. You're not running zone read and stuff like that. The Chargers don't really do that with Herbert, but they can. They have done it. I mean, and we definitely saw more design runs last year with Harbaugh at the helm once Herbert was healthy. using him as a runner.

54:29Steven Ruiz:The only thing I can really think of is the aura thing. Like, oh, he just shows up and wins a big game. The guy has, he's missed the playoffs. And I'm not putting that on him because it's a team sport. I wouldn't put it on Herbert for missing the playoffs or any quarterback for missing the playoffs. The team stinks. But those arguments tend to fall apart. I remember when Russell Wilson was the guy that never lost and was clutch and led the game-winning drives. And then five years into his career, he led the NFL in game-losing interceptions. It's a small sample size because none of this stuff is actually a thing in my mind.

54:58Steven Ruiz:Even though 20 minutes ago, I said I would pick Patrick Holmes to beat the aliens. I mean, and that's just kind of like, that's the tricky nature of this thing, right? Is like, you know which guy you think is better and then you end up trying to wrap the argument around that, right? Like I think that for Herbert, to me, I love Herbert. I mean, obviously you know how strongly I feel about Herbert. I think that for me, the thing that hangs me up with him and I have him fifth, right? Like, so it's not like, I don't think that he's good enough to win a Super Bowl or win playoff games. I think my hangups with him are very similar to what my hangups are with Dak Prescott, right?

55:31And it's like, you get to a certain point where the processing is so elite. And now I'm hyper-focused on each decision you make and why. Now they manifest themselves a little bit differently between Dak and Herbert. I think that Dak can be very machine-like processing in terms of whatever my most aggressive option is, I want to take that. he's on the james winston end of the spectrum and i think that i think that herbert's a little bit more like the matthew stafford end of the spectrum at times right and which is just kind of like interesting because matthew staff is obviously in this top 10 and kind of sandwiched around some of these guys i think that for me with herbert and it's funny because this is the worst thing to happen in the wild card game i wish that he would just cut it loose more often yeah so he can learn exactly what he can get away.

56:19I still feel like almost a half-decade into this guy's career, or a half-decade into this guy's career. I still don't know if Justin Herbert knows what he can get away with in the NFL.

56:28Steven Ruiz:That's the thing. Yeah, he still has to take the restrictor plates off. And I think he'll get there because he's kind of been inching towards it over the last couple years. He needs to bring the shooter's sleep back. I don't know if you remember when they were... I think he wore it when they played the Vikings two years ago, and he just torched Brian Flores, throwing everything at him. He was just handling it all. He needs to bring the shooter's sleeve back. Shooter's sleeve, Justin Herbert, was it was a great time to be alive. Until he got hurt. My favorite throw of his is from a few years ago, right?

56:56It's that deep throw in the middle of the field to Josh Palmer. And it's like you can do that whenever you want. You can climb the pocket and push the ball downfield if you see that whenever you want. I think that that risk aversion does hold him up at times. It's understandable because this offense doesn't offer for a whole lot of aggressive opportunities. I would say even less now with Greg Roman, right? Like you just can't really trust the design of the passing game to give this quarterback as many options as he deserves. And he just has not had that throughout his career because the same thing exists when Brandon Staley was a head coach.

57:33I want to see him just continue to grow in that regard. I want to see him have a year like Joe Burrow did last season. I want to see him have a year like Josh Allen did in 2022, 2023, right? or maybe not 20-20. He's never going to do the Josh Allen turnover because he had a lot of turnovers in 23. But like 2021, 2022, when it was like, oh shit, Josh Allen just figured out that like you can play quarterback this way. And now that he's added his skillset to this, now it looks different. I think that Justin Herbert needs a little bit more of that Josh Allen in him of, hey man, like if you got one-on-one coverage out on the boundary, man, go take it.

58:06If you can pin the ball on a guy's shoulder, which we've seen him do when he's locked in, go do that more often. We just don't get that often enough, but he does so many other things well. Just like a mini lobotomy. 1 ,000%. It's a little. My buddy on Bull Wolf texted me because he's not as big a Justin Herbert guy. And his argument is always like, he's too normal. He's too normal. He's too chill to be the kind of quarterback that he should be, right? Like he's too okay with...

58:35Steven Ruiz:He's too normal. Jalen Hurts is normal too. He's the same thing. I'm with you, which is part of the reason I think that I think and there's obviously a whole other layer to that with you're too close to I think probably a little too close to the elephant to see the whole thing with Philly guys. But I would say like with Herbert, the things he does well is the pocket, the pocket maneuvering. Like you said, it's not like Lamar Jackson in terms of the escapability or the stop on a dime movement. But what he can do at his huge frame to be able to avoid guys and still access passing lanes is one of a kind in the league.

59:09Right. One of the more unique things that we have in the league. and the fact that he is able to get the ball out efficiently and effectively at all three levels basically on command is one of the most impressive things to me as well i think that there's just there is a turn there's a corner that we're still waiting for him to turn based on how talented he is and i think that that will kind of determine whether or not he's matthew stafford where it's like we've got to wait till late in your career for you to land in the right situation or a josh allen where it's like you can put any 10 guys around him and he's probably going to find a way through his aggression, through his ability to avoid sacks and push the ball downfield to have an effective passing game.

59:45So I'm just waiting to see that for Herbert. Yeah. We could just have this go back and forth for like an hour

59:51Steven Ruiz:because I want to respond, but I'm going to move on because I'm going to keep talking about this. Who's your number six? Yeah, six and seven. And then the last eight, nine, and 10, I think we can kind of cluster together. Okay, cool. Six and seven for me are Matthew Stafford and Dak Prescott. And these are two guys, again, that I had a really hard time uncoupling, right? Because you can really make an argument for either in a single season sample being in the sixth spot. For these two guys, at their best, they can probably be as high as four. Can I just say something? Can I just say something?

1:00:22Steven Ruiz:Because I know people hear Dak Prescott at seven and they're like, what the hell are you talking about? Dak Prescott? We're like, what, 14, 15 months removed from him being the MVP favorite? This guy was second team All-Pro. Like 15 months ago. I feel like people have the memory of Goldfish when it comes to Dak Prescott. Yeah, he was banged up last year. The Cowboys were a disaster. But like we are two seasons removed from him having a potential MVP season in the same season that Lamar just went crazy. Like he was challenging Lamar in the favorite before he had that. I think it was the loss to the Bills actually that kind of ruined his tanked his campaign.

1:00:59Steven Ruiz:But the guy was playing brilliant football not too long ago. And I think we're going to see that this year with George Pickens. right and we're also not talking like six seven eight years out from now right like this is single game sample based on what we've seen over the last couple years a great Dak Prescott is still just as good as a great Joe Burrow he can be just as good as a great Justin Herbert right like he might not access it as often and I'm really fascinated to see now what that's going to look like with the George Pickens in the fold with another year with Jake Ferguson with CeeDee Lamb maybe getting to spend a little bit more time doing the things that he does best.

1:01:34I'm really optimistic about what this offense is going to be, but that's a whole conversation for another day. Just looking at Dak Prescott, specifically as a quarterback, you talked about it. It's processing from the pocket, right? I think that his recognition of what defenses are trying to do to him is maybe the most unappreciated trait of any of the quarterbacks that we've talked about in terms of like their best traits. Dak Prescott, because he turns the ball over, doesn't get enough credit for all the things that he does to set up an offense for success on a snap-by-snap basis. He sees things well.

1:02:04He can adjust things from the line well. I think that after recovering from that ankle, that foot injury early in his career, he'll never be as mobile as what he was coming out of Mississippi State, but his functional mobility has been really good, especially like you said, two seasons ago when he was playing at his best, he looked like one of those guys that if you don't get him on the ground within the first two and a half seconds of a play, he's going to tear you up. And I still think that that exists for him and he can still access that on a down by down basis. The arm talent is there. The accuracy can be there.

1:02:38I do think that he can be helped by tamping down on some of the reckless decision-making from time to time. I think that, and that part of that might just be inherent to the way he plays the position. I think that as the years have gone on, I feel like the personality chances. So for the people who have legitimate complaints about those parts of his game, I'm not saying that they don't exist. And I'm not saying that those can't cost you games. We've seen it. We've seen it in the post season. Those turnovers cost his team games. But I also think that you don't get the Dak Prescott that I love without pieces of that.

1:03:14And while I don't necessarily think that he's an elite quarterback anymore, I do think, like you said, he can still access that all pro level play. And to me, like that's, If you're seventh and you can still access that all-pro level play, that says a lot about where the league is at as a quarterback because there will be a lot of years where the best of Dak Prescott looks like one of the best in the league, if not the best in the league.

1:03:36Steven Ruiz:I definitely think Joe Burrow surpassed him this last year as the processor, capital T, capital P. I think before last year, it was Dak Prescott. If you wanted to look at the classic pocket passer, problem solver, the guy that harkened back to the era of Brady and Manning, the sheriff, whatever nickname John Gruden gave. He was that archetype of quarterback, and I still think he has it in him. I'm not going to hold 2024 against him and assume that's what it's going to look like going forward. I'm going to look back at 2023 and 2022 and 2021 and this larger sample size, which is not only productive football, not only good film, but you look at their record.

1:04:18Steven Ruiz:The Cowboys just win games when he's held. They win games and they go to the playoffs when he's healthy. And I don't think that can be discounted either. But yeah, I do think he has something to prove that he still has that in him after what happened last year. Because before the injury, he wasn't playing the best. I know there were issues all over that Cowboys offense, but I do think he has something to prove. Matthew Stafford, I feel like people have reluctantly come around to him being still in this tier. I know when I ranked him, I think it was like eighth a couple years ago, like people lost their shit because he was coming off a year where he didn't play that much.

1:04:47people were assuming he was awful for the whole franchise yeah yeah but his film like a couple

1:04:53Steven Ruiz:of those games he was you could still tell he had like he made a couple of throws where you're just like holy shit how does this guy do and he just continues to do it i i'm in awe of watching him play quarterback i don't think he's the best quarterback in the league but he might be the most fun quarterback in the league beyond like the you know the the circus freaks at the top because they're like josh allen who do these crazy things like i'm gonna throw a football behind my back. He doesn't do that, but he comes close to it. But I do think the difference between him, he has the arm to do all that stuff those guys can do.

1:05:21Steven Ruiz:He can't manipulate time like those guys can. He can kind of do it with the eye manipulation where he can move a guy because he's not going to be a guy that can go outside the pocket and move a guy. He has to do it with his mind or his eyes. But I think that's the difference. Once he faces pressure, it goes all downhill. That's why we've seen the Rams passing game fall apart when the protection isn't there. But when he gets protection, man. He can throw for throw with Josh Allen. We saw it last year. That Rams-Bills game was one of the best quarterback games I've ever seen. And that was a testament to his talent that he could hang with a guy like Josh Allen in his prime.

1:05:57Yeah, I mean, it's interesting for him, right? With Dak, I made the point that in a given year, he can be as high as four. To me, with Stafford, I think the ceiling is a little bit lower because of his age. I don't know if he'll ever actually be higher to me ceiling-wise in about six, but he'll probably as long as he can be protected, I don't think he'll ever be worse than his six to eight range because of what he can do with his arm. And you mentioned it, right, like in terms of like one of the most enjoyable players to watch. This is a very much football writer, football podcaster thing. In terms of quarterbacks to watch at practice, it does not get better than Matthew Stafford.

1:06:33You probably hear the ball travel through the air. I've never seen him at practice. Went to their training camp last season. I mean, I don't think the Cooper Cup got many team reps. So it's not even like he was working with the best of his group the entire time. But they set up their team situation towards the end of practice. And I'm standing in the far end zone just watching the offense march down the field because I want to see him work the pocket. And I mean, dude, it's special, right? It's one of those things that as a fan, if you don't see it, and if you're not looking at it from that perspective, if you're not seeing that end zone angle on the all 22, He's an end zone angle guy, yeah.

1:07:111 ,000%. He's the guy that you get NFL pro for. So you can watch him work the pocket out of the end zone. You get money for that plug. You should, you should, don't, don't,

1:07:22Steven Ruiz:don't pitch a product unless you get paid for it, man. Hey man, look, I'm not going to tell anybody to pirate the product. If you do, that's on you. But look, I'm saying if you can get all 22 access and you watch a guy like that from, from the end zone angle, obviously the Eagles playoff game in the second half specifically was instructive in that regard. I think that the December stretch where things are kind of funky for this team, if you can just kind of discard that and just attribute it to age and you look at what it was basically like from Halloween to Thanksgiving, where this offense kind of started getting some things rolling.

1:07:56I mean, that's the level of Matthew Stafford, man, that you just don't, it's hard to appreciate if you're not watching for it. You've got to know what you're watching. It's definitely appreciating a good wine type of quarterback play for me.

1:08:09Steven Ruiz:You're kind of making the hipster pitch, but I got to say, you know the meme where the two guys on the bus? On the bus, yep. Yeah, but I feel like if you don't enjoy Matthew Stafford, you're just like a dork. You don't like football. It's so fun how he plays football. I don't know. Let's go to your 8, 9, and 10. You said those guys were kind of clustered. They're clustered together, and this is where I think I'm going to get the biggest reaction from you. eight for me is jayden daniels see all right let me hear your nine and ten okay so eight is jay daniels nine is jordan love ten is cj stroud and i would say the stroud and love can kind of be interchangeable for me and then obviously that's going to open up an interesting discussion of the guys who didn't make the top 10 the two i would flip i would put stroud at eight i think and then have love and jayden daniels as those guys that are hard to kind of parse uh just because i think everything we said about jack prescott i think stroud could be that guy this year as soon as this year just because they're giving him the keys to the offense and he's finally able to be that guy I think if you've heard CJ Straub talk about football and break down football like he clearly has the brain and the capacity to do that to be the guy that handles the offense and we're going to see that this year and I think his play even though the stats are bad I think in in spurts you could see evolution in this game where he was a little he could make plays out of structure a little bit more last year I think you saw like the the process get a little finer last year but I'm really excited to see him Jaden Daniels for me is a tricky one because and I just recently went back and watched four of his games for the quarterback rankings and I think I'm a little higher on him than I was watching him throughout the season because you get to see it all in a row and you're not just watching games one at a time and the thing that I definitely underestimated about him coming out and I was a fan of him I kind of changed my tune on him late in the process where I was like, all right, this guy's going to be, at the very least, going to be a good quarterback, is that his ejector button is the best in the league beyond Lamar Jackson right now.

1:10:06Steven Ruiz:Like, out of the pocket, a problem, if there's a problem. And sometimes he does it a little too early, but it never backfires because he's so good at it. He's just able to pick up six, seven yards, no matter what, on first down. Like, they could draw a drop back pass, and they could be covered, and they're still getting eight yards because of the fact that he can run. I think where the evolution is going to come in his game, because we never really talk about young quarterbacks who have these big years where it's like, oh, yeah, he's amazing, and that's that. You're like, no, he's a young rookie quarterback.

1:10:34Steven Ruiz:He obviously has area of improvement. He has flaws. And I think it's just working deeper into progressions, attacking the middle of the field, deeper into progression. But I think when you're able to set it up, and Cliff was able to set it up for him a lot of times last year, he completes those passes. He doesn't miss passes. And then in the quick game, I just think he's like, he was nearly perfect in quick game. Like, just didn't miss throws, got the ball out on time. I think it's when you take away the first read is when you start to see some of the problems, some of his pocket management. And I do think the arm isn't special.

1:11:05Steven Ruiz:The arm is good. It is not special. And I think you do see that when it's a tight pocket and he's throwing with bodies around him. You kind of see the ball flutter a little bit. The ball can, that's when he misses throws. That's when he has thrown like interceptions. A lot of the times when he threw interceptions last year, and there weren't a lot, was he floated the ball to the middle of the field and like a safety who wasn't really in position to guard the receiver, like just got the easiest interception. of their life. Falls into it, right. So that's where I want to see. But I think his floor after last year is top 13 quarterback, which is amazing.

1:11:37And that's honestly why I have him at eighth, right? Is that he can just access something in terms of getting out of emergencies that a Jordan Love can't athletically. And you were on that with Jordan Love.

1:11:48Steven Ruiz:I feel like you were the first person to really bring that out. And after you said it, I couldn't unsee it. And then you could find it in the stats. 1 ,000%. And I had all the same hangups that you mentioned. I think about the way that we were podcasting in the first month of the year when they're winning games. And I felt like every week I was coming in and being like, dude, look at the data is telling you that this is not real. And like you said, as you start watching it, as it expands, as the sample size grows, as you go back and rewatch games, as you get deeper in the season, and you have just a more full body of work to evaluate, the more I realize, like, I might be looking at this wrong.

1:12:25A, the design of the passing game, it's not the most sophisticated. Now, part of that can work to Jaden Daniels' benefit, right? As a rookie, playing within that passing game for all the problems... It wasn't in Arizona either, like with Cliff.

1:12:39Steven Ruiz:So, it wasn't solely like a Jaden help the rookie out thing. Exactly. So, like, it was... And he operated it really well. I think that for me, if we're just evaluating what we saw in the field, you name what the superpower is going to be. And it's that accuracy when he's got a clean platform, he can put the ball any and everywhere. That was the thing that I was most impressed with, especially when they were playing up against top competition, right? Like he played really, really well against Tampa Bay, basically, you know, playing as an accurate quarterback back to back weeks, right? Like he was able to do that and played well down the stretch.

1:13:13And then you add in the scrambling factor. You called it the ejector, right? That immediate sense of, oh, okay, what I wanted isn't there. I'm out of here. Or I feel it. I feel a guy on my back. I'm out of here. Only Lamar Jackson is in the conversation of guys that has that burst. And I would say that Lamar Jackson, his burst hasn't been at that level since 2019. He's added some weight and he moves a little bit more with agility. I would say that Jaden is more like sudden, vertical. I'm up the field. You can't touch me once I get to top speed. and you can just see defenses not know how to react to that because there's nothing like that in the league.

1:13:52Even Kyler Murray, more agile, a guy that I think can get to second and third to your best. He's a little cartoon mouse. 1 ,000%. I think Jaden Daniels is more of like you're 0-60. He's an F1 car.

1:14:08Steven Ruiz:My concern was he was as durable as an F1 car and the guy would like to run into a brick wall at times at LSU, but I didn't see that as a problem last year. And then the other, he did get dinged up a bit, right? Like the ribs, the rib injury definitely affected him in the middle of the season. But I will say that that's, that wasn't as much of a product of, all right, dude, like you got to know when to get down. Cause I actually think that he protected his body relatively well, based on what I expected it would be like coming out of college and more just like, Hey man, that build, that frame in the pocket, you're probably going to get lit up a couple of times and it's going to hurt when you get tackled.

1:14:43Right? Like, But the accuracy is there. The management of the pocket was there at a level that I did not expect coming out of college. The accuracy was top tier, even amongst other really good relative to other really good quarterbacks. And like you said, I mean, if he's able to avoid some of the arm strength issues that he's just going to have based on his arm talent and he can just avoid trouble, get the ball out quickly and effectively. and if they can continue to grow the passing game around them, I think that we'll get more elite-level seasons out of Jaden Daniels because the floor is so high based on what he is at.

1:15:14Steven Ruiz:And we're not saying he has a bad arm. We're saying relative to the top of the top, where every quarterback now seems to have one of the greatest arms of all time. I mean, everybody above him has a much better arm. Except for maybe Burrow? Maybe Burrow. I think they're on par. And I would say that, exactly. And I would say, contextually, the use of Burrow's arm, he's able to mitigate that in ways that we just have not seen year over year because Daniel's only a rookie in the way that we haven't from Daniel. One more thing I would say about Daniel's, where he could take another step, and this would just make him unguardable, is if he threw on the run a little bit more.

1:15:47Steven Ruiz:Because once he leaves the pocket, he's running. There are stats. If you look at the stats, it's historical how averse he was to throwing outside of the pocket. If he did that, I don't know how you guard him. Because like you said, when you watch how defenses react to that speed, that ejector button we were talking about, that's why Washington's offensive line wasn't a problem last year. On paper, it looked like shit. I know they've upgraded it over the offseason, but last year, on paper, it wasn't good. But teams were so afraid to pin their ears back and rush and give up those scramble lanes that it didn't matter.

1:16:20Steven Ruiz:I was going to say, if you look at the pockets, they were wide open, but they weren't even pockets. They were like those college, it was a wall, and he had no one around him. And it's because of him. It's not because of something else, like they didn't respect him and they wanted to keep him in the pocket. is because they were scared to death of this guy getting into the open field, which I don't think is going to go away. I think you can, maybe when he's like 29, 30, maybe you start to worry about how the speed, and if he hasn't evolved those parts of the game we talked about, then you start to worry.

1:16:48Steven Ruiz:But for the next five years, I mean, he's probably going to put up his own life. It's going to be tough. So let's talk about Jordan Love because I, Jordan Love's a tough one just because one, small sample size, two, the inconsistent decision-making and then three, he was banged up last year, but he still played, which is hard to kind of adjust for. And I think there are some people that will be like, oh, if you're on the field, then we can just judge you based on how you're playing. And there are other people that will take that into account. I don't say either one's right. It's probably somewhere in the middle what he should be doing, but it did clearly affect him.

1:17:22Steven Ruiz:And when he was healthy, he had some games where he looked like a top 10, top five quarterback in the league. And I want to see him fully healthy. I want to see him play 17 straight games and see what that looks like and see what the decision-making looks like now that we have two seasons of him as the starting quarterback. So what are your hangups with him not being higher? And then what are the positives that have you still on him as a top 10 quarterback? The hangups are the things that we've been talking about with love, right? It's a lack of creativity as a passer, right? Like I would say, and it's not like he's an untalented arm, right?

1:17:56Like when I say that, for example, when I say that Michael Penix Jr. is not a very creative passer. A lot of that I think is limited just by what his arm is and how he utilizes it. With Love, he has all the arm talent in the world to be able to do whatever he wants from the pocket. And unfortunately, the only thing that we get from him are the fadeaway throws. You were the guy to first point that out, I would say, in national media is all the fadeaway throws, the trick shot looking throws where when he wants to put arc on the ball, you can see him fade back. there are times in which that gets him in trouble but for the most part it's just something that he can do really effectively, more effectively than the other quarterbacks that attempt that.

1:18:35I would say it's the accessing a tricky arm slot from time to time to be able to work the intermediate areas of the field, that 10 to 12 yard range, we don't see as much from him. We don't see the shaking off pressure and even if the play only ends in a check down it's like okay I can see that you can navigate your way around this, not lose sight of what you're going through in your progression and still get the ball out effectively. It happens from time to time, right? It kind of comes and goes. And that's the inconsistent decision-making that you mentioned. And I think a lot of that is because his MO, his default processing is, if I can get a throw-off, I want to throw the dig.

1:19:14If I can get a throw-off, I want to throw the post. If I can get a throw-off, I want to throw the comeback. And it's very entertaining to watch, especially when Green Bay is playing up against teams that they're better than. And you get to see Matt LaFleur start cooking in a play-action game or you go bats protect out of shotgun and you can let Jordan Love just rip the ball in the middle of the field. That part is great. It's more of the contextual things that we don't see as often, right? I think that if he had a little bit more of CJ Stroud and CJ Stroud had a little bit more of Jordan Love, we will be talking about top five-level quarterbacks, right?

1:19:46Because they just respond to those tricky situations a little bit differently. But just what he can do, feet planted in the pocket, it's right up there with your Justin Herberts. It's right up there with your Josh Allens, your big bodied, strong arm quarterbacks that can put the ball wherever they want to. That stuff is, it's tantalizing to watch, right? Like I just need to continue to see him grow in his response to pressure, his response to changing pictures, right? Like the Seattle game, he kind of had some trouble with that at times. And obviously he's been banged up so often in his career even as a starter that it's hard to know exactly when to extricate like he's making this decision because he can only do x y or z versus he's just having trouble with dealing with defenses you think about that second minnesota game where they played a bunch of man coverage and challenged jordan love to play outside of his comfort zone and you saw those hiccups you saw the hesitation you saw the turnovers you saw the pressure turning into qb hits and sacks as a result I want to see him not lose that aggression or find contextual ways to be aggressive within that.

1:20:52That's been Lamar Jackson's big help as a drop back passer is that he'll work through his progression even as he's being pressured and being hit. That's Joe Burrow in 2024. Even though he knows pressure is coming, he's going to work to the end of his progression. That's Patrick Mahomes basically since he's been a starter. He'll take the contact to work through the progression because he knows that he can still find effective offense even if it's not the biggest, most explosive plays. I would like to see him continue to grow in that respect, but for how young and new he is to being an NFL starter, it's hard to have many more complaints outside of that.

1:21:22Also, I'm speaking just strictly as

1:21:25Steven Ruiz:quarterbacking, how we envision quarterbacking as an NFL quarterback. He kind of stunk in college. He made boneheaded decisions. He's very much an outlier kid. I feel like he has evolved as a processor. There's a lot of room to grow, but he has evolved as one and has made great strides. So that's why I'm a little bullish on him. I think he's going to just keep going up and up and up. I think he's more of a creative passer than he gets credit for, beyond the fadeaway throws, eye manipulation and no-look throws. He does all that stuff. He misses them a lot more than Matthew Stafford does, but he still tries them.

1:21:58Steven Ruiz:Maybe when he hones that ability, he'll jump into the top five or around the top five, which I think is definitely his ceiling, definitely in the range of outcomes for this upcoming year. So we talked about the top 10 Stroud, there's not much to say About Stroud, I think Stroud was a victim of High expectations last year I think that was the issue I think as a quarterback he Improved in some areas, the stats regressed I think more control over the offense Is going to do him a big favor Because last year there was just some looks Where he didn't have the tools to fix them before the snap And he just had to take on a free rusher I do think that will help him in the long run Becoming a more are a better, more creative problem solver?

1:22:42Steven Ruiz:Where do you want to see him improve the most next year? I think a lot of it is just going to be, can you be a little bit more efficiency leaning than explosive leaning, right? Some of that is the effect of the offense, right? Obviously, Bobby Sloak was trying to run, was trying to replicate something that he experienced once Christian McCaffrey got to San Francisco in terms of like, we're going to be very aggressive in a play action game. We're going to be very aggressive in a drop back passing game. And that stuff we know he can do very effectively, especially when his wide receivers are healthy.

1:23:15When he has Nico Collins there to take tops off defenses, what we see in terms of him working through the progression looks as good as any of the other guys we've mentioned in the top 10. I think that for me, it's like, what is it going to be when you can't rely upon that? That was a big reason why they were having trouble last year. Obviously, Sloic owns a lot of that in terms of design of the offense, development of the offensive line. But a lot of that was stuff that we can barely put on CJ Stroud, not being able to change that gear in his mind of knowing like, okay, dude, I can't wait to the absolute last second wishing this dig open, wishing this curl open, wishing this skinny post open.

1:23:57I've got to just get the ball out. That's the part of the Matthew Stafford game. A quarterback we know that he idolizes, that he has not yet developed. Yeah. Right. He doesn't have part of that. Maybe he hasn't built up. He doesn't have the arm for it. Anyhow, I hadn't built up the scar tissue. I don't think for it. Right. Like Stafford kind of had to get the shit beat out of him for a few years in Detroit before he really kind of accepted, you know, what he can and can't get away with. maybe this was an instructive season for him and him getting more control over the offense at the line of scrimmage and having experienced what he did in terms of the ways in which an offense can fail you and take you out of that mode of being able to be aggressive as often as you want to be.

1:24:35I think that that can end up being a net positive, assuming that he's not a shell-shocked quarterback, which it didn't seem like he was, right? Even in that playoff game against Kansas City, when guys are bearing down on him, you still saw a quarterback who wanted to be aggressive. That's an excellent trait of his. it's just going to be being efficient when that stuff is not available for you to access. I think that he can and will grow in that. And the rest of this stuff sets such a high floor because he does have a good enough arm to push the ball outside the numbers at times because he is aggressive enough to push the ball deep downfield in the middle of the field or outside the numbers.

1:25:08He's got a lot of the necessary tools to be really effective and efficient. It's just going to be him taking control of the wheel and making sure that his offense puts him in a position where he can be that efficient on a down-to-down basis, even if structure breaks down.

1:25:22Steven Ruiz:Yeah. I mean, I can talk about these quarterbacks for long and long. We've already gone an hour and 20 minutes. But your top 10, just to recap, was you had Lamar, number one, Josh Allen, number two, and that was a 1A, 1B thing for you. Yep. Patrick Mahomes, basically, 1C. Joe Burrow, Justin Herbert, Matthew Stafford, Dak Prescott, Jaden Daniels, and then C.J. Stroud and Jordan Love were interchangeable there. I think I'd love 10. Just to hit on some guys that I think are going to be controversial omissions from the top 10, where did you have Baker? Baker to me is 14th. Okay. So who was your 11 through 13 then?

1:26:02So 11 through 14 was Hurts, Goff, Purdy, and Mayfield. Okay. In that order. Hurts. So why Hurts over Goff?

1:26:10Steven Ruiz:Because I feel like those are two quarterbacks that are very hard to compare, but they are quarterbacks that kind of benefit from their surroundings. I think that for me with Hertz, for me with Hertz, the reason why I feel as safe putting him at 11 is because he doesn't put the ball in harm's way. Right. And now once we're outside of the top 10, right, like the guys who can access elite level play, I'm really hyper focused on guys that can avoid disaster. Functional like Hertz has a functional disaster mitigation, essentially. 1 ,000%. Like, and it's different between Hurts and Goff, right? Goff is trying to get the ball out before he gets hit because he knows bad things.

1:26:47If he could play on an office chair, he would. That's always been my art. Barstool, if he would. I mean, he would be the greatest quarterback of all time. He'd be the same quarterback, too. In flag, right? If he was in flag, if he was in flag ball and wasn't being rushed, he'd probably be the, I would say this, he'd be the best seven on seven quarterback that's ever lived. Yeah. If that were available to him, right? Like, I think with Hurts, he's a little bit more willing to take the sack. and I think that he exchanges the sack for the risk the risky throw yeah which is frustrating right it can break down an offense 2024 basically all the way up until December was instructive in that regard of how that can break down a passing offense when your quarterback would rather be sacked than put the ball in harm's way and I think that but I do think though that when he's healthy he can move the ball on the ground and when he feels confident in the passing game which he should always given the wide receivers that he is to throw the ball to that you do get that best of the rest quality right and that's really where i think that his ceiling comes out right the the super bowl was instructive in that regard even the nfc championship game a lot of that was you know explosive runs or just explosive plays kind of putting them in in good position and turnover look but even in that he was working effectively then the divisional game against the rams was like the worst version of that right the weather gets bad he doesn't want to turn the ball over because he feels like they're going to win this game as long as they hold possession and he's taking some really bad sacks in the second half and that's just kind of the the yin and yang of what Jalen Hurts is going to be with golf it's more because he wants to get the ball out before he gets hit he will take the risky throw in high leverage situations that he probably wouldn't in normal scenarios and that he knows he shouldn't he just doesn't want to be hit I think that the divisional game against Washington was the biggest example of that but those two guys I think are right there with one another.

1:28:35And really this whole cluster of Hurts, I would say Hurts, Goff and Purdy may feel, I think is a little bit more interesting, but those three guys, when they're not turning the ball over, when they're not taking terrible sacks are the last three guys. You can probably have the conversation of being super bowl level quarterbacks, playoff winning level quarterbacks. If the rest of the situation is, is right around them. I want to get you in trouble. Where did you have Tua ranked? Tua's 20th. Who's, who's directly ahead of him? Aaron Rodgers. Oh, God, that's perfect. And based on the conversations we've had about Aaron Rodgers, I think that says a lot about that group of quarterbacks.

1:29:13Okay, just to make our boss happy, where do you have Drake May? He's 18th, so right ahead of those two.

1:29:18Steven Ruiz:I would have him a little bit higher. I don't know where I'm going to end up with him. I'm really liking what I'm seeing. He's tricky. He is tricky, you're right. He's tricky because they weren't winning a bunch, but the level of play was great. You have to fight the urge. You have to fight the urge to already give him credit for the progress you think he's going to make. You see the flashes and you're like, oh, that's who he is. And it's like, no, he has to fill in the gaps a little bit. Not as much as people thought, definitely before last year, but there are still some gaps. And I would say in the opposite direction for me is Gino, who I had 16th, right?

1:29:50Where I have to stop myself from thinking about the cliff because of some of the things we saw that were problematic for him down the stretch of each of the last two seasons with being pressured and the offense breaking down with him in the pocket because he does so many other things really, really well. Right? And I think that when you feel really secure about the things that a quarterback like that does well, the issues start to really shine a lot brighter. And I think that for Geno, I probably ding him a lot for the failings of Seattle's offensive line, for the failings of his offensive coordinator at times, for the failing of his wide receiver core at times.

1:30:26We just have not... It just runs so hot and cold with Gino that I have a hard time knowing exactly where I'm going to place it.

1:30:32Steven Ruiz:I am now realizing I'm in off-season mode and need to get it together because I didn't even process that you left Gino out. Not only at the bottom of the top 10, but out of your 11th and 14th. He's not in the top 15. Yeah. Now I want to fight you. I want to fly to San Diego and fight you. I might lose. I probably will lose, but I don't care because I have to defend Gino's honor because if I don't, who will? Like Greg Rosenthal, Mina Kimes, and that's it. Right. Mina Kimes, basically. Geno Nation. It doesn't run that deep. It's a lot deeper than it was in 2018 when it was just me and Greg. But, yeah, that's an inexplicable omission, in my opinion.

1:31:09Steven Ruiz:But, no, I wasn't offended by your top 10 list. I mean, there was obviously some things I would move around. I think Jaden, for me, is just a little too much too soon, maybe three spots, four spots lower. I would put him in the same area I had Stroud before last year. I caught a ton of shit for not having him in the top 10. By the end of the year, I was looked at as someone who was too high on him. So that's how it goes. But God, man, talking about quarterbacks, Scott, I'm excited for football season now. Season's back, man. I love talking about quarterbacks. Teams reporting to training camp over the next couple weeks.

1:31:39We are back at it. I cannot wait.

1:31:41Steven Ruiz:But yeah, that's going to do it for this episode. That was Deontay Lee. Be sure to yell at him about his top 10 quarterback rankings on Twitter. Any social media platform that you can reach him on. Let him get a taste of what I have to deal with. And by the way, I didn't say this. I meant to say this earlier. We were talking about Jalen Hurts. Eagles fan recognized me on the Metro yesterday. Big fan of the show, listens to the show. Said I was too low on Jalen Hurts, but he was very nice. Maybe the nicest Eagles fan I've ever interacted with. They're probably all going to be a lot nicer to you because they won the game.

1:32:14That's a good point.

1:32:15Steven Ruiz:And he probably got off the train and then talked shit about me to his friends. 1 ,000%. But shout out to Noah. He definitely got cussed out in the group chat. Yeah, yeah. But yeah, that's going to do it for us. That was Deontay's top 10. I'll have my top 10, my top 32 coming out at some time in August. We will not be back next week. I think we're going to take a week off, then we will be back. We're going to ramp up the season preview coverage, training camp coverage. We're going to have people at training camps all over the country. So I'm looking forward to that. But we will see you in a couple of weeks.

1:32:44Steven Ruiz:That was Deontay Lee. I am Stephen Ruiz. Thanks to Christopher Sutton for producing. Thanks to Connor Nevins and Arjuna Ramkapal for additional production supervision. and thanks to Kiara Gibbons for socials.

1:33:06Steven Ruiz:Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in DC. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. Call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut or visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelplinema.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-877-8HOPENY or text HOPENY in New York.