00:00So I think there's going to be a time in the future where we're going to look back at this
00:03class
00:04and we're going to say there were teams that overthought it a little bit,
00:07that went down their board to get the player at the position they were allowed to draft at that spot
00:12so that it didn't look crazy that you took a running back at three,
00:15or how dare you take a safety at five.
00:17I heard one of the smartest draft people in America,
00:20whose mocks I take more seriously than almost anybody else's last night on television,
00:24say, I'm just not sure I think Caleb Downs goes there
00:28because you don't want to take a safety that high.
00:30That is a dumb reason not to take Caleb Downs.
00:33I'm sorry, it just is.
00:34In this draft, in this class, when you're so unsure about so many guys,
00:38if you're sure about Caleb Downs, then take him.
00:41And someone could record this and play it in a year or two and make me look silly.
00:45I'm talking about the 2026 NFL draft.
00:48It is different than what happened in 24 and 25.
00:51It is different than what will happen in 27.
00:54All you can deal with is these players.
00:55It's not a great first round.
00:56The ceiling on most of these guys, we don't have the same level of blue trippers
01:01and potential Hall of Famers, Danny.
01:02So for me, if I'm a GM in the top ten, it's not about keeping my job.
01:07It's trying to hit a home run.
01:09I'm still going with the philosophy of don't overthink it.
01:13Keep it simple, stupid.
01:14Get the great player.
01:16There is a line of demarcation.
01:19And this is the question that GMs have to answer,
01:22and the scouts and the people in these war rooms.
01:24And it's kind of the way I try to think along with everybody else.
01:28I'm making this up, just putting arbitrary numbers on it for the sake of argument.
01:31A 10 out of 10 prospect at safety, which Caleb Downs might be,
01:36is that more valuable to my football team than a 7 out of 10 wide receiver?
01:40Than a 7.5 out of 10 left tackle?
01:43There is a number where even though the prospect at the lesser-valued position is better,
01:49there's a place where the gap isn't big enough to justify taking the lesser-valued player.
01:53A.K.A.
01:54If there was a Panay Sewell in this draft as a tackle, you'd go,
01:58he may not be the prospect Caleb Downs is, but I don't care.
02:01That's going to save me tens of millions of dollars over years against the cap,
02:06not having to go into free agency and find someone that's flawed,
02:09or bamboozled the team in a trade.
02:11Thank you again, Houston Texans, for allowing Laramie Tunsil to come here.
02:14But that position is so valuable that if Sewell's an 8 out of 10 and Downs is a 10 out
02:18of 10,
02:18Sewell's worth it.
02:20Again, this is a bare-bones sort of hypothetical here.
02:23There is a line, and it all depends on what the evals are
02:26of some of these prospects at the more valuable positions.
02:29I don't think there's a question that the best players in this draft,
02:32a couple of them are pass rushers.
02:33That's valuable.
02:34That meshes.
02:34But among the Stiles, Downs, Love, Camp,
02:39those are three of the five best players in this draft.
02:41You'll never convince me otherwise.
02:43The other guys, though, the Baines, the Delanes,
02:49some of these other dudes, these cats, Cardinal Tate, I think is a prime example.
02:53If the evals of them are high enough and that gap isn't as big
02:56as maybe is perceived by the public, some of those guys will go higher than we think.
03:00So I'm going to take it a different route.
03:01Now, you're juxtaposing if I've got a 7 out of 10 on one guy
03:06and a 10 out of 10 on the other.
03:07Here's how I'm looking at it.
03:09If I think a guy is a perennial pro bowler and an occasional all-pro candidate,
03:16more succinctly, if I think a player could end up top five at their position,
03:20I don't give a damn what position they play.
03:22Now, your philosophy of position mattering and we'll call it the value of the position
03:29from a math and a cap standpoint is relevant.
03:32But I'm saying Sunday between 1 and 4 for those three hours.
03:37And this is coming from someone who fancies himself trying to be analytical
03:40and driven by the numbers and newfangled in my thinking and all of those things.
03:44But I'm going to go football cowboy on you for a second football player.
03:47If Caleb Downs is inevitably going to be a top five safety.
03:51So it's hard for me to do the what is a 10 out of 10, what is a 7 out
03:55of 10.
03:55I mean, I'm putting arbitrary numbers on it.
03:57But what does that mean for Carnell Tate?
03:58But what I'm saying is if Carnell Tate is an annual 60 to 75 catch,
04:03900 to 1,100 yard wide receiver,
04:05who's basically an excellent number two in an elite offense,
04:09where Caleb Downs is an all-pro safety?
04:13I think there are plenty of R&D department heads that will tell you draft Carnell Tate.
04:18And what I'm saying is I think you still take the best football player.
04:22This team has not had all pros that weren't specialists,
04:25but once in 30 years, Brandon Sheriff, they don't have great players.
04:29They don't have elite talent.
04:31They don't have superstars.
04:32We get a really good player like Terry McLaurin and we throw parades.
04:36We chant his name.
04:37And I'm not saying we shouldn't.
04:38I love Terry McLaurin.
04:40Terry McLaurin will not be confused for Jamar Chase or Justin Jefferson.
04:44You see what happened with Jackson Smith and Jigbo last year?
04:47Terry doesn't have that club in the bag.
04:49Really, really good football player.
04:51It's okay sometimes to try to get a superstar, a great player.
04:55If love becomes that, we haven't had that at running back in a long, long time.
04:59If Downs becomes that, you haven't had that at safety
05:01since Sean Taylor as he was ascending before his tragic death.
05:04I want great football players.
05:06And tonight, they might be able to get one if they're willing to take a little heat
05:11for doing the thing that you're not supposed to do.
05:14Yeah.
05:15I know.
05:15Again, that's on the table.
05:17But is there a line for you, though?
05:19And again, I keep using my arbitrary numbers, and I know that's frustrating to everybody
05:23because it is.
05:24It's just arbitrary.
05:24But if one guy's an 8.5, one guy's an 8, and the 8.5 guy's the position of lesser
05:29value,
05:30is that close enough for you?
05:33I need to know, are they a star?
05:36I need to know.
05:36Give me numbers.
05:37Give me a role.
05:38Give me an NFL comp.
05:39Does that make sense?
05:40It does.
05:40Like, what is Carnell Tate?
05:42You tell me what he is, I'll tell you if it's worth it.
05:44Right.
05:44Yeah.
05:44And that, to me, is what the variable is.
05:47If Caleb Downs is Buda Baker, okay, and Carnell Tate is Jabbar Gaffney in the Shanahan system,
05:55No, I'm not doing that.
05:56When he went for 900-plus yards or whatever, then give me Buda Baker.
06:00Right.
06:00Now, if Carnell Tate is 1,200-yard guy three of his first four seasons, okay, then I've
06:06mis-evaluated a tad.
06:07And I like Carnell Tate.
06:09I posted something on social today, and a lot of people were like, dude, I didn't know you
06:12were down on Tate.
06:13I thought I spent the entire time saying I'm not down on Tate, but my point is, when
06:17I watch Carnell Tate, I do not see the same twitchiness.
06:21I do not see the same wiggle.
06:23I do not see the same explosiveness and post-catch abilities as I do that I covet so much with
06:30Jordan
06:30Tyson, Arizona State, Makai Lemon, USC.
06:34Those guys, after the catch, to me, are scarier.
06:37They do more.
06:38I think Carnell Tate is the awesome, like what I would consider the old-school Z receiver.
06:44Like, we're running our, we're bending in, we're running digs, we're running crossers,
06:48we're boxing people out with our frame, we're making sideline catches, we're never dropping
06:52a ball.
06:53I think he's 70 for 1057.
06:56If you tell me one wide receiver in this class next year goes for 1000, it's going to be
07:00Carnell Tate.
07:01I would bet on that.
07:02If you tell me that one wide receiver in this class goes for 1400 yards at some point, I would
07:07guess that either Tyson or Lemon did it, and Tate did not.
07:13I just think it's floor over ceiling with him, and I'm trying to take big swings, man.
07:17I'm not trying to get on base Jacob Young style at seven.
07:19I'm trying to hit a James Wood, 473-foot homer into the third deck at number seven.
07:25I get that, and I don't hate that philosophy.
07:27I mean, to me, though, but that's where the R&D department, the math department, the analytics
07:32department, the pocket protectors are going to be having those conversations with, as you
07:35said, to put it politely, the football Cowboys, where it's like, I don't give a damn what position
07:39he plays, like tobacco spit.
07:41He's a thumper.
07:41He's a winner.
07:42He's downhill.
07:43And there's going to be that push and pull.
07:44And I don't know where this Washington franchise falls out on that map.
07:49I really don't.
07:49They have R&D.
07:51They've got smart folks, but, you know, what have they been spitting with through two years?
07:54There are very few exceptions.
07:55They've basically drafted guys with exceptionally high relative athletic scores.
07:59By the way, that's a decent enough philosophy.
08:01I'm not criticizing it.
08:02I'm simply saying that's their type.
08:04So what does that lead you to believe?
08:06Again, we're going around in circles to a degree, but that's what's so fun about this
08:10is there's so much mystery here.
08:12I really don't know what they're thinking.
08:14And I think they've got scenarios one through 50 based on what could happen in front of
08:19them.
08:19And I think they'll be prepared.
08:21No doubt they'll be prepared.
08:22Yeah.
08:22It's the whole job.
08:23I mean, they're all paid millions of dollars to figure this thing out.
08:26It's kind of all they've been doing for a month.
08:28You know, they are putting a board together.
08:30They're going one by one through every permutation.
08:33And they are mocking their way.
08:35I mean, you and I do this on a simulator every night for 30 minutes because we like football.
08:40Imagine if you were getting paid millions of dollars and it was your job.
08:43It's been an entertaining, I'm sure, several weeks of arguing and discussing and debating
08:48and rearranging over at the facility in Ashburn in their much improved new look war room.
08:56Secondarily, so my number one theme and interest tonight is this positional value conversation
09:00we just had.
09:03I got to get Jaden Daniels weapons.
09:05I don't really care how you do it.
09:07I don't know if it'll be at seven.
09:08If Love's not there and they're not enamored with Tate and they're worried about Tyson's health
09:14and they think it's too rich for a slot guy in Lemon, fine.
09:19Take your defensive stalwart, draft Mansoor Delaney or whoever fell into your lap.
09:23I can get down with that.
09:24But you sure as heck better get me a pass catcher at 71.
09:28They've got to come out of the early part of this draft.
09:30And this is where the trade back makes so much sense to me.
09:33Because you get to have your cake and eat it too.
09:35Remember years ago on this very day, draft day, mid-afternoon, we reported as a station
09:45that Dan Snyder had, quote, according to a source in the room that had texted this,
09:49taken over the first round of the draft.
09:51Do you remember that?
09:52They would go on to draft Dwayne Haskins at 15.
09:55There was a major pushback from coaches and football people.
09:59They were livid about what was happening where they had done all this work.
10:02And he's like, thanks guys, sit this one out.
10:05My kid went to high school with this guy, right?
10:07They ended up trading back into the first round to appease the football people
10:10so that they got their guy, so to speak.
10:14For me, this time around in terms of weaponry,
10:17if you were to move back, everyone can get what they want.
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