- 3 weeks ago
Seth and Sean discuss what Jason MacIntyre and Rich Ohrnberger had to say about CJ Stroud's contract situation possibly getting contentious.
Category
š„
SportsTranscript
00:00This is an interesting question posed on a podcast that's part of Colin Cowherd's network of podcasts.
00:06Jason McIntyre, who's his co-host, Cowherd's co-host, on TV.
00:11Is this a regular podcast, or was he just a guest on his podcast, Seth?
00:15Do you know?
00:16Are you talking about Rich Orenberger?
00:18Orenberger, yeah.
00:19Was Orenberger a guest?
00:21I have zero clue.
00:22This is the volume football.
00:25So the volume is Colin Cowherd's podcast network.
00:28And this is the volume football.
00:30The time I watched it, this had 13 views.
00:33So I don't know how that happens.
00:35On Colin Cowherd's network.
00:37Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:38But it's a separate channel, so I think it's a new channel he's doing.
00:41So I don't think this went out over Fox Sports.
00:44I think this is just on this particular podcast.
00:47Well, it was an interesting conversation either way.
00:49Orenberger is a former defensive lineman in the NFL?
00:52Offensive lineman.
00:53Offensive lineman, okay.
00:54Offensive lineman in the NFL.
00:55And he was on there talking with Jason McIntyre.
00:58And posed the question, does C.J. Stroud trust the Texans?
01:03Here's the question that C.J. Stroud needs to ask and answer honestly himself.
01:08Do I trust the Texans?
01:10If I take less, am I their guy?
01:14And if the Texans, and this may be the Houston's front office fault.
01:18This may be the coaching staff's fault.
01:20If he isn't 100% bought in and trusts that he's their guy going into the future, well, then he's
01:27going to hold this team hostage like other contract negotiations go with other quarterbacks across the league where he says,
01:34no, no, no, no.
01:35You can tell me until you're blue in the face how you're going to build around me.
01:39But I don't feel like you're that invested in me, so I'm going to get that back.
01:44It's really going to come down to whether or not he trusts this front office.
01:49Boy, that is interesting.
01:52So that if somehow he got like a Jordan Love type of contract or something, does that show ā does
01:58he interpret that as the organization saying, okay, they're not really all in on me and this is just a
02:04wait and see still.
02:06I still have to prove myself.
02:07Yeah.
02:07And I guess the follow-up question to that would be like, so?
02:11What is it about Jordan ā why did you bring up Jordan Love?
02:14I'm just curious.
02:14Because he didn't get like a top-of-the-market deal.
02:16You know, he got a ā you know, he got something that was more of a ā it was a
02:21ā
02:21He's in the neighborhood kind of ā
02:22Yeah, it was a ā well, and it was a shorter term.
02:24It just wasn't as lucrative as like a Trevor Lawrence, the amount of total guaranteed money and everything like that.
02:28Yeah, yeah, yeah.
02:28Now, we should point out, you know who Jordan Love's agent is?
02:30It's David Mulligetta.
02:31So there is that.
02:33So, you know, he's done a deal that's in that neighborhood before.
02:36What I found interesting about that cut from Ornberger there is that he's talking about C.J. Stroud and, you
02:45know, invoking Tom Brady.
02:46Tom Brady taking less money to build the team.
02:49Like, he's talking about C.J. Stroud like C.J. is the one that's got all the cards right now.
02:54Right, right, right.
02:54It was very ā that's very strange to me.
02:56Like, I think C.J.'s still got a lot to prove.
02:58I don't ā so this is the way I would have framed it is the trust ā the trust dynamic.
03:04Yeah.
03:05I think that, in general, if you want your quarterback to somehow play at some kind of a discount, then
03:12it has to be ā it usually is that the quarterback himself also trusts that the organization knows what they're
03:18doing.
03:18Yeah.
03:19So that's the part that I find interesting is, all right, Pat Mahomes has been playing at a discount for
03:24a long time now.
03:25He signed a 10-year contract knowing that he'd be underpaid at some point.
03:29They haven't really tweaked it much, if at all.
03:33But it's that he trusts that the Chiefs know what they're doing.
03:38Tom Brady forever ā Tom Brady didn't ā Tom Brady never trusted that Belichick had some kind of undying loyalty
03:44to him.
03:45Tom Brady has said openly many times before that, no, I knew they'd get rid of me as soon as
03:51they felt like they had somebody younger and cheaper that they thought could be as good as me.
03:56Yep.
03:56So the trust for Tom Brady was he trusted that that was the best place for him to win a
04:01championship.
04:01Yeah.
04:02And he trusted that if ā the biggest thing, if I take a pay cut, are you guys actually going
04:05to do something?
04:06Are you guys actually going to do something with all this extra cash?
04:09And they do.
04:09Yeah.
04:10Yeah, yeah.
04:10Yeah, like ā so I don't ā that part of it's interesting to me.
04:14Does CJ trust or believe that that organization, the Texans, are capable of, you know, putting the right ā
04:23having the right support around them and having the right offensive coordinator?
04:26It's interesting, too, because we're coming off of a week last week where just out of nowhere, the Texans just
04:34gave Nico Collins $17 million.
04:37You know, they just gave ā and I'm not saying he doesn't deserve it.
04:40He's a really good player, and it still doesn't put him in the top 10 of wide receivers in terms
04:45of average annual value.
04:46But this ā I think we've ā you know, we've seen more and more that ā I know people ā
04:51anytime somebody from New England comes to the Texans,
04:54whether it's a coach or a player, there's this feeling like, oh, there we go, another New England person.
04:59And yet there's so many things that Nick Casario does that are very different from Belichick.
05:03You know, like, would you ever have seen ā do you think Belichick would have given Nico Collins a raise
05:07out of nowhere last week
05:09without an extension on the other end of it?
05:11Right, yeah.
05:11And I'm not saying either one is right or wrong.
05:13I'm just saying ā
05:14Well, we know that ā well, I mean, Belichick went ā did some things at the end of his tenure
05:19with the Patriots
05:20that were way different than they'd ever operated before, I think because of the changing landscape and circumstance.
05:25Like, they spent a boatload in free agency that one year.
05:29I think that, you know, one thing out of the Belichick school of how you operate your football team,
05:35it's that you have to adapt to the changing times and the way people are handling the salary cap.
05:42And, yeah, I think that ā I don't know.
05:44If Casario and Belichick had remained together up in New England,
05:47they might have started operating more the way they are right now.
05:50Maybe.
05:50If you think about ā so, when Orenberger talks about playing at a discount,
05:56usually I would think, okay, you're talking about in terms of guaranteed money.
05:59Yeah.
06:00So, with Jordan Love, he got $160 million, whereas a guy like Trevor Lawrence got $200 million guaranteed.
06:06Yeah.
06:06You know, Justin Herbert got $218 million guaranteed.
06:10Joe Burrow, $219 million guaranteed.
06:12Yeah.
06:12So, whether you want to call it a discount or something else,
06:17Nick has operated in a way where he wants shorter-term deals but with a boatload of money guaranteed.
06:22Mm-hmm.
06:22And that gives the organization some flexibility in terms of if things go south,
06:27if you need to move on from a player for whatever reason, the commitment isn't as long.
06:32But the player gets a big chunk of it guaranteed up front.
06:35And I think that's what it would probably look like if CJ were to get a contract right now.
06:40A huge percentage of it would be guaranteed, but the total dollar amount isn't going to be mind-blowing
06:46in terms of ā it probably won't be a five-year extension or something like that.
06:51What if he got the exact same contract that Will Anderson got?
06:55The exact same.
06:56Three years, $150 million with like $135 million of it guaranteed.
07:01That would be ā see, I think that's one of those classic contracts where can both sides be happy?
07:06The ā I think for CJ and Mulligetta it would probably be they want it to be somewhere around the
07:11$55 million mark.
07:13Sure, where all these other guys are.
07:14In terms of average per year.
07:15But for the total commitment, the total financial commitment and all of that,
07:19it would be less for the Texans than a lot of these other quarterback contracts.
07:24Well, and those other quarterback contracts you mentioned are all five-year deals.
07:27Yeah.
07:27And this would be obviously a three-year deal that would keep him a Texan for five years
07:32because he still has his last year ā his last regular year of his rookie deal plus his fifth-year
07:38option
07:38and then the three years would kick in after that.
07:41Yeah, and I think that's the reasonable thing at this point would be that the Texans might want to have
07:47some stability
07:48and be able to lock him down so that they know that they can work the next couple of years
07:55and just try to make the best of the situation around CJ and see how good he can get.
08:00And from CJ's perspective, look, sure, just because Trevor Lawrence got that contract
08:06or just because Tuatunga-Vailoa got that contract and it's a precedent doesn't mean it was a good precedent.
08:11Yep.
08:11And nobody's obligated by law to follow a precedent.
08:17It just ā there's ā CJ ā like Nick and D'Amico could tell CJ or tell Mulligetta,
08:25look, yeah, we know that those organizations gave those guys those contracts as well as Kyler Murray.
08:31We don't ā we wouldn't have.
08:33Yeah, we wouldn't ā yeah.
08:33We just ā that's just not the way we operate.
08:35Yeah, I think ā
08:36The Astros, probably a bad example to bring up if you want to feel good about this.
08:40But the Astros can tell people, look, we just don't ā yeah, a lot of these other places are giving
08:44out 10-year deals.
08:45We're never going to do it.
08:46We don't do that.
08:47Yep.
08:48We don't do that.
08:49Here's one ā another one from Orenberger saying this will be a cagey offseason for the Texans.
08:53This is going to be a very cagey offseason into a regular season for CJ Stroud and Houston.
09:02They signed the fifth-year deal.
09:03It definitely felt like they were kicking the can down the road.
09:07There's going to be a big, potentially, impasse at some point between his agent and the team.
09:13Yeah, I know ā I disagree just in emphatically saying it will be a cagey offseason.
09:19That all depends on the people involved.
09:23If CJ had been a guy who was agitating for this and unfollowing the Texans on social media or not
09:31showing up to OTAs or something,
09:32then I feel like you'd have justification for saying, ooh, things are going to get cagey or they already are
09:38cagey.
09:38But CJ hasn't operated that way at all.
09:41He's done nothing to make it look like there's this tension or anything that nobody can overcome.
09:46He's been the exact opposite.
09:47He's been the exact opposite.
09:48That's, to me, the word he got used in that cut right there that I said, oh, wait a second,
09:53was impasse at the end.
09:54At some point, there's going to be an impasse.
09:55An impasse means that the two sides can't reach an agreement and something bad happens.
10:00You're like ā that CJ is withholding services at some point.
10:04You know what I mean?
10:06To me, at this point, if there's any talk of a contract going on behind the scenes,
10:10they just haven't arrived at anything that both sides agree to.
10:12That doesn't mean there's an impasse.
10:13And CJ, to your point, Seth, all of his actions ā and now we've got words to go with the
10:19actions.
10:19All we knew before was, hey, he'd been texting new teammates and greeting Keelan Rutledge at the hotel,
10:25and he'd been working out, and he cut his hair and all these other things.
10:28He slimmed down.
10:29He's got some ā you know, it seems like he's really committed to his workouts.
10:33Not that he wasn't before, but, boy, he seems like he's dialed in.
10:36And everything Nick Casario and D'Amico Ryans were saying, back that up.
10:40Now we've got words to go with it, too, and there was nothing in that press conference that I saw
10:43last Thursday
10:44that tells me this is a guy that's getting ready to be part of an impasse at some point.
10:48Well, and the other thing that's happened, too, is because the landscape's always changing.
10:53Some of those contracts that were given out previously were when the franchise tag for a quarterback
10:59was going to be really, really punitive and make it hard to operate,
11:04where now you're in an environment where, look, CJ can play two more years, this year and next year,
11:12before the franchise tag even becomes involved.
11:15And as of right now, I think the franchise tag for quarterbacks is about $55 million.
11:20There's a lot of quarterbacks who have cap hits of higher than $45 million right now.
11:25It's not as big a deal to have a quarterback on your roster playing under the franchise tag right this
11:32moment
11:32as it has been in the past.
11:34So the quarterbacks don't have as much leverage as they did a few years ago.
11:39Matt Stafford's going to play.
11:40Now it's Matt Stafford, who's the MVP of the league.
11:42But his cap hit this year is $48 million.
11:45Yeah.
11:46And that'll be interesting.
11:47I don't know if we ever get there with CJ.
11:50I feel like if we get to a stage where we're discussing a franchise tag,
11:54then the team will have already paid him.
11:55He'll have played well enough for the team to already have paid him.
11:58And this is what's so annoying this time of year, though, is that people in the national media,
12:04especially because there's not a whole lot to talk about, want to create some kind of drama or something.
12:10When, look, realistically, okay, Dak Prescott played under the franchise tag.
12:16He's still with the Cowboys.
12:17Lamar Jackson actually hit free, well, modified free agency.
12:21He's still playing with the Ravens.
12:22And those organizations, they haven't reached the heights you want to achieve.
12:26But as far as having the quarterback that they wanted to keep and everything, it all works out in the
12:31end.
12:31So it's only, it's as contentious as the two parties involved want to make it.
12:37And to call it cagey when you're really very early in the process of potentially getting a new,
12:43it's just, that's not backed up by precedent.
12:46There's plenty of other quarterbacks who played after, you know, into their fourth season without a new contract.
12:51I want to skip down to McIntyre here, who hosts this show, Jason McIntyre,
12:55who hosts the show that we're playing the cuts from here, from Colin Cowherd's network.
13:01The Trevor Lawrence extension is the one for me.
13:03If I were C.J. Stroud, if I was any quarterback that was looking to get paid
13:06and I was at a point where the team is kind of, you know, we're kind of in a staring
13:10contest,
13:11that's the extension.
13:13Even with Trevor Lawrence having ascended to where he might be worth the money,
13:16when that took place, Trevor Lawrence was not a good quarterback
13:21and he got paid $275 million over five years.
13:24Here's Jason McIntyre mentioning the Trevor Lawrence contract.
13:27Trevor Lawrence in Jacksonville, you know, he wasn't delivering
13:30and he got the early extension, right?
13:33They didn't wait to kick the can down the road.
13:35It was get early, more quarterbacks are going to get paid.
13:38So all of a sudden Trevor Lawrence was like the highest paid quarterback for like a week
13:41or whatever it was.
13:42And then a slew of other contracts come and the Lawrence deal doesn't look bad.
13:46But I don't think Mooligeta is going to play that game.
13:49Okay.
13:50Yeah, and I guess that's, I mean, the Lawrence deal doesn't look bad.
13:54I would say that's not nearly a consensus opinion.
13:58This is a big year for that, whether or not that contract looks good or bad.
14:02Yep, yep.
14:02And the thing is, if Lawrence were to get an extension this year,
14:06like if that, let's say Lawrence had that really good back half the season,
14:10they wanted to extend him, like he probably wouldn't get much more than the original deal.
14:17No.
14:18Like that's just, that's where we are with quarterback salaries.
14:20They just haven't kept escalating.
14:22People were trying out in front of all these ridiculously expensive contracts
14:27and then all of a sudden everything just kind of stabilized.
14:29Yeah, yeah, that's the weird thing about what McIntyre said right there.
14:32Like they got out in front of it two years ago and then blah, blah, blah.
14:35You know, he's talking about like it was this genius thing to do.
14:38You got Dak at 60 and then you got a slew of guys at 55, one of which is Trevor
14:42Lawrence.
14:42Like he's still tied for the second highest contract in terms of average annual value.
14:47Okay, should we, let's, do we want to play these other McIntyre cuts?
14:52Play the one, play the one that doesn't make any sense at all.
14:55Just to lay it out for everybody, to lay it out for everybody.
14:58I just, I don't, I, McIntyre has been having this discussion with Rich Orenberger
15:03where it feels like he generally understands the timeline and everything.
15:06I give a break to people in the national media because you can't keep track of 32 different teams all
15:11the time.
15:12But just for our listeners' sake, to lay this out, C.J. Stroud, if he plays, if there's no new
15:20contract,
15:20then next year in 2027 he'd be in the fifth year of his deal and he would play under that.
15:262028 would be when the franchise tag would come in.
15:28Right.
15:29So we're talking about that's when you would apply the franchise tag to C.J. Stroud in the year, 2028.
15:34Two years from now.
15:35And then maybe you guys can explain what the hell McIntyre is talking about here.
15:39Do you think I'm a franchise tag, Stroud, and there's a great quarterback class coming up,
15:44I'm going to go take one.
15:45And I'm going to keep drafting quarterbacks every year so I have insurance.
15:48Because, Rich, honestly, Dak Prescott, I think he got the, he was the highest paid quarterback or one of them.
15:5360 million a year is his average salary.
15:55Did the Cowboys make the playoffs the last two years?
15:57No.
15:58And you're going to say, well, it's not Dak.
16:01Yeah, it is.
16:02He made so much money, you can't roster around him.
16:05Okay.
16:06So you're going to franchise Stroud in 2028 and then go back in time and draft one of these illustrious
16:13quarterbacks from this year's class.
16:14I can't believe I'm going to do this.
16:15I can't believe I'm going to do this.
16:17But I am going to give Jason McIntyre the benefit of the doubt.
16:20And just, I think he, I think he meant the fifth-year option and he said the franchise tag.
16:26Oh, okay.
16:27That's what I, that's what I think.
16:29Yeah.
16:29Because I don't think he's that dumb.
16:31Yeah.
16:32Yeah, like, I think he.
16:33Well, but it's also, okay, it's a great quarterback class.
16:36But, like, what would, unless the Texans have a really disappointing season, what exactly entails the Texans?
16:43I'd be like, it's one thing.
16:45Look, the Rams drafted a quarterback and, but who's clearly going to be a backup quarterback this year.
16:49The Texans would have to aggressively trade up to get one of these quarterbacks to potentially replace T.J.'s child,
16:57I guess.
16:58If we're giving McIntyre the benefit of the doubt where they say, okay, he's going to play out that fifth
17:02-year,
17:03they'll draft the quarterback, but he'll play out that fifth-year of his contract.
17:07Okay, do we want to play this one where he talks about billionaires?
17:11Yeah, just because I know he was trying real hard to sound like Colin Cohen.
17:14Yeah, here we go.
17:15Do you trust billionaires?
17:17So, it's funny, you said, do you trust management?
17:18And I would say, Rich, do you trust a lot of billionaires?
17:21Because here at Fox, there's a lot of coaches have come through.
17:25Yeah, the billionaire owner told me this.
17:27And then midway through the season, change his mind, and I get screwed and I'm fired.
17:30Like, I try not to trust a lot of billionaires.
17:32You know, I know a lot of guys, Elon Musk, whatever he says, you got to listen.
17:36I'm going to pass on that one.
17:39See, this is where I wish the guy, Rich Ornberger on there with him, was like, oh, what?
17:44I guarantee it, McIntyre probably has no clue, like, why he's supposed to say that about Elon Musk.
17:49Yeah, I know, yeah, I know.
17:49He knows that Colin makes a lot of analogies to billionaires and finance and all that stuff.
17:55So, he's, yeah, and when he says we've had a lot of coaches come through and say that, you know.
18:02Sean Payton.
18:03Yeah, okay, Sean Payton came through and told you and dissed you a bunch of stuff about how they operate.
18:09The other part there, though, too, is in trying to shoehorn billionaires into the conversation,
18:13I think at least as far as the way the Texans operate, I mean, it's Nick Casario.
18:19And it's not, you know, Cal is very much, Cal and Hannah are pretty hands-off in terms of the
18:25way they dictate things to their coaches.
18:28Compared to a lot of other organizations.
18:30Yep, no, they live in.
18:31As the Cowboys, that's a whole different deal because your billionaire owner is also the general manager.
18:34Correct, correct.
Comments