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00:00Audio courtesy of ESPN. This sucks.
00:03It's probably the most prudent move for everybody involved.
00:06I'm not going to sit there and deny that, but it sucks.
00:09And you know why it sucks?
00:10Is because I've had numerous arguments with numerous people over numerous years
00:15about, you know, what has Miles Garrett given you?
00:17What have you won with Miles Garrett?
00:19I've always fired back with, you know, just imagine what we wouldn't have won
00:21if we didn't have Miles Garrett.
00:23And then I came to this epiphany yesterday,
00:25because there were a lot of people going,
00:27there were some people who immediately turned and said,
00:29good riddance to hell with them.
00:30I'm like, no.
00:31But I'll tell you this.
00:33Why it sucks is that there's still more waiting to go.
00:37There's still more strife and argument to go over the most premier position.
00:44We know the position they have to go after.
00:46But the real reason it sucks is that with the exception of three years, basically,
00:53four maybe, if you really want to get technical about it,
00:56you've been bad since 1999.
00:59But when Miles was here, it's like, we're not good, but we have somebody special.
01:07This morning, now we're just another bad team,
01:10and we're just another bad team looking for a quarterback.
01:14That's all there is.
01:15Like, there was the Cardinals, the Jets, the Dolphins, just speaking about this year.
01:21Like, the Raiders had Max Crosby, but he ain't that guy.
01:24And we had that guy.
01:27That guy was special.
01:28That guy won a bunch of awards.
01:30And it's like, man, if we could just get the right play from the most important position,
01:35he's the second most, but the most, arguably, the second most,
01:39the second most important position, arguably,
01:41if we could just get that one piece, damn it, we'd have it.
01:46And now it seems just, we woke up this morning,
01:49and we are still further away than where we were yesterday.
01:52And to go further away, after going through 10 years of playing around
01:58and kind of sort of flirting with being competitive, it sucks.
02:01The prudent move?
02:03Yeah.
02:04Probably the common sense move?
02:05Yeah.
02:05It sucks.
02:08He's obviously the best Browns player I've ever seen.
02:12And I'd be stunned if the Browns ever have a better player than Miles Garrett.
02:17I know if we get, like, a quarterback that's middle of the road,
02:19we'll call them better because they'll have more of an impact on winning, potentially.
02:24But they'll never be in the same stratosphere as Miles Garrett.
02:27Like, I'd be stunned if in my lifetime there is a better player that wears that uniform.
02:32And what, we get him for nine years?
02:34Yeah.
02:35We have him for nine years total, which is, I mean, in today's day and age in sports,
02:39I mean, we had LeBron for seven the first go-around.
02:43David Ajoku, was he here for nine?
02:46Yeah.
02:47That was a total of nine years?
02:48He was the same dragon class.
02:50Yeah, that was a three-man draft.
02:51You just don't see that in, like, Jose Ramirez.
02:55That's, like, shocking in today's day and age, especially in baseball.
02:58You're a small market, you hold on to a guy like that.
03:00So, there's a lot of emotions because we feel like we know Miles as well as anybody.
03:07And we've also traversed the roller coaster of the Miles Garrett from having to have a State of the Union
03:15address after the helmet situation.
03:17When Baker Mayfield went off, you know, on national television about that whole situation, we all had to choose sides.
03:24Are you on Baker's side or are you on Miles' side?
03:28And just riding that wave of somebody as talented and as a freak in nature, and then he continued to
03:34get better.
03:35Like, every year, Miles Garrett got better.
03:37And I'm like, well, he can't possibly get better.
03:39And now I'm hearing people say, well, why can't he get 30 sacks?
03:42So, people think he might even get better than what we just saw last year, which was, you know, an
03:46all-time sack record in the NFL,
03:47which was, I thought, really entertaining.
03:49Yeah.
03:49I know I asked people yesterday, I'm like, was it worth it to hang on to him for another year?
03:54Because I think they would have gotten more potentially in trade compensation.
03:59And people were mixed.
04:00Like, they did get to see the record, albeit on a losing team.
04:04But it was still pretty awesome to see the record.
04:06So, you know, it forced everybody to kind of have a value judgment on what this season was all about.
04:12But in the end, I was so shocked to hear, like, I was in the airports yesterday,
04:18two different airports listening to the afternoon show.
04:20It was a great show.
04:21I just fundamentally disagreed with the tone of the show.
04:25But their tone was mirroring a lot of the fans' emotion.
04:29And, I mean, I had just taken emotion out of it so long ago, Miles.
04:32What time were you listening?
04:34I was able to catch the first hour.
04:36And then I was in flight and then caught, like, the 5 o'clock hour.
04:39Okay, because the 6 o'clock hour was exceedingly different from the hours, the early hours of the show.
04:46It was a wild, wild show yesterday afternoon.
04:49Where, when I tuned in, it seemed like they were helping guys along with us.
04:54Like, there were some guys just, like, down about it.
04:56Like, they understood.
04:58And they just went, like, man, it's, again, they were saying the same thing I just said.
05:01Like, this sucks.
05:02It's an admission that this team is not going to be good.
05:07The only thing I disagreed with with what I heard yesterday, and this was in the first hour,
05:12was that having Jared versed doesn't mean that they're tanking.
05:16It's like, well, they've had Miles Garrett before and went 0-16.
05:19So, I mean, getting a young, quality player, that doesn't mean that they're going to still strive to win games.
05:27I mean, some of this is still, like, what are they going to be?
05:29What are they going to do?
05:31Because it's still up in the air.
05:32It still seems that Deshaun Watson would be the leader for quarterback,
05:34which I got more on that coming up later on in the hour, probably at 7 o'clock.
05:38But when it comes to Miles, like, I kind of want to know.
05:40Like, there was, I think there was an initial rage.
05:44Definitely, I was disappointed with the haul.
05:47But can I admit something here?
05:49Is that he's the greatest defensive player I've ever seen for the Cleveland Browns.
05:52And he's, I mean, when it comes to physical attributes and everything,
05:55I mean, he's just the best that I've ever seen play for the Cleveland Browns.
05:58So, naturally, I'm going to overrate the haul that I get back for Miles Garrett.
06:02It seemed that to a lot of pundits, 30 was the magic number.
06:05Once he got to 30, that was it.
06:07And so, that was going to take away.
06:09Because I, honestly, I affixed a lot to what Elliott Wolfe,
06:12because he doesn't say anything by accident.
06:13So, when he's talking about three first-round picks, it's like, okay,
06:16there was definitely conversations.
06:18That was the asking price to it.
06:19And then, I was just in flat-out denial because of some of the stuff you brought up.
06:24And the reason I was is, no offense to you,
06:26I mean, I know we've had knock-down drag-outs before over it.
06:29But the reason I was is because I had heard it all before.
06:32And I'm telling you right now, it was the Rutenberg thing last week
06:35that kind of just made my throat gulp because I'm going,
06:39man, this guy,
06:41like, tornado warning sirens keep better secrets than this.
06:44This is not good.
06:46And there were people saying I was making too big a deal.
06:48I'm not making too big a deal about this.
06:49This was a confident guy.
06:51And he's humming a, humming a, humming over here
06:53when he's asked a question about Miles Garrett.
06:54And that's when the wheels started turning.
06:56And then, of course, you know, we were getting texts on Sunday about it.
06:59And off we went, and here we are.
07:00Yeah, and in the end, we weren't making a big enough deal about it.
07:03But I have to say, maybe I was divorced from the fandom
07:08more than the emotional fans that were calling into the afternoon show yesterday
07:12that I was keeping that at arm's length
07:14because I always thought he was getting traded.
07:15So you do play a trick.
07:17Your mind plays a trick on you, right?
07:20See, I didn't, but I didn't want to believe it.
07:22But if in my mind I always thought he was getting traded,
07:24I was already starting to separate, you know,
07:28the emotional toll, I was trying to do everything I could to avoid any of that
07:32because I never thought Miles Garrett was going to be involved
07:36in the iteration of the Browns that would be on the way up.
07:39I always thought he was going to be the means to an end.
07:43And whether that's just the Miles trade in and of itself
07:46with the compensation, if that was going to be used to jockey
07:49for position in the first round,
07:51or if just by virtue of Miles not being here,
07:54does that put them in a better spot
07:56to potentially get the No. 1 or No. 2 quarterbacks,
08:00maybe No. 3, who knows, in next year's draft?
08:02I had just kind of mentally moved on,
08:05but maybe that, again, is how I cope with stuff like this.
08:08They'll say differently because, of course, they have to say differently.
08:11I mean, we know what this is about.
08:12And I got to a point yesterday.
08:14I'm not...
08:15I'm just tired of fighting.
08:17I'm tired of the arguments.
08:18I'm tired of the fights over the guys that aren't so good.
08:20I mean, guys, if they thought the quarterback was on the roster,
08:23they wouldn't have traded Miles Garrett.
08:24So, we understand what they feel about their roster right now
08:27and where they think they're going to go
08:29and where they need to go.
08:30So, I'm sure they'll talk up Deshaun Watson
08:33and they'll say all these great things,
08:34but I don't think that they think very highly.
08:36And I think that they'll probably talk up eventually Shador Sanders
08:39or whoever ends up playing quarterback,
08:41and I just don't think they think very highly.
08:43So, if this is the move to go out and get the quarterback,
08:46go out and get the quarterback.
08:47Now, I'm not going to sit there and hope that they lose
08:48because I'll never allow myself to do it.
08:50It'll never happen.
08:50But, as of this moment, and obviously things change
08:56in the heat of the day, I find it very hard to work myself up
09:01depending on how they look like in the preseason.
09:03And I've got to feel it's going to be very hard for me
09:06to work myself up about this season, you know,
09:09when they go out there and they do lose games.
09:11And the defense does take a step back
09:13because Jared Verse is a fine player, good player, dog even.
09:18And we'll probably add that leadership element
09:21that we've always been wondering and asking of Myles Garrett
09:24that he just has not provided.
09:26That I'll never take back.
09:27But I don't know how much of a difference it's going to matter
09:31in the grand scheme of things.
09:32I don't know how bad they're going to be.
09:33I don't know how bad they're going to be.
09:35But I think that we all know that this is kind of the plan now,
09:39is to take a swing at 2027.
09:41If we want to talk Soresby, we can talk Soresby up and down, whatever.
09:44I don't care.
09:46But I think that the quarterback conversation is right there in 2027.
09:50It's just, how low can you go to go out and get that guy?
09:54At least that's how I feel right now.
09:55And I mean, I've had 18 hours to sit here and think about it.
09:57So that's how I feel right now.
09:59Did you notice, though, there seemed to be a change
10:03over the course of the day immediately when the trade was announced?
10:06Because you've got to remember,
10:07we were never truly talking about, in any other way than the three first-round picks.
10:14We were never really talking about a current player.
10:16So I think it was hard for people to recalibrate the math
10:20on what that meant to get somebody as good as Verst.
10:23So again, we have to acknowledge he's not Myles Garrett.
10:26He'll never be Myles Garrett.
10:27But somebody as good as him on a rookie, team-controlled contract,
10:33like that's the value part that emotionally fans aren't going to understand.
10:36Their mind doesn't go to salary cap mechanics when you lose Myles Garrett.
10:41Like, I understand that.
10:42No, but this isn't a knock against Jared Verst whatsoever.
10:44My whole goal is, now you've got to find the quarterback
10:47so I don't waste any time with Jared Verst.
10:48Like, we've wasted, we really have, three playoff games over ten years,
10:53nine seasons with Myles Garrett, three with the premier pass rusher,
10:57arguably by the time it's all said and done, in the history of the league.
11:00That's some tremendous territory when you think about some of the names.
11:03And it feels wasted because of the mismanagement, because of the problems,
11:09because people got too emotional at times and they made silly decisions.
11:13Because, honestly, I mean, you go back to Myles,
11:15Myles' hands is dirty on this.
11:16You remember the Mary Kay Cabot article years ago.
11:19It's not that he's completely clean of that.
11:20I think that that's in the back of a lot of people's heads
11:23as that's been brought up.
11:24The whole me or him sort of thing when it came to Baker Mayfield.
11:27And here we are with neither.
11:28And Baker Mayfield isn't God's gift,
11:30but he sure is helped better than what we're talking about here.
11:32So, now, it's, all right, the Myles thing happened.
11:37I hate that it happened.
11:39I hate that it happened this way.
11:40I hate that he couldn't finish his career with the Browns.
11:43Now, I know I got a good player in Jared Verse.
11:45I don't want the same thing to happen to him.
11:47Because now, we are at liquidation time.
11:50That all these other teams have had to go through
11:52who have had their quarterbacks.
11:53We just haven't had that quarterback.
11:55So, now, the clock is now ticking on Denzel Ward.
11:58And, yeah, I know.
11:59They said, no way on Denzel Ward.
12:01Yeah, well, now you can't believe anything that they say.
12:03So, that's always going to be a conversation.
12:05He's 29.
12:06You're not going to get a first-round pick.
12:08I imagine that could be more trade deadline.
12:10Probably.
12:11We'll see.
12:11Yeah, probably.
12:13So, I mean, that's kind of where I'm at.
12:15But I'm not, I didn't, like, go to bed last night.
12:20You're ruining the Cleveland Browns.
12:22You're thinking about how maniacal this has all been.
12:26And Jimmy Haslam this.
12:27Listen, like, we already pay, we've been paying that price for a while.
12:30We've known the Deshaun Watson deal, however you want to phrase it,
12:35most yesterday, mostly it was worst deal of all time in sports.
12:38Whatever you want to call it.
12:40That was the disaster, right?
12:41I mean, obviously, we all had envisioned the Browns getting a potential top-five quarterback,
12:46pairing him with Miles Garrett, and then winning games.
12:49And it just never happened.
12:50It just didn't happen, and it's going to go down as a terrible trade,
12:53and we'll never know, would Baker Mayfield have also bottomed out the way he did in Carolina?
12:57Whatever.
12:58I wasn't thinking about Baker Mayfield yesterday.
13:00I heard the afternoon show kept bringing him up, kept bringing him up, kept bringing him up,
13:03kept bringing him up, to throw that in another log onto the fire of,
13:08this is, like, the worst organization in sports.
13:11And, like, they made one of the most critical mistakes in NFL football history,
13:16and they paid for it, and you'd throw this in as the last vestige of that.
13:23But you can't deny this was the right move.
13:26This was always going to be the right move.
13:28And maybe, again, mentally, I was preparing myself for it,
13:31but I tried to prepare the fans for it as best I could,
13:34that this was going to have to be the way to the other side.
13:37And to see, by the end of yesterday, most of the NFL people,
13:42where I value their opinion, they're like, yeah, this is a good haul.
13:45This is pretty good.
13:46I saw some people saying the Browns won the trade.
13:48I can't go that far.
13:49You can't ever win a trade where you lose Miles Garrett.
13:51Well, somebody tweeted at me that they fleeced him, and I go, man,
13:55they're trying to host a Super Bowl again.
13:57They're hosting a Super Bowl, and they're trying to play in a Super Bowl again.
14:00They got a first ballot Hall of Famer who, if they win a Super Bowl with that guy,
14:03is going in as a Los Angeles Ram.
14:07And you got a nice haul.
14:10Again, it felt like to me at the very first blush,
14:12because we always overrate our own players,
14:14but let's not go using the F word here, guys.
14:16Let's not go do that.
14:17I mean, there's telling ourselves things to feel better,
14:21and I'm the king of that.
14:22And then there's just silliness.
14:24Let's not go nuts.
14:25That's all.
14:26I think the Browns are as well-suited as they've ever been
14:30to actually do this thing the right way now.
14:32And I think, unfortunately, trading Miles Garrett was a part of that.
14:35I know people are not going to understand that.
14:37How is that the right way to trade somebody
14:39who's the best Cleveland Browns football player in most of our lifetimes?
14:43But I do think this is the most responsible move you could possibly make.
14:48And the fact they got a really good player involved in it, too,
14:52and you combine it with the last two drafts,
14:54I think the arrow is actually pointing up.
14:56I know that's going to be hard for anybody watching games this year.
14:59Not this year.
14:59No, no, not this year.
15:02Unless Shador surprises me and surprises a lot of people.
15:06When's he going to play?
15:07Week 6?
15:08Because as of right now, everybody says the other guy's a leader in the clubhouse.
15:10And I think that might be the best thing for Shador to play week 6 or week 7.
15:14That'll be a discussion we will have many, many, many, many, many times over.
15:172-1-6-4-7-4-0-0-92.
15:19Have you warned up to the trade?
15:21Do you understand the trade?
15:23He's mad about it.
15:24He's still mad.
15:25There were plenty of people who said that.
15:26I mean, I had messages from people from Timbuktu to Portland, Maine,
15:30to Portland, Oregon, who were Browns fans, who said that they were done.
15:33Of course, that was at 2.30 in the afternoon.
15:36I wonder if the tenor has changed a little bit.
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