00:01The ESPN put out their rankings of the best lineups.
00:04These are starting lineups for all 32 NFL teams.
00:07Number one, the LA Rams.
00:09Miles Garrett lined up as the edge rusher on the other end of Byron Young over there.
00:14They have Matt Stafford.
00:15They have Kyron Williams.
00:17Kuka Nakua, as long as he can keep healthy and keep his head out of the clouds there.
00:22And they got a really good football team.
00:24That's number one.
00:25Do you know where the Cleveland Browns finished in their rankings of the top starting lineups in all the NFL?
00:31Well, I'm guessing it's not great.
00:33It's not.
00:34It's 31st.
00:35They're only ahead of the Miami Dolphins in terms of their lineup.
00:39It says biggest strength, the front seven.
00:41Even though they had lost Miles Garrett, they still bring back Jared Verse, this, that, and the other.
00:46You know, you got Mason Graham, Carson Swessinger.
00:48Of course, you know what they say their biggest weakness is.
00:51It's quarterback.
00:52And Deshaun Watson and Shador Sanders, it doesn't seem like they have a very much amount of faith in either
00:58one.
00:59And then you get into the Dylan Gabriel, Taylor Green stuff, which doesn't really matter a whole lot.
01:04Their X factor is the offensive line.
01:06Certainly true.
01:08Non started to know they wrote Emmanuel McNeil-Warren, which is certainly a very big one.
01:13It was a bit surprising, they said, when he failed to pick 58 in the second round.
01:17A natural box safety who will need to work on his coverage skills in the NFL, so expect him to
01:23play a linebacker-like role in a lot of these safety sets.
01:25That's from Aaron Schatz, if I'm not mistaken.
01:28So they're 31st.
01:29I want to know whether you take that as a good or a bad thing.
01:31I want to know whether or not people take that as a good or a bad thing.
01:34Because me as a person who wants to win, I don't take it as a very good thing.
01:37I always want to win until I reach a point where it's like, alright, I'm not going to be so
01:40upset that they lose.
01:42I'm not going to sit there and, like, I blow blood vessels at times when they lose.
01:47Because they do things that are silly, they have done things that are silly and lazy at times, and I
01:52just can't stand it as a bunch of grown individuals.
01:55But you do reach a point where you can see your future happening, and you go, well, it ain't so
01:59bad.
02:00But there's plenty of people, they think that this quarterback conversation that we have almost every day didn't have one
02:04yesterday.
02:05And right now, I'm not having one right now.
02:07This quarterback conversation that we have nearly every day is a waste.
02:10And that they're already looking forward to 2027.
02:12If you see 31st, I want to know whether or not people think that that's a positive or a negative.
02:17Yeah, I actually could spin this as a positive.
02:21Spin it?
02:21I could spin it as a positive.
02:23Because young teams lose in this league.
02:26Doesn't mean that there's not talent there.
02:28Young teams with talent, with young talent.
02:31They lose games because they aren't ready for the league.
02:36They haven't been in the games.
02:39There are just other teams actually trying to win and making it their goal to go to the playoffs.
02:44And so you could have a team brimming with young talent that could still lose so many games.
02:50Which, to me, could be the best of both worlds.
02:54Where you have solid drafts, good drafts, maybe great drafts.
02:59But still lose a ton of games.
03:01And then you're put in position to get the quarterback that you would want to get.
03:05That aligns with that perfect storm, that right timing in what is supposed to be a big time quarterback draft.
03:13And then that sets that quarterback up so much better the following year.
03:17Well, this is my issue.
03:18I understand what you're saying, but one, you said you can spin it.
03:21Which means that's not how you feel.
03:22You say you can spin it.
03:24When you admit that you can spin it, you're telling me that's not how you feel in your first draft.
03:28Well, wait a second.
03:29What don't I feel?
03:29I mean, I do feel like they've had some nice drafts.
03:31I think you're trying to spin it into a positive, but I think you feel dreadful about this.
03:35And I think I want to hear you tell me the truth.
03:37It's not good for Todd Munkin.
03:37No, it's not.
03:38I think it's worse for Andrew Barry, to be honest with you.
03:40Like, the young, talented teams do lose a lot of games in the NFL.
03:44That is kind of how the league works.
03:46Like, especially when you say goodbye to Miles Garrett, you're probably saying goodbye to Denzel Ward.
03:50I don't know what's going on with Grant Delpit.
03:51So, the defense, which has been the one thing, you know, you knew was going to be consistent time and
03:57time again.
03:58Like, their defense, you could tell me their defense is bottom 10 this year.
04:01I'd be like, oh, well, yeah, they don't have Miles Garrett, and they traded Denzel Ward at some point.
04:05Like, I could see that.
04:06I mean, Jared Burst could be really good, and there's really good players on all sorts of bad defense.
04:10I think that defense going into the season is just the biggest wild card ever.
04:13It is.
04:13Oh, yeah.
04:13Because it wasn't like Miles Garrett was the most emotional leader, far from it, but they knew he was the
04:18best player.
04:19And a guy like that's going to make everybody's jobs easier.
04:21Now, Jared Burst is a really good football player.
04:23He's not Miles Garrett.
04:25It's going to make everybody's jobs a little bit more harder.
04:27But a guy who can make jobs real hard is Mike Rutenberg.
04:29Because we have seen firsthand what a person who has some common sense can do with a defense and what
04:35a person who just refuses to change their alignments can do against a defense.
04:40We have seen that with this generation of the Cleveland Browns.
04:43So, as exciting as Mike Rutenberg, as excitable as he is, as fresh as he seems to be, I know
04:49he's 44, but it seems like a young 44, as exciting as that can be, I still got to keep
04:54him at arm's length.
04:55Because he's replacing a guy that was a fan favorite.
04:57And also, you can put people in the wrong place.
05:00But I have to make sure that that's going to be good.
05:02That being pointed out, like, I'm a guy who wants to win, but I'm also trying to think about long
05:05-term stuff here.
05:06So, if you just want a quarterback, if people just want a quarterback, hey, you should be looking at this
05:10going, yep, that's exactly where I want him to be.
05:12The young guys will play.
05:13They'll probably show a little bit of promise, but the thing ain't good right now.
05:16And maybe we'll find ourselves in a spot for a quarterback.
05:19But I think there's so much more to that.
05:20You mentioned Todd Munkin.
05:22Todd Munkin, whether I want to say it or not, and I hate talking about it, and I don't want
05:25to take it further than this,
05:26could end up being a one-and-done coach, and I don't want that to happen.
05:29Two, Andrew Barry, I think his last two drafts, we'll find out more about this year,
05:33but the last draft that he had was still very, very good, even though you got Dylan Gabriel there in
05:36the third round,
05:37but we blame Kevin Stefanski on that.
05:39Are you going to finish the vision, whatever that is, with Andrew Barry at the end of this year?
05:44Like, these things, and if you bring in another GM, remember,
05:48they always think they've got to reinvent the wheel when they get here.
05:50So now the players that we like and we think are young and exciting,
05:53maybe they'll think they're real football players for you.
05:56It happens all the time.
05:56And then you have a difference of opinion of quarterbacks.
05:59And if you're taking a quarterback, you're going to bring in a guy here who's been,
06:03obviously he's been doing his homework, but might have been doing his homework for another team,
06:06or like in John Dorsey's case, was on the beach doing his homework.
06:09Like, there's a lot that plays into that.
06:12I don't think continuity is the only reason to keep Andrew Barry employed,
06:15but it doesn't make me feel good when they're 31st going into a season,
06:19according to one big website.
06:21Well, not to mention, this is ESPN.
06:23You can talk about the optimism you have for a lot of young players,
06:26but it does suck to lose week in and week out,
06:29even if guys are shining, guys are making plays,
06:33and it's just the other teams are flat out better, more experienced.
06:37You know, you're just still going to run into that.
06:39It's not a great schedule, though, with the losses racking up.
06:42I should say they're not good football teams.
06:44There's a lot of not good football teams you're playing that don't have a lot of experience.
06:47Sure, and obviously they circle the Browns when they get a chance to play you.
06:50I understand that, but if you have some smart football players on your team,
06:53you might be able to win a few.
06:54So rankings are rankings, I get that, but 31st, that's really, really bad.
06:59I mean, that could be seen as a flat-out disrespect,
07:02or the cold honest truth, depending on how you see it.
07:05It's both, right? It is both.
07:07It's a disrespectful truth.
07:09It's basically what you make it out to be.
07:10But I don't want to turn it into a good thing.
07:15I just want to look at it in terms of you're 31st, you're only ahead of Miami,
07:19which Miami, I mean...
07:21Well, everyone says it's just tanking.
07:22Well, do we want to reevaluate the Malik Willis arguments
07:24that we used to have day in and day out at the end of the football season last year,
07:27considering they're worse off than we are,
07:29and they're the ones that signed Malik Willis,
07:30and apparently he wasn't even going to give us a meeting at the end of all this?
07:33I think Malik Willis was just a dart.
07:36They threw the dart.
07:37If he ends up being really good, then it's a coup.
07:40If he's just on a bad football team and he's a bad quarterback,
07:44then where are they going to be positioned?
07:46And if he works out great, if not, he doesn't work out fine.
07:49So when I have the 31st, because they have the projected starters, by the way,
07:53Deshaun Watson is listed as the projected starter quarterback.
07:57Does any of that change with Shador Sanders?
08:00No, they probably think he's worse.
08:01Well, they probably do, but I'm saying, is it any bit of a sunnier disposition?
08:07Or is this an argument to me against Deshaun Watson to even start going,
08:11hey, if you're 31st, and if Shador Sanders isn't going to make that big of a difference
08:15to your overall rankings of what it is, then what the hell are we latching on to
08:19with this guy who all he does is remind us of bad football?
08:23Yeah, I think that's probably the thought.
08:25But you've got to remember just how, especially these people who look at the analytics,
08:32and where did they see Shador Sanders last year?
08:36They saw him as an all-time bad rookie quarterback.
08:40They're not as excited about some of the nice plays that we're excited about.
08:45They're just writing him off.
08:46They're saying a fifth-round pick that has that rookie year on a bad team
08:49that's going to be even worse next year in their minds is zero shot.
08:52Which I don't understand why they need to just write him off.
08:56I mean, there is a conversation to have about him being a starter.
08:58Now, that pointed out, how high-end of a starter can he be?
09:01I'm not sure.
09:02I mean, the people that I respect, they're really looking at him right now saying,
09:05well, he's a guy who can start, but he's more of a high-end replacement quarterback.
09:11Yeah.
09:12Which is, if you're coming from the fifth round, that's fantastic.
09:16Yeah, that's a good story.
09:17But you're dealing with a lot of people who thought he should have been drafted much higher than that.
09:20And, in fact, we've got to admit, we were surprised that he fell to day three for crying out loud
09:24there.
09:24So there is a lot to argue about with Shador.
09:28But I see some of this, and I go, well, then why are we even arguing about Deshaun Watson?
09:31If we're going to be 31st no matter what, what the hell are we even doing with this other guy?
09:36Other than, I guess he counts against the cap, and I guess he'd be too much of a hit to
09:42cut.
09:42So I guess we might as well hold on and see what he has.
09:44But that's not a great argument to play him.
09:46We got the humongous cap savings thanks to the insurance play.
09:51Can you make sense of that?
09:53Because if Jack Duffin is looking at this going, man, this is in a different language here,
09:56then what the hell are you supposed to do?
09:57I was wrong.
09:58I thought for sure that they were going to look at it and go, nah, he probably could have played
10:02at the end of last year.
10:03You guys held him out.
10:04You're not going to get that insurance money.
10:06No, apparently they did.
10:07Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute.
10:07You could work out and still not be able to play.
10:09There's plenty of guys who go through workouts, and they're not able to play.
10:12Oh, yeah, but how could you prove the inverse, right?
10:16Like, couldn't every team just say, nope, can't play, insurance, let's collect.
10:20But you've got to go with the player.
10:21If the player can't play, then am I supposed to take him to court and accuse him of lying about
10:25his own health?
10:25That's what I mean.
10:26You would think this is like a way around the salary cap, that all teams would just be buying these
10:30insurance policies.
10:32I think a lot of them do.
10:33They just don't have guys who miss entire seasons after they sign these guaranteed contracts because of injuries.
10:39So a lot of them probably do.
10:41They just never have to exercise it because the guys end up playing.
10:44Because if you're still able to play, but you play poorly, you get nothing back.
10:48He was able to play and play poorly until he wasn't.
10:50So you get something back.
10:51I don't know how much you're going to be able to help yourself with it.
10:53I saw some national people were like, this is insurance fraud.
10:55And I'm like, what did we get out of it?
10:57It's insurance fraud done poorly then.
10:59Because what did we get out of the whole experience?
11:02You're supposed to gain from it.
11:04He wasn't able to play.
11:05How was it fraud?
11:05Well, because they saw him at the end of that year looking like he probably could have played.
11:11And then the other mysterious injury.
11:14That's interesting.
11:15Remember the mysterious injury that we were told it wasn't in Berea?
11:19It was down in Florida.
11:20It was rehabbing, but he got injured again.
11:22We got another surgery.
11:23Yeah, I know.
11:24But it was like, how did he get injured?
11:25Did he get injured working out or did he get injured hanging out?
11:28There's a big difference.
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