- 13 minutes ago
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00Baskin and Phelps, 92.3 The Fan.
00:02Brown's getting set for week three.
00:04They are one and one.
00:06I don't know if a lot of people expected that to happen,
00:08and we'll find out if our next guest expected that.
00:10He's a super friend of the show.
00:12NFL Blue Book is his new home,
00:14and it's a place where you need to go to
00:15to get all of the latest from Charles Robinson,
00:19who joins us now on the Why Start Right?
00:21We Make It Right.
00:22Call Kyle Wright Hotline.
00:24Make sure you're reading his daily email, too.
00:26I love getting stuff from Charles, too.
00:27When I see that Blue Book email light up, it makes my day.
00:32How are you, Charles?
00:33I'm doing well, gents.
00:34We're right where we thought we would be, right?
00:37Oh, one and one, for sure, yes.
00:39In the week three, yeah.
00:40The storyline changed pretty quickly.
00:44It was impressive, though.
00:45I actually watched some of it on Sunday.
00:48I re-watched the game on Tuesday.
00:51It's definitely a lot to like there, for sure.
00:54What part impressed you the most, then, as we talk about that game?
00:57Well, you know, if we tie it back to conversations we had, you know,
01:03going back into camp and why was Watson named the starter
01:06and all those different things,
01:09I thought there was some tangible evidence of, okay,
01:12now I'm starting to understand the decision that Todd Munkin made
01:17only because Deshaun Watson made us, at least for a one-game snapshot,
01:21understand it.
01:22And I think what I mean by that is when I went through and I talked to people
01:29in the organization, they're like, oh, you know, Todd asks quarterbacks
01:32to do all these things.
01:32You have to be able to assess things before the snap, get the motion right,
01:38say, you know, make all the calls that you need to make.
01:42We saw that in the game against Tampa, you know,
01:46and like one particular play that I thought was really interesting,
01:49it was the 55-yard touchdown to Boston.
01:53And he said, you know, later he comes and he says, you know,
01:55Deshaun put me into a post in that play.
01:57So that means Deshaun got to the line, he looked there, you know,
02:01broke the huddle, looked at the defense, saw, you know,
02:04exactly what needed to be dialed up, saw the look,
02:07and got his X receiver into the proper look
02:12and then got him the ball and let him go to work.
02:15And so I'm like, okay, well, that's certainly what Todd Munkin
02:20was talking about when he wanted to name a starter.
02:23He wanted to have a guy who could run his suite of offense
02:25and diagnose things.
02:27And then also I thought what was interesting too,
02:29listening to Munkin talk about it afterward,
02:32I think it's the other thing.
02:34It's the adaptability of a quarterback.
02:36When early in a game, Tampa Bay's, look,
02:41when you're under center and you're going through play actions
02:44and you have to do all these post-snap reads
02:50and Tampa's attacking that successfully and then Munkin goes,
02:53okay, we're going to switch to shotgun.
02:55We're just going to get the ball out as fast as possible
02:59and we're going to let him dial it up and operate in space.
03:03They made that adjustment and Watson was comfortable with it.
03:06Like you could see it.
03:07He looked a lot better, didn't he, Charles, out of the shotgun?
03:09Yeah, he did.
03:10He looked decisive.
03:12I thought he looked really decisive.
03:13I thought it was interesting.
03:14I saw a next-gen stat that said, you know,
03:17he went from like three seconds in the pocket to two and a half seconds in week two.
03:21That's a big, that's a pretty big difference.
03:24And especially when you're playing a pressure team like Tampa.
03:26So I thought, I thought things, I thought I saw things with Watson where I'm like,
03:32this looks in a one-game snapshot, it looks real,
03:36and it looks like things that can be replicated if he can, you know,
03:43continue to make the adjustments in game when it's necessary.
03:47So, you know, again, it's two weeks.
03:50I never want to get ahead of myself here.
03:52I think this will be an important week.
03:54Carolina's a good team.
03:55I expect Carolina, you know, they've been putting up points this season.
04:01So it's going to be a good challenge.
04:03But I, just from a progress standpoint, I saw the connection with Munkin, you know,
04:10how it's working out with him and Watson at this point,
04:13and you hope that's kind of this trajectory.
04:16Charles, I kind of thought that one game alone is enough to think that he's
04:22off the hook for, like, any short-term starting quarterback gig.
04:26It made me think, all right, he's got four or five more starts that, you know,
04:31he bought some real goodwill with Todd Munkin because of what you said.
04:35Munkin made the choice in the first place,
04:37and then Deshaun just backed up the reason why.
04:40I can't imagine that he gets yanked after a game or two.
04:44I mean, look, if he continues to play some, you know,
04:49semblance of what he did in week two.
04:52I mean, look, they accessed his legs.
04:55They used them, you know, at times, you know, design quarterback runs.
04:58There was some, you know, some RPOs, some boots.
05:04That was encouraging, you know, because I was kind of like,
05:06I don't know if he's still got it, you know, below the waist anymore.
05:09If he does, then that's a really significant positive.
05:13But maybe the one thing I would say that just gives me a tiny bit of pause.
05:17He goes 24 of 30, 238 yards, two touchdowns.
05:22Could have been better.
05:23I mean, you know, Boston doesn't convert the touchdown on the deep throw
05:27in the back corner of the end zone,
05:29so those numbers could have been even better.
05:31But, you know, the 55-yard touchdown to Boston,
05:35if you take that away from the stat line, then it's like you're like, okay.
05:41Then it was just, it's an okay game.
05:44That's kind of like a game manager type of game.
05:46You know, it's 183-yard passing game and one touchdown.
05:51And it's maybe not as, and a lot of that 55-yard touchdown was yak.
05:58So let's just see the consistency here.
06:01But, yeah, I would say it was positive enough to me where I'm like,
06:08it would just have to be absolutely catastrophic now, I think,
06:11for you to start yanking it back and forth and once again go back to, you know,
06:16a controversy of, you know, who's going to be starting, who's not.
06:19I mean, that kind of answers my question.
06:22I was going to say, where does that leave Shador Sanders?
06:23But where, a little bit more, where do you think that leaves Shador's future?
06:27Sure, and as we see quarterbacks getting hurt around the NFL,
06:30you have to wonder, what's Sanders' future?
06:33What might be Gabriel's future?
06:35And, you know, we sit around talking about Watson,
06:38but, I mean, we kind of know Watson's future starts as soon as the season's over.
06:44Yeah, I think we don't have a big enough snapshot yet to know, like, how real this is.
06:51And it would only take a couple of games before, you know,
06:55if this reverts back to week one, it would only take a couple of games to go,
07:00okay, we're back to square one now and we're looking at Shador
07:04and when is he going to get an opportunity and what's that going to look like?
07:09So I think the snapshot, it's just too small to make that call.
07:14In terms of, like, other teams out there and the quarterback injuries,
07:17and obviously there's a lot, I just don't think,
07:20I think if any teams are making moves to add quarterbacks to their roster,
07:26they're doing it in a, like, okay, we're making this move to win now.
07:31We've got to, like, let's say it's the Giants, right?
07:33People are talking about, well, you know, go call for Mac Jones, right?
07:37Well, why would the Niners give up Mac Jones?
07:39Like, their quarterback has the problems that he's had in the past
07:43from an injury standpoint, so that doesn't make a lot of sense.
07:45We'll go get Tyler Huntley, you know, John Harbaugh's got a relationship
07:50with Tyler Huntley from his Baltimore days.
07:52Again, why would Baltimore give up a Tyler Huntley?
07:56Because they may need him.
07:57If anything, I think a lot of teams out there are looking at the situation
08:00and going, well, we might need our backup quarterback.
08:02When it comes to, like, Dylan Gabriel and Shador, I don't know,
08:08especially the teams that have lost quarterbacks
08:10or had quarterback injuries this early, I don't think the player you'd look to add
08:15is someone who's, like, A, not established, has not shown success as a starter.
08:20B, is in a developmental phase of their career, which Shador and Dylan Gabriel are.
08:26And, you know, C, has shown limitations.
08:29Dylan Gabriel, it's the size.
08:31You know, Shador, it's the lack of consistency over his start.
08:37So, I just don't know that there's the appetite out there to add.
08:42Plus, look, the 2027 quarterback class is going to be pressing on all of this.
08:46No one wants to give up draft picks in that 2027 class.
08:50And teams that are looking at trying to find a young, long-term quarterback
08:56are all staring at that class and going, well, there's probably going to be five first-round quarterbacks.
08:59So, we're going to have an opportunity to potentially dip into this class.
09:03Let's not give up assets to go get somebody else's quarterback
09:06who can't, you know, fight their way into a starting job in that franchise.
09:11Charles, the defense looked like it had a little change of philosophy from week one to week two.
09:16More of a, all right, let her rip.
09:18Let's get this thing going.
09:19I thought it paid off.
09:21Did you notice anything like that?
09:24Yeah, I mean, I think we're still figuring out, you know, what this defense is going to, you know,
09:31going to look like.
09:32I think when you go back to the Jacksonville game, they just couldn't get Jacksonville.
09:39First off, they couldn't stop Jacksonville.
09:41What did Jacksonville score on the first?
09:44First four and six of their first seven.
09:47I mean, it was just, you know, you couldn't get them off the field in key situations.
09:53You're giving up explosives, and there was no pressure, you know, on Trevor Lawrence.
10:01And I think really from week to week, that's part of what changed.
10:06I mean, if you're able to, you know, start to get pressure up front,
10:10that's going to dramatically alter, you know, what the back end of the defense looks like.
10:15But it's sort of like the offense right now.
10:18I'm not convinced that anything has changed meaningfully until we can see it over an expanse of at least,
10:27you know, two, three, four games.
10:31I think the roles, you know, look like they're starting to become a little more defined,
10:36which is what's going to happen.
10:36Like, I mean, even on offense, you can see with those young players,
10:43Boston's developed into the downfield role, the explosive role, you know, Casey Conception,
10:49and he's still got work to do here, but he's developed into that underneath volume role.
10:53You can see how the coaching staff is starting to balance out, you know,
10:58the roles that the guys play in the scheme.
11:00But it's still, you know, I think Carolina's going to be a really tremendously important game
11:06because I think it's going to stamp, maybe not completely stamp it,
11:09but it's going to tell us what was more real in week one and week two.
11:12Is Tampa, Tampa who, you know, they've missed 22 tackles through two weeks?
11:18So was some of this just Tampa's ineptness on defense?
11:24Or was it, you know, the offense, Cleveland's offense and the ability to grow into
11:32what Munkin asked Watson to do, what the young players, what roles they're filling out?
11:36Carolina, I truly believe Carolina is a quality team.
11:40I think they've got some of their own problems and they're growing as well.
11:43But I think, like, a win against Carolina to me is more impressive right now than a win against Tampa.
11:49Just curious your thoughts on all these injuries with the quarterbacks.
11:52I mean, and what will that mean as the season progresses?
11:58You know, Jackson Dart, even though he's been injury prone, you know,
12:02he's been banged up a lot in a very short expanse of time.
12:06The knee injury is just, that's like a freak one.
12:08You get a high-low tackle and, you know, the knee gets banged.
12:12And that's just something that it wasn't like he stuck, where he's dealing with concussions
12:18because he's taking hits and he doesn't know how to protect himself.
12:20I didn't think that was anything to me other than just the quarterback injuries that we see that are unfortunate.
12:27The Jayden Daniels thing to me is a lot more concerning because it's the same injuries he's had to a
12:34non-throwing shoulder
12:35or a non-throwing elbow.
12:37So, he hasn't had any lower body injuries, but I think, you know, when he went into the draft,
12:43his frame, just because he's slender, he's tall, but there's not a lot of bulk to his frame,
12:49the question was, like, can he be durable long-term and how much do we need to worry about with
12:54his lower body?
12:55Well, now you're dealing with, like, an injury.
12:58You couldn't even have assessed, you know, that this could possibly be a problem.
13:03Plus, you're heading into an offseason where you would have signed him to a contract extension.
13:08I don't, to me, that's got to be on hold now because you can't walk yourself into, like, a Tua
13:14situation
13:15where you're signing a guy to a contract extension and then, oh, you find out, oh,
13:19all these health concerns that we've had, those are real.
13:23So, it stinks.
13:26I don't agree with the narrative, though, that, oh, these quarterback injuries,
13:31everybody's just going to start tuning out the NFL because these quarterbacks are banked up.
13:34Come on, man.
13:35We go through seasons where there's a spate of injuries at the beginning of the season
13:39and it seems like we're hitting the panic button.
13:42What does the NFL do?
13:43The NFL doesn't do anything.
13:43They just move on.
13:44And I think that's just what they're going to have to do.
13:49What do you think of the Bengals?
13:512-0, only undefeated team in the AFC North?
13:54Yeah.
13:55They look, I'm shocked how they look defensively.
13:59I didn't, I, again, I'm going to keep saying it's only two games, so I don't know if the
14:04sample size is big enough, but I'll say this.
14:06Dexter Lawrence, I understand why you gave up the 10th pick in the draft for that guy
14:10because he has been a monster for them.
14:13Jonathan Allen.
14:14The front end of the defense just looks so much better.
14:18And it looks, I mean, it's just stunning to me, the turnaround that they've had.
14:24And then, you know, offensively, you can see the offense is the offense when everybody's
14:29healthy.
14:29They're healthy right now.
14:31You know, T. Higgins is playing great.
14:34They're balanced.
14:35They have a running game.
14:38They're, as long as health permitting this lasts, they're, they've got the pole position
14:44in the division for a reason, and they've got quality wins.
14:48And if that defensive front holds up, that's just, what a, unbelievable.
14:54I would argue that that defense and maybe the front end of that defense, other than maybe
15:00the Raiders offensive line, in terms of like a single unit through two games where you're
15:05like, wow, this kind of feels night and day, that, that's how I feel about the front end
15:10of Cincinnati's defense.
15:11Like, it's got to be one of the best unit turnarounds year over year.
15:15We're just kind of waiting for what the reaction's going to be to the Browns, from Browns fans
15:20on Sunday for Deshaun Watson.
15:22I, I mean, the fact that he played well on Sunday, I think tempers things.
15:26And if he can come out on the first drive and lead them to a touchdown, I really think
15:30it's going to temper things.
15:32What, I don't want to say, what do you think the right and appropriate response is from fans,
15:36but what are you expecting?
15:38And are you hearing anything around the league, even on some of that stuff?
15:41Like, that's, it's kind of been a topic here.
15:43I don't think it's bigger than here, though.
15:45Yeah, I don't think, I don't think people around the league.
15:47I, I think people, especially after game one, were like, whoa, what is going on with, like,
15:53I think everybody, if you, if anybody saw what was going on in game one, the reaction was
16:00like, yeah, it kind of feels like Deshaun's cooked.
16:02Like, it's just, he's not playing well.
16:04And this seems to be the trend line throughout his experience in Cleveland.
16:07I think people would have told you they doubted that there would be a game to win and people
16:12would have thought there would have been a change prior to game three, because, you
16:16know, what the Browns would have walked into.
16:20What do I expect?
16:22I, I saw like a fan at one point, I think when I was talking about Watson on social media,
16:29I just saw fans say, you know what, man, we just want to win.
16:32If we're winning games, it's, that's really what we care about.
16:37And, and so I, I think that's realistic.
16:39I think him having the game that he had against Tampa, um, that calms things.
16:45But I also think if you come out in the first half against Carolina and it's, it's a, you
16:51know, replication of what things look like against Jacksonville, there's going to be
16:56booing.
16:56There's going to be problems.
16:57Like, I don't, I think people are hopeful now.
16:59They're like, you've got something to feel good about going into the home opener.
17:03Now they want to see if that's real.
17:06They want to see a continuation of it.
17:08So, um, I do that's, and that's not specific just to Cleveland.
17:14I think that's everywhere.
17:14Like fans are sick and tired of players and they're sick and tired of losing.
17:18But as soon as they see, uh, um, you know, any light at the end of the tunnel or some
17:23glimmer
17:23of optimism, things can change pretty quickly.
17:26Like Marvin Harrison jr goes out this week and he catches five balls for 92 yards and
17:31a touchdown.
17:33People are going to chill out in Arizona when it comes to Marvin Harrison jr.
17:37And that narrative will go outward through the media.
17:40I guarantee it.
17:40Good call.
17:41All right, Charles.
17:42Of course, we're reading you all the time.
17:44NFL blue book.
17:46Thanks, Charles.
17:47Appreciate it guys.
17:47Talk to you next week.
17:48We'll talk to you next week.
17:49All right.
17:49Charles Robinson.
17:50Make sure you listen to him every week at 11 o'clock.
17:52Uh, we talked to him on Thursdays right here on Baskin and Phelps NFL blue book.
17:56And of course he was on the wise heart, right?
17:58We make it right.
17:58Call Kyle, right?
18:00Hotline.
18:00Uh, let's get an update and we'll talk more about what he had to say when we come.
18:02We'll talk more about what he had to say when we come.