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Transcript
You brought this up, Albert, and I think it's a great topic.
We're gonna touch on the Patriots a little bit later, but as an ancillary piece of this, we have the, the big three out of the 2024 quarterbacks, and you can add, um, certainly add Bo Nix into the equation here and make it the big four, but we have Caleb Williams I think we have to add Bo Nix.
Yeah, I mean, here's why.
I, I know he's not, he doesn't have like the highlight tape that the other guys have.
I, I.
I mean, he's the only one who's really performed at a high level both years, right?
So, I, you know, maybe his, maybe his highest highs haven't been with the highest highs of Caleb Williams and Drake May and, and Jaden Daniels have been, but like I, I think he's the only one of the three that has shown us like, OK, in one year in this, in, in the offense I'm playing in, I was dynamite, and now coming out back the next year in that same offense, I did it again, even though everybody had tape of me in that offense.
Like that's a big thing for a young quarterback, so.
I, I don't, I don't want to discount, like, I, I think that's the temptation, and it's an easy thing to do.
I just wanna be careful about that because I think.
Like, we shouldn't be sneezing at what Bo Nix has done.
They got to the playoffs with him as a quarterback for, and that was the first time the Broncos have been to the playoffs in almost a decade.
And then the year after, he gets them to the AFC championship game, and it's no fault of his that they don't wind up going, you know, further than that because obviously he had the freak injury at the end of the divisional playoffs, right?
No, you're right.
And, and I think that what is interesting about this whole thing is, and, and you nailed it.
Seasons like this tend to pull apart.
Uh, you know, cause this is the 3rd season for everybody, and so you have Jaden Daniels' phenomenal rookie season.
You had Caleb Williams and Drake May's phenomenal sophomore seasons, and you're looking at this year as the season where it's like, OK, is this just gonna be like the Roethlisberger Manning class where all these guys are just good for the next decade, which is more than possible, right?
I mean, I totally believe that that has the ability to happen.
Um, or is it the, is it the season where it's like, OK, Andrew Luck and RG3 start to separate a little bit.
There's health issues, there's, uh, other things that are materializing within the worlds of these quarterbacks that are forcing them not to play well.
Um, but this is something that you put on my radar this summer, and I want to bring this up first.
I think that underneath the hood, uh, Drake May had one of the truly great quarterback seasons of the last 5 years, last year.
Um, we talked a little bit about Jordan Love being underrated.
Uh, I think that Drake May was underrated last season and you could say what you want about the schedule, but I wonder what happens if he finished 2nd in MVP voting.
He finished 2nd in MVP voting.
Um, I, I wonder what happens if that performance holds or even improves against a tougher schedule with a better number 1 wide receiver in AJ Brown who wants to be there.
Yeah, I, I think the thing that's interesting about Drake is I think he's still relatively raw, and like he's still to some degree, a big athlete playing quarterback, and I think you saw that last year.
Um, this is a guy who didn't have a, have a throwing coach until he was 15.
This is a guy who was a multi-sport athlete in high school who lost his senior year in high school to COVID, who started two years in college, who hasn't had the same coordinator, the same play caller in consecutive seasons since he was a sophomore and junior in high school, and that's the only time it's happened for him, um .
Which, like I think gives him the opportunity, Bill, but it also cuts both ways because now everybody has tape on him playing in Josh McDaniel's offense.
So there's gonna be a challenge to that too.
Uh, but I don't think like he's close to his ceiling yet.
Like I think his ceiling is sky-high.
Like I think his ceiling is, As high as the other two guys despite going behind them in the draft.
I think his ceiling is the best player in the league, you know, like I think that there's still a lot of meat left in the bone with him.
Now, like, the question becomes, all right, so after, you know, like after a, a spectacular 17-game regular season, Now, in the playoffs, everybody has tape on you, it doesn't look the same, right?
Like everybody has all that tape on you, they're dialed in because these are playoff weeks.
And in the 4 playoff games, it didn't look quite the same.
They kept advancing and he made some balls out throws that helps bail them out, but it's just like, I, I think like you're looking at it and you can look at this, you know, both ways with him, where it's like, You know, it's gonna help him to be in the 2nd year of an offense.
And, you know, at the same time, it's also gonna inform other teams on how to attack him.
So, there's an advantage that he has there, but also a challenge they'll be facing.
Which I think like then you go to his makeup and his makeup, I think tells you he's gonna be able to figure it out.
I, let's just play a game, OK, at the end of this season.
Where, in what direction do you think that all of these quarterbacks will have gone?
And there's an easy answer, which is just that, and, and this is what we're all going to tell ourselves this time of year, which is up, up, up, up because hope is at an all-time high and Davis Webb's gonna be the perfect play caller for Bo Nix and Ben Johnson and Caleb Williams are going to be even better in year two, and Jaden Daniels and David Blau are gonna be awesome and they're gonna explode and take off .
Do you have any, are you, are there, I mean, I like, see, see, here's where it's hard for me though.
I think so much of it with all three of these guys, 4 of these guys is gonna be based on circumstance and like, so Bo Nix adds.
Uh, as Jaylen Waddle.
Drake May adds AJ Brown.
Jaden Daniels is now his new coordinator and David Blau, so he gets to kind of reset with that.
You know, Caleb Williams now goes in with Colton Loveland, likely being used in a different way because he's going into his 2nd year.
Um, you know, you've got another year of Romaunze, so there's gonna be some natural progression there.
There's reasons you can look at every one of these situations and say, yeah, it's gonna work.
But there's a flip side with all those teams too, right?
Like, so, are the commanders gonna be able to run the ball effectively enough?
Is Croske Merritt gonna be, you know, the every down back?
Um, you know, who's the number 2 receiver?
Like once you get past Terry McLaurin, what are you looking at?
The Patriots, the offensive line issue, um, is lingering.
Morgan Moses is, I think, 36 years old now.
They bring in Oliveira Tucker.
He hasn't been able to stay healthy.
What does the offensive line look like?
Uh, you know, with, uh, with, with Chicago, you know, the left tackle position is a huge question for them.
So what does that look like?
What does your running back room look like?
There are questions with every one of these guys.
I mean, to me, it's still, I still look at it and like it still feels to me like Bo Nix probably has the most solid, consistent circumstances around him, which tells you maybe he has the best chance to take another step.
Um, with the other guys, I just think like so much of whether or not they take the next step this year is gonna be determined by those variables around them.
And I know that's not gonna be something that you can clip and throw on the internet or all that.
But, you know, as much as like so much is determined by how the quarterback plays, like how the other 10 guys around him play goes a long way to determining, you know, what, what he is and what he does and what he's capable of doing, especially when, when the quarterback's young.
One of the things I'm interested in specifically, and, uh, upon Russell Wilson's retirement, have been thinking a lot about how a quarterback can go from where we thought he was to where he ended up, uh, so quickly.
And I guess it's a faux retirement.
I wouldn't count out Big Russ coming back and making a little appearance at some point during the season.
Maybe he leaves the booth, rips off the cape like Superman, and just walks down to the field one of these days.
Um, but Caleb Williams, Is a better version of Russ, I think already, right?
The arm talent is just exceptional.
Like Caleb Williams, I think, has Russell Wilson's backfield escapability with like the arm, like with like Drew Brees caliber arm talent, right ?
Um, I think what happens is I like to see the moments where the The on-field expertise.
Sort of this cuts out the need for you to evade as many sacks, like, you know what I mean, and, and I'm, and I'm not pigeonholing him in that way he's almost in in that way he's almost reversed Russell Wilson though because Russell Wilson was convince in order to, he was, well, he, well, Russell Wilson was convinced that if you just play me from the pocket I'll be Peyton Manning, and that obviously wasn't the case and that he wound up finding out, finding out the hard way that that wasn't.
That wasn't his game, you know, and that maybe Pete Carroll and his staff were doing things the right way all those years, whereas with Caleb, it's like you gotta rein in the, and that's why I thought like what JT Barrett, um, his quarterbacks coach said was so interesting.
I can't remember what the exact quote was, but it's like something like we need him to do the easy stuff better, you know, and.
And, um, I know I've brought this up on the podcast before, but it reminds me of, you know, a conversation I had with Brian Daball and I think it was 2019 or 2020 when he was with Josh Allen and he had put together like a, a cut-up that, you know, he watched with, with, with Josh, and it was of Tom Brady who he'd been with in New England.
And every throw it was like checked down slant like it was like every throw was a layup and his point to Josh was this is the greatest quarterback of all time.
Look how much of these like look how easy he's making it on himself.
Like he's just getting the ball out of his hands.
I even heard Brady say it once, which was interesting because it's like he didn't have to battle what these guys have to battle with, which was Belichick told Brady early on.
We can't really make something happen until the ball's out of your hand, you know, and like, like he was like he had it trained in his head like I gotta get rid of the ball and get it to a playmaker because I can't create on my own, you know, these guys can, and you're still trying to teach them to do that, which I think is a really interesting piece of it, at least the way I look at it.
So with Caleb, I think the The reality is like you've got to rewire him a little bit.
I think this is where, where he was really raw coming out of USC and it's sort of like why I think his trajectory is similar to Josh Allen, right?
Like where it's like, Josh had to be convinced, like, you don't be Superman all the time.
You know what I mean?
Like, I know you're capable of it.
Don't be Superman all the time.
And when Josh Allen really took off was when he started Really buying in on that, right?
And I think with Caleb, it's like so much of it now is buying in on, like, instead of trying to make 20 spectacular plays a game, maybe I make 6 or 7 in most games, you know.
And that's gonna be harder to defend because now the defense is gotta defend all of the other stuff, and they don't know when that spectacular stuff is coming, you know.
So, like I think that's sort of where you're at with Caleb.
Like I, I don't know why I like workshopped in my head, but I, I, I think like the trajectory of Josh Allen is sort of the, would be the trajectory of, of, of Caleb Williams if it works out.
The, um, I, I just remember there was that weird stretch of time where, um, Thomas Brown took over as Caleb Williams' play caller during his rookie season and Caleb went from one of the longest time to throw quarterbacks in the NFL to by far the shortest.
It was like 2.2 seconds.
And I'm not saying I want him to be that way because you take away.
What is truly special about Caleb, but in those moments he was he was also spectacular, and Caleb can do it.
And that's the trick, you know, it's like that the balance, that's hard, you know what I mean, like figuring out, like finding that balance, that's hard to figure out like where is the balance between.
You know, the routine versus the spectacular.
I'll, I'll , I'll, I'll comp it this way and you could tell me if I'm absolutely ridiculous and out of my mind, but like, it almost reminded me of Saquan, and there's a lot of mitigating factors there, but like Saquan 2024 versus Saquan 2025, where it's like, can you kind of pack the wings in and get me 3.8 yards of carry like Christian McCaffrey when everything around you sucks, or do you have to be, You know, you know, I know you want to be that other guy, the, the, the jumping guy, the flip guy, the, the spin guy, you know, and I, you know, I'm gonna start sounding like a 2000 or like 1999 radio host, and that's not, this is not what I'm saying.
I'm talking about just like efficiency for when you need to be efficient, you know, um, that's not TikTok quarterback.
Yeah, we don't want a TikTok quarterback.
I'm a TikTok, you know what I mean though, right?
Like it's like.
I think that's sort of like.
You know, are you aspiring to have that highlight, or are you aspiring for your team to win the game and for you to be the most dangerous player you possibly can be?
And it doesn't, it sounds like, like it sounds, it sounds almost illogical, but like the most dangerous quarterbacks, the ones who do the routine routine really well because they're incorporating everybody into what they're doing.
And then when they can do the spectacular on top of that, now that's when you're really cooking.
It's funny because with Caleb in particular, right?
It's like when you try to teach your kids like, hey, don't climb up that step ladder, like something bad's gonna happen.
And then the opposite of that happens where they like do a flip off it and landed on their feet and they think it's hilarious like and now they just want to do it all the time.
It's like with Cale, it's just like, hey, stop doing that, stop doing that.
And then literally he throws one of the greatest passes in the history of Chicago Bears football and it's like, oh yeah, well, I, this is working pretty well too.
I could just keep doing this, you know, I, I can identify with that because my kid, my oldest is exactly me in that regard.
I was the kid who had to step on the rake for myself.
My parents could say, don't step on that rake, don't do it, don't do it.
And I would have to walk right into it to find out for myself that it was the wrong thing to do, and my oldest is sort of the same way.
It's frustrating.
The most frustrating thing about parenting is when you know the answer, and you give them the answer, and they still won't take the answer, um, which happens a lot.
My dad got mad at me the other day because we have one of those like uh Fisher, you understand why your parents got so frustrated with you when, when you have those moments.
Oh, for sure.
My kid, we had the little Fisher Price playhouse in the back and like the big thick plastic one and it's like in the shape of a cottage and so it's about as tall.
It's a little bit shorter than me, right when, when you get up to the roo.
Roof and my 22 of my kids are just like on the roof, right ?
And, and I'm just like, get off of the goddamn roof over and over again.
And I said to my dad , you know, Daryl, yeah, get off the shed, um, uh, and I said to my dad, I was like , you know, like it's underrated, the better one like but I, I, I think like the one where they're The youth baseball game actually that is, that's the all-timer, yeah, it might be better than get off.
It was get on the bag, was that what it was or get on the bag, yeah, and he cracks the beer, which is the best part everybody's like it's like 10 o'clock in the morning, yeah, all time.
I watched that maybe twice a month, uh, still.
Uh, it's still one of the great, uh, sketches of all time, but I said to my dad, I was like, you know, I can't wait for these goddamn kids to fall off the roof.
And he was like, what is the matter with you?
He's like, I would have never wished harm upon you.
And I was like, first of all, that's bullshit.
I know you would have at some point.
And second of all, it's the only way that they're going to figure out that they should get off that.
Like, I can only say it 11 times , nobody's going to listen, or I can physically remove them from the roof, or they can fall 1 time and bang up their shoulder and then we don't climb on the roof again, you know, and so that's just how it happens.
