guy's going to go into

coaching and be a successful defensive coordinator, and he's done a great job.

And it seems like the guys love him.

They love playing for him.

So I'm really happy for him, and he's an LSU Tiger.

Yeah, another LSU Tiger.

He's an LSU guy.

How jealous are you? You

Mm.

And the longer he's in it, the more freedom he's gonna have, uh, the more he's gonna grasp it and just become a master at it.

And so it was really cool to watch him play last year and just the jump that he made from the year before.

Now, I mean, with him, you know, they had the great run in the playoffs, but he didn't necessarily have, play his best football i- in the playoffs, and so that's something, he's a young guy, that's gonna be sitting in the back of his mind.

So to come out early and to have some success and to get rolling again, I think it's gonna be important.

But you know, one guy that isn't being talked about, we've talked about A.J. Brown, you know, ad nauseam, and everybody loves that addition and it's gonna be great for him.

I'm a huge Romeo Doubs guy.

Mm.

Am I wrong?

I, I just think the NFL is awesome.

It's so much different than the NBA and the super teams, because it is so much about the team.

Yeah, it's about the health, but it's about guys playing together, and it's about the schemes and the coaches and...

So I think it's very hard to go, um, you know, to be the f- favorite in pre-season and to take that all the way through the season.

I mean, we still have to remember, I know they've made their improvements, but you know, Seattle won the whole thing last year.

So, um, I, yes, I think they should be the favorites.

... everything's, everything's, you know, that hay is pretty much in the barn here

In this transfer portal era, what were some of the, you know, really good things that you had, were able to kind of gather from, you know, sitting behind a quarterback when you knew you were prepared and probably good enough to play?

Yeah, I mean, my journey going from high school to college, I wasn't heavily recruited.

and I view that as a huge blessing because I probably would not have ended up at Harvard if some of the bigger, you know, Stanford, Notre Dame, even an ASU.

I'm from Arizona.

If those schools would have come after me, I probably wouldn't even consider going to the Ivy League, but I consider it a huge blessing that I did that.

I had a guy, Neil Rose, that started my first two years.

It was great to sit back and learn from him, and I had kind of come in and spelled him a little bit with some injuries and other things my first two years, but... it's hard to project what I would have done, especially after my junior year, I had started getting calls from agents, um, saying like, okay, I think you've really got a chance here to do something, to make it to the NFL, to get drafted.

And, I mean, I couldn't imagine, you know, doing that nine different times with nine different little tweaks in that terminology just talk a little bit about you know how you were able to digest you know this elaborate system and be able to perform highly at all these different stops

This is really kind of a unique pregame run-up to a telecast.

Yeah, we have not opened a stadium.

This is season five, actually.

Oh, man.

It feels like it was just yesterday.

But it's easy for me to keep track of that number because I retired, and then as I've been going through it, I got straight into it.

So I can keep track that way.

They've been pretty productive.

Walk us through how you walk into a new locker room, you know, nine times, eight times and develop that trust within the locker room.

Yeah, I'll start with my wife is amazing.

And that's the only way it ever worked.

Because everywhere I went, besides when I went to Miami, when I was in Tampa, my family came with me everywhere we went.

And so to be able to have her kind of take care of all of the stuff to allow me to focus on what I needed to do.

She was a rock star through everything.

So that helped a lot to alleviate some of the concerns off the field with finding schools and sports and stuff for the kids.

And so as someone who was actually overlooked in high school, kind of overlooked when you were drafted, but ended up having an amazing career, what do people miss on what makes a great long-term quarterback in the NFL that you or Alex understand better?

Like Mike Evans or –

when I think of like big, fast, strong, I think of like DK Metcalf, right? A guy like that, where Brandon Marshall, uh, Brandon Marshall, same way, but I've never played with DK.

So I don't know, but like Brandon Marshall is the smartest receiver I ever played with.

Like, so he had the physical ability.

Like he looks like a tight end.

He looks unbelievable.

Um, great catching radius, but he was the smartest dude I ever played with.

You know what I mean?

[laughing]

I'll tell you, you have to-- You do have to rely on your coach for a lot of that, though.

I think that's why it's important that there is a previous relationship with Klint Kubiak and Sam Darnold.

Klint knows Sam well, and he has to know in those moments what Sam's feeling, what Sam's gonna do.

There's play calls that you have dialed up for this Super Bowl that you've been working on for two weeks, and sometimes you've been working on them the whole year, and you just haven't had a chance to call them, that are gonna get dialed up in particular moments.

And when they get dialed up, Klint and Sam have already had the conversations: "Look, Klint, if you call this play and it's one-on-one, we're putting it down the field." And so Klint has to know on certain situations and certain plays, "If I call this, I know we're taking a shot.

I know we're gonna be really aggressive." So he has a better idea of how to turn it up and down with Sam as the game goes on, and it's a really important relationship, quarterback and play caller.

How do you see the game?

[laughing]

I'll tell you, you have to...

You do have to rely on your coach for a lot of that, though.

I think that's why it's important that there is a previous relationship with Clint Kubiak and Sam Darnold.

Clint knows Sam well, and he has to know, in those moments, what Sam's feeling, what Sam's gonna do.

There's play calls that you have dialed up for this Super Bowl that you've been working on for two weeks, and sometimes you've been working on them the whole year, and you just haven't had a chance to call them, that are gonna get dialed up in particular moments.

And when they get dialed up, Clint and Sam have already had the conversations: "Look, Clint, if you call this play, and it's one-on-one, we're putting it down the field." And so Clint has to know on certain situations and certain plays, "If I call this, I know we're taking a shot.

How do you see the game?

So I would guess, Ryan, you would appreciate Darnold to some degree.

Oh, I love, I, I love Sam, and I've known him since his rookie year, and so always been a fan.

But it's not easy.

It's not easy to get picked that high and to fail, right? And he failed i- in New York, in the biggest media market.

Uh, I think the smartest thing that Sam did when he went to San Francisco, he took a step back.

He wanted to insert himself into the McVay-Shanahan tree.

He did that.

How do you see the game?

[laughs]

I'll tell you, you have to, you do have to rely on your coach for a lot of that, though.

I think that's why it's important that there is a previous relationship with Clint Kubiak and Sam Darnold.

Clint knows Sam well, and he has to know in those moments what Sam's feeling, what Sam's gonna do.

There's play calls that you have dialed up for this Super Bowl that you've been working on for two weeks, and sometimes you've been working on them the whole year, and you just haven't had a chance to call them, that are gonna get dialed up in particular moments.

And when they get dialed up, Clint and Sam have already had the conversations.

"Look, Clint, if you call this play and it's one-on-one, we're putting it down the field." And so Clint has to know on certain situations and certain plays, if I call this, I know we're taking a shot.

How do you see the game?

[laughing]

I'll tell you, you have to...

You do have to rely on your coach for a lot of that, though.

I think that's why it's important that there is a previous relationship with Clint Kubiak and Sam Darnold.

Clint knows Sam well, and he has to know, in those moments, what Sam's feeling, what Sam's gonna do.

There's play calls that you have dialed up for this Super Bowl that you've been working on for two weeks, and sometimes you've been working on them the whole year, and you just haven't had a chance to call them, that are gonna get dialed up in particular moments.

And when they get dialed up, Clint and Sam have already had the conversations: "Look, Clint, if you call this play, and it's one-on-one, we're putting it down the field." And so Clint has to know on certain situations and certain plays, "If I call this, I know we're taking a shot.

How do you see the game?

And there's great, but at least for this year, this feels like a lot of smoke and mirrors for this team to try to go on some kind of playoff run, because collectively, I just don't know that they're that much more above average in the turnover game is kind of helped them survive.

It has, and you have to give credit to them for being able to force all those turnovers.

And it's no surprise that Al Harris is there and they did such a great job in Dallas with him.

And now he's there doing great things.

But I think you have to be careful.

Like when we look at Caleb, what do you see? Rocket arm.

Like he can make every throw.

Because I feel like you're just seeing that generally throughout the league is that even if you may not love your quarterback, you're tasked with making them feel great about their abilities as opposed to prepping them to diminish their abilities.

... um, how would you kind of level out the, uh, the pressure on either of these teams and coaches and quarterbacks?

Yeah, I think LaFleur's got a lot more pressure on him.

Ben Johnson, masterful job this year.

What he's done with this team, completely changing it around in a year, uh, what he's done with Caleb Williams, I think it's been great.

And really, just the mentality of who they are.

Especially offensively, they have an identity.

They're physical, they're gonna run it straight down your throat, um, they're gonna do the play action stuff.

It doesn't feel like they have a lot of stars at the wide receiver, tight end, uh, positions.

But, um, how would you kind of level out the, uh, the pressure on either of these teams and coaches and quarterbacks?

Yeah, I think LaFleur's got a lot more pressure on him.

Ben Johnson, masterful job this year.

What he's done with this team, completely changing it around in a year, uh, what he's done with Caleb Williams, I think it's been great.

And really, just the mentality of who they are.

Especially offensively, they have an identity.

They're physical.

It doesn't feel like they have a lot of stars at the wide receiver, tight end, uh, positions.

What can you say about the way in which you felt you connected with the fan base as a group?

If you just think about the offense at that time, right, I was a seventh-round pick that had been on a couple different teams.

Brett Jackson, a great story that we all know, co-college, undrafted.

Scott Chandler, you know, we picked him up off a trash heap.

Donald Jones, Naaman Roosevelt, David Nelson.

You just had all these guys that were Stevie Johnson's seventh-round pick that were so unheralded, and I think that part of it, the underdog, dog part of that guys that you know people had already discarded and thrown away and didn't think anything of to go out there and to have a little bit of success uh but really you know our time going to training camp and getting to interact with the fans and being at St. John Fisher that's like one of my favorite moments just going out to dinner and going out on town and interacting with people uh and then for me it was also just the people of Buffalo like my neighborhood Crock pot Sunday, baby.

We would always have that one o'clock game and then would come home and everybody would sit out in their front yard and make something in the crock pot.

Chargers all the way up through the four division winners in Buffalo?

... yeah, there's a-- there's a problem with quarterbacking and how we're getting quarterbacks ready, that this can even happen.

I don't think so, because if you look around the league and you look at, I mean you look at your guy Caleb and the way that he's kind of developing this year, and Bo Nix, there's a lot of different guys.

I-- I think the hard thing is for Shane Steichen, I mean for all coaches/play callers, you have trust issues.

And so basically the Colts were in a position where they needed a guy to come in that wasn't gonna screw it up, and as a young guy, it's really hard.

We've seen it in Minnesota where you just have these plays that you're young, you're developing, and you screw it up.

Um, McCarthy had one in this last game again, but like, Philip Rivers is a guy, he's gonna get the motions right, he's gonna get the shifts right, he's gonna be able to get guys in and out of the huddle, he's gonna call the play and he's not gonna put the ball in harm's way, so that's all they were looking for.

I don't think it's an indictment on young guys, I don't think it's an indictment on Riley Leonard.

What have you seen? Are you, are you trusting in Sam Darnold? Do you think that this is a Super Bowl-caliber team?

You know what I mean? You- you- you picking up what I'm saying about this team?

Yeah, but, I mean, I mean, we've...

It was at a simmer last year, too, and they won the Super Bowl, so...

I mean, this team, they're just so talented, and I think the great thing about the Eagles is they're gonna have time to work through this stuff and they'll continue to win football games.

Um, you know, new offense coordinator in Kevin Pattulo this year.

They're, they're breaking in some new stuff there.

His relationship with Jalen Hurts and then the receivers, you know, they're gonna find some things that work for them.

Yeah?

(laughs)

He was meant to be on T- TV.

He was meant to do it, but for us knuckleheads, we didn't know.

And I think that you hit it on the head.

We love each other, and we love football.

We love watching it, we love talking about it, and we like to have a good time, too.

Why does that happen? Is it the experience is teacher stuff? Is it just getting to the right system? What are your thoughts on it?

Yeah.

With the New York Jets, the market, everything like that, is it going to be possible for Aaron Glenn to have the patience or for people to hold on for them to develop the culture? Or what are you seeing from them?

Yeah, it's a tough place to play.

It's a tough place to not win in.

They're the only team that hasn't won in the NFL this year.

But I think there is some patience and some grace for him this year.

They've seen this as a rebuild.

I mean, if you go back to the first game, they took the Steelers down to the wire, then we've got him doing this deal against the Bucks.

Why does that happen? Is it the experiences teach you stuff? Is it just getting to the right system? What are your thoughts on it?

Do you agree with that? Jared Goff, a Super Bowl win makes him a Hall of Fame quarterback.

Wow.

We're starting with the tough questions early.

I think so because it's Detroit as well.

I think there's a lot of fan bases that would go crazy for that, but Buffalo and Detroit, if there's a quarterback, could bring a Super Bowl to either of those.

think they'll end up in the hall of fame so it's it's been amazing what jared has been able to do in detroit uh and now switching offensive coordinators you know we talked about the genius of ben johnson and after the first game against the packers will they be the same ever again i think we got that answer i think they're going to be just fine what do you take away from last night's game I come out of that.

I think the Ravens are going to be fine.

How has quarterbacking changed in the last 10 or 15 years? It's

(laughs)

"...

in the NFL? This is what it looks like." But these rules have helped quarterbacks stay healthy and stay on the field.

And I think the second thing that's a big difference, you've seen completion percentage jump way up.

And, you know, the, the air yards on these passes, a lot of these offenses now getting the ball out on the perimeter...... uh, having those plays where it's a swing pass and there's a fullback or a tight end as the lead blocker out there, a lot of this is an extension of the run game.

And so, I think we're seeing a lot of quick passes, a lot of short passes, and I don't know that it's necessarily changing for the better.

I like some of that other stuff, and that's why you like teams like Detroit and like to watch the play action and Jared Goff throw it down the field and on fourth and two, the Amon-Ra play action, you know, trusting him to make that throw.

What the hell has happened?

(laughs)

"This is what it looks like." But these rules have helped quarterbacks stay healthy and stay on the field.

And I think the second thing that's a big difference, you've seen completion percentage jump way up.

And, you know, the, the air yards on these passes, a lot of these offenses now, getting the ball out on the perimeter, uh, having those plays where it's a swing pass and there's a fullback or a tight end as the lead blocker out there, a lot of this is an extension of the run game.

And so I think we're seeing a lot of quick passes, a lot of short passes, and I don't know that it's necessarily changing for the better.

I like some of that other stuff.

And that's why you like teams like Detroit and like to watch the play action and Jared Goff throw it down the field, and on fourth and two, the Amon-Ra play action, you know, trusting him to make that throw.

What the hell has happened?

Yeah.

Which i- I mean, as, you know, you have the, all the young kids and stuff, it's like, you think about my wife.

We have seven kids in seven different cities, and so it's like, the amount of moving that we did, and they came everywhere I went, and then we had to pick up and go, "Okay, school, sports, you know, regular life."

What about you, Fentie?

Uh, so I ended up...

My, my last year I was in Washington.

And I had a...

So, 17 years relatively healthy for 17 years.

... fr- from you- when you're watching the games and you're watching maybe the t- the film after, what, what makes him so special and what is he doing that, like, other tight ends aren't able to do?

Well, his, his rules are different than every other tight end in the game.

He gets to do whatever he wants.

And that's just something that over time he and Patrick, I mean, they, they're so on the same page.

So for example, if he's got a 12 yard out route, well, if it doesn't look like it's gonna be open, he can turn in, or he can run his out route and then stop, or he could just keep running vertical.

And for me, that would be really difficult, 'cause I was so much about, like, the, the timing and getting it out when it's supposed to.

And but with him and Patrick, uh, they're the same mind.

But what would you do to limit his effectiveness in stopping you?