Trey Wingo, Alternate Routes Podcast

It's that time of year. Cash the Ticket.

Jim Costa with Mike Valenny. We shift the focus from football to college hoops. Playing that system that's not a system but sure plays like a system leading up to the tournament. We're looking for that value with the daily dimes. We look for the gross lines. Getting us ready for the tournament where we're going to break down all the matchups and have an eye on some future plays too. This time of year, baby.

Search Cash the Ticket on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. Trey, thank you for taking the time to hop on. Oh man, good to be with you. How are you? I'm good, I'm good.

I love the fact that you have freedom to do what you want. You don't have to ask anybody. Tell us what the hell you've been up to in all the projects that you're working on.

Thank you, man. The big one is the one you just mentioned. Alternate Routes is a podcast with Amazon and Wondery.

Wondery is the biggest name in the podcast and Amazon is obviously the biggest company in the world so we're thrilled to be working with them. It's myself and my former SportsCenter co-host, Kevin Frazier. We basically take one play, one decision in sports and say what happened if it went the exact opposite way.

Like for example, what happened if the Seahawks had handed the ball off to Marshawn Lynch in Super Bowl XLIX instead of thrown it inside to their fifth best receiver? And we take it out as far as we can take it. A real sort of sliding doors effect. So it's out on Wondery Plus today and it'll be out everywhere where you get your podcasts on March 12th. There's some really fun ones that we've recorded. We've got a bunch more to do. We're really excited about it. But it's just spinning whatever we think we know and making one change in it and sort of the butterfly effect and how far it goes and changes the sports world as we know it. Beautiful. Well, congratulations. Trey Wingo is here with us.

The JR Sport Reshow on CBS Sports Radio. You talk about one little change can make a whole big old difference. We know that today was pretty much the deadline for NFL teams to go ahead and tag their franchise players. Certainly no big surprises when it comes down to folks like Saquon Barkley.

Is there someone who got tagged today or did not get tagged today that caught your attention? Well, there's a couple of them, right? Obviously, Chris Jones is probably the biggest name out there. But I think that both he, his representatives and the Chiefs are fairly confident that they'll find a way to get something done. I mean, I think that's why they chose to put the non-exclusive tag on Legerious Snead. Like, my philosophy has always been, and Legerious Snead, by the way, is one hell of a cover corner. Don't get me wrong.

He's phenomenal. You could make the argument that Snead on one side and all-pro Trent McDuffie on the other side, Chiefs had the two best cover corners in football last season. But for me, if I'm building a defense, a cover corner takes away one wide receiver. A great pass rush takes away all of them. So for me, and I think the Chiefs and GM, Brett Beach feel the same way, they have to get Chris Jones done.

And I think that's going to get done. You know, the entire running back market didn't get tagged. There's literally nobody that got tagged. It just continues to show the devaluation of the running back position. And it's tough for these guys because they're, a lot of them are really good at what they do. But when you see guys come in, like an Isaiah Pacheco in the seventh round for the Kansas City Chiefs and the production they've been able to get out of him, it makes it hard to pony up the big bucks for a running back. When you know that's a position, when you talk about value as opposed to dollar deposit, you can probably get a much better deal somewhere else outside one of these big names.

Without a shadow of a doubt, Trey Wingo here with us on the JR Sport Brief show. You talk about the devaluation of running backs, not to say that they're going to be playing for pennies, but we know that they ain't going to get the best of deals. Is there any particular running back who you think might or has the best chance of ending up in a different uniform? Well, I mean, I do think that Saquon and the Giants feel like, I mean, there could be a whole mess of changes going in New York.

You know, there are a lot of reports out there that people think the Giants already moved on from Daniel Jones as well. Look, Saquon is interesting, right? Because when he's healthy, he's as good as anybody.

The problem has been those three words, when he's healthy. You know, so many of these running backs, you know, they say, hey, our injury rate is not that much different, but it is because of the nature of the position. You know, I think the average running back career in the league is two and a half to three years based on the position and the collisions that they come into. It's not a contact sport.

Football's a collision sport. And Saquon is a guy that has unbelievable talent, can help you in the running game and can help you in the receiving game. But just like all the other top running backs, he's had to battle the injury bug. I think Saquon could make a difference at a pretty decent dollar amount for a good team.

Austin Ackler was the same way. You know, he was, outside of this past year, he was a touchdown machine. I think the last two years he had over 40 combined touchdowns. Things went a little sideways this year, but this is what you have to worry about when you've got a guy that's four or five years into the league.

How much longer do you see that top level production? Well, Trey, you know what, it's not just the running backs who might be moving around. We've spent the past couple of weeks and even now talking about some of the QBs. We know Russell Wilson officially is going to be let go by the Denver Broncos. There's certainly rumors now about Kirk Cousins making his way down here to Atlanta.

What are some of your thoughts on who might move there? Even Justin Fields. We know he's likely to be gone. Yeah, you know, everybody, I'll say this about the Justin Fields situation. That's obviously where a lot of attention is because of where the Bears are drafting. They have those two first round picks. Everyone loves drafting a quarterback until they don't get it right.

And then it's the worst thing in the world. Look, Caleb Williams could turn out to be great. I'm not denigrating anything with Caleb or if you feel more towards Jayden Daniels or whomever. But quarterback drafting is not really a science.

It's more of an art and educated guesswork. The best way I can describe it is let's take a look at two back-to-back quarterback drafts in the first round and see how it's going. In 2020, you had Joe Burrow first overall. I think that's worked out.

You had Tua Tongo by low ago. I think that's worked out. You have Justin Herbert. That's worked out. Then you have Jordan Love, who was a surprise pick by the Packers.

And I think in the end, that's going to work out. And Jaylen Hurts to the Eagles in the second round has looked really good. Now let's just go one year later, 2021. Trevor Lawrence, first overall. And there wasn't a scout GM or personnel guy that wouldn't have said take Trevor Lawrence in the first round.

He ticked every box. They regressed this year. I think he led the league in fumbles. They didn't make the playoffs, but they're making the playoffs a year ago.

So the jury's still out. Zach Wilson went number two. Well, Zach Wilson will never start again for the NFL barring massive injuries for whatever team he's second or third string on.

Okay. Then you have Trey Lance, whom the 49ers traded three first round picks to get. He was inactive for the Dallas Cowboys as a third string quarterback when they got blown off the field by Jordan Love and the Packers. Then you have Justin Fields, who might be traded. And then you have Mac Jones, who lost his job to Bailey Zappi. Like everyone falls in love with these quarterbacks during the draft. But just understand it doesn't work out as much as it does work out.

Or maybe even it doesn't work out even more. Anthony Richardson last year was supposed to be the most athletic, freakish, strong, fast quarterback we've ever seen. He couldn't finish a game.

He literally could not finish a game before he was injured for the rest of the year. It is a crap shoot, man. So if you're going to move on from Justin Fields and not use all these draft picks that you have to build around him with guys like Marvin Harrison to go alongside DJ Moore and Cole Komet and everything else, you better make sure you're right. Otherwise you become the Jets. Darnold Zach Wilson to 40-year-old Aaron Rodgers and who knows what he's going to be after the Achilles.

Yeah, pretty ugly we know that. Trey Wingo joining us here on CBS Sports Radio, the JR Sport Reef show. We know that there are a lot of prospects, especially quarterbacks on their way in. For the two plus decades that you spent at ESPN, you certainly know about draft coverage. What are your thoughts on just how the players seem to have a little bit more pull when it comes to whether or not they need to participate?

And what has now been pretty much known as the Underwear Olympics? Yeah, listen, I do. I'm glad you brought that up because the players do have more empowerment because I think people don't understand this, OK? The run up from when your college football season ends, whether it's at the regular season, a bowl game, playoffs, whatever, your entire job as a player is to increase your value during that run. And so Caleb Williams is likely going to be the number one overall pick.

So it's his job to make sure that he does nothing to decrease his value. There's nothing that he could do with the combine, in my opinion, whether it was his medicals or his, you know, his throwing or doing whatever that would change the years of film you have on Caleb Williams. You know, when people say, well, what are you afraid to compete?

Well, look at the film. Clearly, he's not afraid to compete. What he's doing is making a smart business decision, much in the same way so many of these players, if they're not competing for a national championship, have decided to skip ballgames.

It's not worth the downside risk. Players do get hurt at the combine. Players do get hurt at pro days. You want to maximize your value and they're understanding that concept better. Jaden Daniels, the same way. If you think you're going to see something in the combine that's going to change your opinion of Jaden Daniels, I question what you've been doing scouting for the last couple of years, okay? So it's smart for these players to understand the business of what they're doing. Maximize your value.

The other side is also true. Teams are trying to decrease players' value so they can maybe get them later than they thought they were going to get them by potentially leaking out some information. The combine is great for teams or players that need to prove something. For players that have already proven where their stock is, the combine, if you really want to be honest about it, is a meaningless exercise for them.

Without a shadow of a doubt. Well, listen, Trey, I want to ask you this question in finality just based on so much of your experience from now the digital space and the traditional space. We see so many changes going on in the sports media landscape from, I don't want to say the elimination of cable, but the elevation of streaming. We see the ESPNs and Foxes coming together to combat the Apples and the Amazons of the world. Where do you see sports media going in five, ten years? It moves so fast right now. Yeah, well, in the way it's trending, whatever the next thing is that we'll figure out the next couple of years, that's where it's going to go. Like, Roger Goodell had a great line at the Super Bowl at his press conference.

He goes to the State of the League press conference every year. People were very upset about the game that was put on Peacock between the Chiefs and the Dolphins, a playoff game, the first ever playoff game streamed instead of over traditional routes. And, you know, it shattered numbers.

It broke things. But Roger had a really good line. He said, we have to fish where the fish are. And that's where the fish are.

The fish are in streaming. The money is in streaming. You know, you're going that's where a lot of dollars are going. That's where a lot of advertisers are. More importantly, and this is so critical, that's where the younger demographic is watching things.

They have to fish where the fish are. And I think we're continuing to see that trend. Live sports is the only thing that keeps television and cable basically going. I think 70 plus shows or 80 plus shows on television last year, the top 100 were all NFL football games.

Like, this is the thing that keeps it going. It's the only thing that's a destination event on traditional television or cable anymore. You know, I'll Shogun, the new series on Hulu. I'll check it out when I have time. What's new on Netflix? I'll watch that whenever I get a second. Live television or live sporting events and live football games, NFL specifically, is the thing that drives the bus.

And they're going to go wherever they think the dollars and the viewers are. Absolutely. Well, listen, you're in an excellent position with the content that you're creating and your experience. Trey, tell us one more time where we can keep up with you and all of your work. Thanks very much.

Yeah, the alternate routes drops today. I do stuff for the 33rd team. I post stuff for them. I also do a podcast with Chase Daniel, the longtime backup quarterback there, called Chasing It. And that's available wherever you get your podcasts.

We drop that every week. I work with my old buddy Mark Schlerath on the stunt app. It's basically Twitter just for sports. So if your feed is loaded down with everything that you don't care about, it's just sports takes and just sports conversations and live rooms on the stunt app.

You can download it in the App Store or Google Play if you're on an Android device. And I also do work with the PGA Tour and we'll do some stuff for golf for NBC Sports this summer. So we're looking forward to all of that. Beautiful. Listen, Trey, we're going to talk soon. I appreciate you coming through to show your insight. You got it, man. Anytime.

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