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If it's got to be clean, it's got to be Tide Free and Gentle. Jared, thank you for taking the time and joining us. Hey, what's happening? Are you taking a break from the Olympics? Hey, listen, I watch people do the backflips. I don't do it. I just watch.
Man, I'm telling you, I have so much respect for the people that can do some of the things that they do with their bodies. You're right. It is incredible. And we have to sit back and say, I cannot do that. Listen, I enjoy it every four years. You know, so give me another four in Los Angeles and maybe I'll see it in person. We'll get there.
That's something to look forward to. But Jared, you've been quite busy. I want to get into your conversation you had a few days ago with Patrick Mahomes. I also know today you were keeping busy with the Steelers up in the Steel City and having a chance to see what's going on with Mr. Wilson and then also Fields.
What is that situation looking like in Pittsburgh right now? Well, Russell practiced today. They put the pads on for the first time today and Russell Wilson was a participant. So when they opened camp, they had the conditioning drill, which everybody does, and he strained the calf or something.
So he hadn't been practicing much and they're not alarmed. He was back on the field today. He threw a really nice touchdown to George Pickens. So George Pickens, maybe his court has been something this year, man. But it was a sweet little throw in the red zone that got a touchdown. But Justin Fields has been getting his reps. I couldn't tell so much from one day at practice, but I was talking to one of the Steelers reporters about Justin Fields and he said, you know, he looks great on four or five plays and then see another play or two. And you go, hey, wait a minute. What was he doing?
What was he thinking? You could say that about a lot of young quarterbacks. And so it'll be interesting just to kind of see his progress. But Russell, yeah, just excited to see. And this is going to go on for a while, really, into the season if he can stay healthy, just to see if he's able to, you know, reestablish himself as a major player. But not a good way to start when you put the calf in the conditioning, but they like them and they said that, you know, his work ethic has been exemplary, as we've heard before in other places. And without a shadow of a doubt, you can expect that from Russell Wilson.
Jared, your thoughts on Fields. Are we going to see him in gimmicks every now and then? Are they going to use him closer in the red zone?
What do you think they're going to do? The old Falcons coach and I think this is a good spot for him to kind of reestablish himself. So think about this. You got Russell Wilson, who got kicked to the curb by the Broncos. You got Justin Fields, who essentially kicked to the curb and traded from the Bears.
And you got Arthur Smith, who was fired at the Falcons coach when he didn't have a quarterback. Right. And these guys are trying to put it together.
Right. So they all kind of have this chip on their so if you listen to Mike Tomlin talk about it, you know, you kind of got some people that have some stuff to prove. But to your point, to your question, you know, they're going to be coy about it.
So they're not really dealing their hands on whether they'll do that. But I will say that when I was watching the goal line drill today, they were probably at like the five or seven yard line or something like that. And Justin Fields did like a quarterback keep, you know, off the edge and nobody could catch him. Yeah, so that was so if you talk about situations that you could put them in, and you know, Russell Wilson is a mobile guy, but he's not as fast as as Justin Fields. So I think, you know, there's always that prospect, you know, a few years ago, when when the Patriots got Tim Tebow.
Right. And they had Tom Brady, of course. And there was a question of just what you said, Hey, can they just use Tebow in some packages, right as an athlete and run that sort of thing.
But the question became, and it never happened in New England. But you know, the rationale was, why would you take the ball out of Tom Brady's hands, just for you know, a gimmick if you bring somebody in. So I think that same sort of thinking might apply here, if Russell Wilson is playing at a level, right, if he's not, then that becomes a more legitimate question. So we'll see. Patrick, you know, you know, you've been talking about the big deal, you know, in the past.
You know, he got the big deal, but if you're on the big stage, and we know Jordan Love got his deal, based on your conversation with Patrick, he's real comfortable with what things are or where they're at. When do you think he might get that big deal that next deal? Are we talking three, four years from now?
How long is he gonna kind of sit around with the current restructuring situation? Yeah, because they just restructured last year, but I think that the way it looks right now from what they did in the restructure, like the four-year average from this point on is at like $53 million on the average, right? So that's, you know, you look at these contracts and you say, okay, in the Holmes's case, it was 10 years at $450 million, which was a mega contract when he signed it, and still is, right, it averaged $45 million a year at that point, well, these deals, as you mentioned, a few of them have come in and then when you look at the average per year, it's not there. But if you take the restructure that Russell, I mean, that Holmes got and then say, well, what does that average over four years?
So that's the clue, right, just to your question, when did they go back? Now, here's the other thing, JR, to remember. You know, the title of the cap is going to keep going up, right? And there's going to be some other quarterbacks that are going to get deals, you know, in the next year or so, we know Dak Prescott, you know, he can't do it in the playoffs. It really helps Patrick Holmes's negotiating position, right? How can you give Dak Prescott $55 million, $60 million or whatever that number is going to be?
And, you know, he doesn't get it done in the playoffs. So all of that to say the cap's going to keep going up and the NFL revenues kind of go in line with that. They're talking about opting out of this TV deal, right? Now, that may not happen for a couple more years, but it's definitely on the NFL's agenda to do that, okay? Let's not make any bones about whether it's going to happen. I think it's a matter of when it's going to happen.
And you've got all these other players involved, like Netflix and, you know, Amazon, some of the streaming services and others that we don't even know to say right now, right? And so I say all that to say the money's going to just get so much bigger. So if you're Patrick Holmes, still young, and from what he told me, much like Tom Brady said years ago with the Patriots is that, you know, I don't need to make all the money. We need to be able to have enough money, cap-wise, to keep some of our key guys. And they couldn't keep Tyreek Hill, but boy, Xavier Worthy, the number one pick, he looks good. The couple days I saw him in practice, and I mean that. But they were able to keep Chris Jones, make him the highest-paid defensive tackle, able to extend Travis Kelce again, and he's the highest-paid tight end for average salary. So you know, if you're Mahomes, you want to be able to see your team back to your supporting cast.
And so that's part of his thinking, and then, like I said, when they restructured his four-year average, it's still over 50 million, it's 53 years of change. So anyway, but you know, I'm glad I got him, because the deal with Tua and with J-Love just came down over the weekend, and you know, it was just my fortunate timing to be able to have something arranged to see him over the weekend, and that was obviously one of the talking points. I'll have some more from Patrick Mahomes coming, you know, as we head towards the season.
Amazing. Jarrett Bell is joining us here from USA Today. You had that conversation with Patrick Mahomes, and you talk about Xavier Worthy, the speedster out of Texas, who they've just added. We know about the championship that they just won against the Niners.
We know the money keeps going up and up and up. The team that they beat, the 49ers, it looks like they have some financial issues they need to work out sooner than later. What do they do with Brandon Aiyu, because he's sticking around for another year or two?
You know, what is Brock Purdy's deal going to look like? Would you say that the 49ers are still their biggest competition? Or the next best team in the NFL behind the Chiefs? I mean, you couldn't go wrong saying that about the 49ers, but think about it this way. There's always, you know, like four or five teams in the NFL that you know are good, right? And depending on how things go, they could make it to the Super Bowl. Then there's four or five teams that you know are crappy, and they're just not going to be any good, and it's going to take them a while to build, and they may still be bad three years from now, right?
And then there's like 20 teams in the middle that depending on, you know, how some of their moves worked out, rookies, injuries, you know, even, you know, the break in the schedule when you play certain, that they can end up making a playoff run. So all that to say, yeah, the 49ers are in that upper echelon, but think about this with the Chiefs. I mean, they were underdogs in the AFC Championship game at Baltimore, right? So Baltimore had everything lined up to, you know, to knock them off, and Buffalo had, you know, the chance to knock them off, and Cincinnati has beaten them before in the playoffs.
So you know, that's competition, right? So before you can even really worry about the 49ers as being your main competition, look at some of those AFC teams and think, okay, there's still some work to be done there in terms of, you know, proving ourselves. And they're up to the task, because one of the things that we saw from the Chiefs last year, in addition to going to win on the road in the playoffs as underdogs, was the style of play. You know, they were not as explosive as they had been.
Travis Kelce wasn't even as explosive, but boy, did he come through down the stretch and in the playoffs, and he was the same as Travis Kelce, but for much of the season, he wasn't that dominant player. Holmes, you know, his receiver's corp was dropping passes and all that, but the defense, the defense really kept them in so many games, and then by the end of the season, they got that championship experience, that mojo, that know-how, you know, just that resilience and all of that. So I think they were able to lean on that as well and win as underdogs.
So they'll still have all those things, right? And if they get this B dimension worked out with the deep passing game, with Worthy and Ollie Woodburn, who also looked pretty good in the couple days I saw them, I mean, that's a dimension that is just going to make them just so much more dangerous. So are the 49ers the top competition? I don't know, I need a little bit more time to see that, because, you know, you think about the, well, I was going to say the Eagles, but we'll see if they can rebound or if the Packers are ready to take that, you know, at the Detroit Lions, heck, they were winning in the championship.
So all that stuff, you know, there's going to be several teams that are going to be making their play, but yeah, you still got to knock off the champs to beat a champ. So I think they'll have a chance, but you know, we haven't seen a three-peat like ever. Well, I'll say this, Jarrett, and I say it to absolutely be flippant, no mention of the Cowboys, huh? Yeah, I've been thinking about the Cowboys, thinking about the Cowboys, I can't quite go there yet, but yeah, maybe they'll win the NFC East again, but you know, I was at that playoff game against Green Bay, and that's why I haven't been missing the Cowboys, because even with the people that they have that you know are, you know, big-time players, Prescott, and you can talk about his playoff stuff all you want, but I mean, still, you know, Prescott, C.D. Lamb, Micah Parsons, I mean, how many sacks did Micah Parsons have he had in the playoffs?
You talk about Jack all the time, Parsons is another guy who is a tremendous ballplayer, but things like when the playoffs come around, he's not as tremendous. So yeah, the Cowboys, I think, you know, when you talk about the talent and the talent at certain positions, yeah, they still rank up there, but shoot, I think you talk about the 49ers, I think the Cowboys still have to figure out a way to beat the 49ers, man, but anyway. They got a lot of teams they got to knock off, they're going to have to go on a revenge tour if they're going to turn things around. We're looking at it, I don't know if that's going to get them more motivated, but they need to see something, man. Yeah, I think they might need a new owner, but that may not happen no time soon. That ain't going to happen, just, you know, just come on, man. That's not going to happen. That's not reality, so let's talk about what he does and what the people do there, but you know, and I'm not trying to carry water for Jerry, but I mean, you know, shoot, if you paid $150 million for a franchise 30 something years ago and now it's worth like $9 billion, I think it stays in the family.
Oh yeah, genius marketer. Some of them football decisions below him and underneath, we'll see, we'll see. It's crazy, it's crazy they are because if you look at the Cowboys and some of the talent that they've had over many years, I mean, going back to, you know, we know the Super Bowl years, but since then, I mean, when you talk about, you know, shoot, the market's where it was there. Tony Romo was really, you know, was really good and then, you know, the guys they have on the team now that, you know, we just mentioned some of their top players, so, you know, it's not good because of lack of talent, but you know, I think it's, it's, yeah, it's like you said, some of the other, you know, other components and I think that's going to be one of the key storylines, obviously, going into this year for the Cowboys is, you know, Mike McCarthy, you know, on a lamed up situation, right? And that's going to be major pressure, you know, as the season goes on, especially dependent on how the season flows too.
Yeah, this is the Dallas Cowboys are like a living edition of the Hunger Games. We'll see what things look like at the beginning of January. All right, just just the facts.
Hey, Jared, thank you so much for the time. Where can people follow you read all your work with USA Today? Where can people keep up? Yeah, man.
USA Today dot com. And then I'm on Twitter. And that's probably the best faces.
And I'm not as active on social media as a lot of my colleagues. But if you look for me, you can find me. Absolutely. Well, I'm glad we found you right here on the radio with us. Getting the insight, especially that the great article and conversation you had with Patrick Mahomes. Looking forward to reading more of that. Jared, thank you so much for the time and safe travels around, OK? OK, yeah.
Take care. What kind of programs does this school have? How are the test scores?
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