What’s the 2023-24 season going to look like for THESE NFL teams??

Before we introduce my friend, where does this come from?

I know it's because Will's here. Little live Steely Dan? Yes, and I know you love it too. I try to please. Very nice. Very nice. A little, I mean it does sound like, almost sounds like a cover at one point, but right now Donald Fagan sounds like a cover.

Will Brinson, Senior NFL Writer, CBSSports.com, pick six podcast, super friend joins me as always here on the Adam Gold show. Good choice if you selected Do It Again live. I mean, Steely Dan, really more.

No, I didn't pick, that was all Victoria. I was, you know, as a passionate fan of the band Fish, someone willing to even stand through a torrential downpour, hypothetically, and maybe a lightning storm. I would, to watch the band, I would just say that that would have been a fine choice too, but you can never go wrong with Steely Dan. I actually was thrown a little bit by the live version. Don't see a lot of live Steely.

There is a live album, but I'm not necessarily a fan of it. All right, let me get to something I led into this segment with in our last one, the notion that maybe the clock is ticking on Bill Belichick. I think we play revisionist history with the end of the Tom Brady era because we fell in love with Brady's year one in Tampa with a loaded roster.

As I said before, he was handed a deck full of aces the way that that team was put together. And a lot of it was the attraction of playing with Brady. So a lot of players played for, you know, below what their market value might've been because they knew that there would be an opportunity to win a Super Bowl. It didn't go well after that, right? It wasn't like they were great after that.

And I don't think he was great all that year either. But now we're looking at Bill Belichick and saying, man, they won a Super Bowl. What have you done? It's been a while. Where are the Patriots right now in their rebuild?

I mean, I think that they're probably trying to figure out what is. I think they're like a rebooting dynasty. Right. And it's like if you're it's really it's a really hard act to follow six Super Bowls in a 20 year span. And in the two years where you don't win the division title.

Right. And you have the greatest quarterback of all time and the greatest coach of all time. But he's still the greatest coach of all time. I think there's a reasonable if you want to say Patrick Mahomes can catch Brady, then that's fine. But then that means you probably think Andy Reid can catch Belichick, too, which is crazy to think about, but not not totally out of the question.

There's just been an increasing amount of pressure, just sort of the way that it's been spoken about. Like you hear Bob Kraft talking in owners meetings and I mean, I don't think Belichick's on the hot seat. He wants Belichick to catch Shula on the all time wins list. He wants Belichick to wait to go out as a winner in New England.

Like, you don't want it to end poorly. But, you know, last year they hired Matt Patricia as the offensive coordinator. Right.

And Joe Judge. It's one of the most inexplicable coaching decisions, maneuvers, whatever you want to call it, that you ever see. Look, he also let Tom Brady walk, really pushed him out the door.

Right. Brady would have stayed in New England. Belichick had been thinking about rebooting for a while as a quarterback. That's why he drafted Jimmy Garoppolo in the second round. He didn't believe, he just believed in the law of physics in reality that Brady wasn't going to play forever.

Little did we know he's superhuman. And I think that I think that probably has an impact on this, too, because Bob Kraft loves Tom Brady so much that he probably holds a little bit of a grudge here with Belichick. And then if you keep not winning, the NFL isn't very much what have you done for me lately league. But it seems unfathomable that Bill Belichick would push out at him. But right. I mean, he keeps losing and keeps talking about Patricia.

Who knows? Well, look, yeah, you can't make bad decisions. I don't know that they've drafted really well. All right. They've made poor decisions in free agency.

I think these are the problems that is really plaguing this. And I would argue this. We saw the end of Brady in New England. And it was ugly, not because of Brady, but he was unable to help what they had be even competent offensively. Their offense at the end of that season was atrocious. And their offensive personnel the following season was equally as bad, maybe worse.

So. I mean, there's no way that Brady at that stage of his career was going to elevate, you know, second tier at best talent into being a really good team. So, look, I don't I don't disparage. I don't I don't I don't blame Belichick for letting Brady walk. I don't I don't blame anybody in Brady's Brady's Brady's final year. The top four receivers by yardage were a thirty three year old, Julian Edelman.

It wouldn't be around long. A twenty seven year old James White, who's a running back. Right. Philip Dorsett, who is a former first round pick, was bounced around the league. And Jacoby Myers, who is beloved around here. But like, given his and a great draft record, I'm glad he got paid. But like, given his pedigree, like and just given given where he was drafted, that you wouldn't have expected him to be the Patriots number one wide receiver that quickly or that quickly. That's that's problematic for them.

Is Mac Jones in New England. Going to be good enough to elevate what they've got now, they did better. They actually went a little bit more sizzle in free agency this year and they added to the offensive personnel. Is that enough what they have done? And then Juju Smith Schuster, right?

Is that enough to do to take them to a level? I mean, it's a difficult division. I think Miami is really good. We know Buffalo is really good. Right.

And we don't know. I mean, the Jets are set up to at least be interesting and competitive. I mean, the Patriots are like eight to one to win the division.

That is wild. If you think about it, a double check coach team is like getting creeping up towards 10 to one to win their own division. I think you can. I always try to do in the off season with every team, like take a look at him, be like and like squint really hard and try to figure out what's like, what's the best case? And then also like sort of look at it and say, what's the worst case? And there's definitely a downside, a huge downside for the Patriots here.

Like things could just go south. But it's like Bill O'Brien's an improvement. I mean, he's going to be an improvement over Matt Patricia, like he's just going to be.

That's it's like, you know, it's yeah, it's like, oh, yes, this is just hard to fathom just how bad that Patricia that higher was basically when Andy Reid hired won to see you at the end of his run in Philly as offensive line coach to be his DC, which again, makes no sense. The weapons are there, I think, to fashion enough of an offense. If for Marjorie Stevenson's healthy, if he's the bell cow, like Cole strange or the Chattanooga first round pick that from a couple years ago, he like this offensive line has to come together. The power run game has to be there and they need Juju and to sort of eat up underneath and then Davante, Davante Barker to take the top off. Like they, the best case scenario I think is like a top half of the league offense efficiency wise, maybe not volume wise. And then defensively, like you just have to trust Bill Belichick is going to, you know, have and have a defense looks like it could be better. It looks like he could improve and so like this is a team that's going to be frisky. They're going to be a pain, but they're going to be frisky is the word.

Maybe it's like they're, they're not going to just go away quietly. And so I think there's a change. Belichick wins 10 games is here. Everybody sort of off his back.

But I mean, I guess there's a chain. I'm I don't for like, again, the division is very, very competitive and the conference is as well. Let me ask you about the Jets because I heard somebody I might've been Jeff Darlington on ESPN. I have no idea say that he thinks the Jets have a greater chance to miss the playoffs than make the playoffs. I mean, I kind of floated that right after the Aaron Rodgers thing and maybe that's over the top.

It probably is over the top with half the league, basically half the conference making the playoffs seven out of what, 16 teams in the, in the conference will make the playoffs. But I don't think the Jets were just a quarterback away. I don't think had you plugged in competency at quarterback over Zach Wilson and Mike White, they would, they, they, there was a reason they lost seven in a row to end the year.

So they were good. So I look, I don't, I think the jury is still out on Robert Sala, as much as I like Robert Sala as a, as a coach or as a guy, I think the jury is still out on whether or not he's a good enough head coach to win. But what are your thoughts on, I know Aaron Rodgers is there, but are they definitely a playoff team or is it still up in the air? I think he's very much up in the air.

I mean, I, I mean, I'm with you. I said that really when the, when the Rogers trade went down, it was like, of course, like this could be a playoff team, but you know, when you say, Oh, they're a quarterback away. That means everything clicked for you, but the quarterback position. And I know Breece all went down with a, with an ACL injury, but the assumption is just that he's going to come back and be fine.

And there could be a little bit of time. I'm trying to actually see it on Caesars right now, but because they had to make missed playoffs. I mean, I'm sure that the, I think the last time I saw it, the Jets were like minus one 50 to make the playoffs. So they are inherently, or I mean, I guess just by, by the nature of what Vegas is assigning to it, they are more likely to make the playoffs than miss the playoffs.

But I think that Jeff's point was probably, I didn't see the hit, but I would assume that his point was more like everyone's penciling in the jets to make the playoffs. And they have to deal with the Patriots team. We just talked about it, which they do have, they do have a possible upside, right? They have to deal with the Miami dolphins where if tool plays the whole season, they're going to be a really good team. That offensive line is good as well. And then the bills who everyone's tried to write off in a weird way, but you know, are clearly going to have a chip on their shoulder based on this off season, still have Josh Allen.

Like that is a really hard schedule. And then you factor in the rest of the AFC where you've got the chiefs, the Broncos, who I think are possible bounce back team in the chargers in the West. Like, I mean, both, both divisions can't get three teams in some good, there's a very good chance that a terrible team from the NFC gets in the playoffs and a really good team from the AFC is left out.

So you get home and we have that whole, should we receive conversation and then we move on. What's the playoffs start. Isn't there a chance that a terrible team from the AFC also gets into the playoffs.

Well, I mean, Jacksonville will probably be significantly better than terrible. Uh, whether it's 15 to one with the MVP man. Yeah. I mean, I'm not a term.

I'm not, I'm not a, I know you are, you're, you're buying, you're, you're all about for sunshine. I still, I don't know, man. I, uh, I think I see a lot of good, but I see a lot of, uh, I see a lot of average. And one thing I will say is that he's got, I think, outstanding coaching, uh, in, uh, Doug Peterson. To me, the biggest advantage that he has and why not urban Meyer, numb, not a reminder, but also not whatever they've got in, uh, with the Los Angeles charges, because Trevor Lawrence is going to pass Justin Herbert on the really handsome six foot, six inch blonde flowing loss quarterback list. Um, but I'm not sure.

Probably in large part to coach you. I mean, now Kellen Moore, Kellen Moore could come in there and you saw me with Joe Lombardi, like they threw underneath all season long, the chargers did and Kellen Moore comes in and they'll attack vertically. So like that, that should benefit them. But I don't know if that team is good. Like I'm just saying that a nine or 10 win team is probably gonna miss the playoffs today. I would be my guest. Sure. All right. So we'll, we'll close on this. Will Brinson, uh, rank. Give me your order of finish in the AFC East.

I, um, I've been pounded the table that the bills are being written off. Like the chiefs were last year for some silly, because if you're the dolphins are like the hot team and the jets get Rogers. Um, so I'll say the bills won the dolphins to jets three Patriots four. I think that's probably, I'm feeling really frisky. Come prediction time for cbssports.com. I'll put the Patriots ahead of the jets and just get just so much vitriol from jets fans. And that's, and that's fine because as Victoria will test too, I'm not sure Aaron Rogers is enough tomato juice to mask the stench of the jets. It's just that you're going for a bloody Mary. No, no, no, no, no.

It's just high Alaska. Uh, but yeah, I'm not sure at this stage of his career, as good as he is still, I'm not sure that's enough, but we will, uh, we will find out. Are you excited for hard knocks? Uh, yeah, especially cause Roger's mad that he's on hard knocks. He's like furious.

They put him on hard knocks, which makes me like kind of love the fact that he's on hard knocks. Uh, I'm still not, I'm still not sure I'll watch, but, uh, I'll certainly read the stories about it. Will Brinson. I appreciate your time, my man. Uh, talk to you very soon. Uh, that's will Brinson senior NFL writer, cbssports.com pick six podcast super friend.