REShow: Hour 2

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Tits just keep on coming. This is the Rich Eisen Show with guest host Tom Pelissero. A really talented player. Dalvin Cook is not coming in for four or five million dollars. Live from the Rich Eisen Show studio in Los Angeles. There are a bunch of running backs. Josh Jacobs, Pauler, and Barkley.

The clock's not quite ticking yet. Earlier on the show, Steelers wide receiver Alan Robinson. Still to come, senior writer for NBA.com, Steve Ashburner. Plus, your phone calls, latest news, and more.

And now, sitting in for Rich, it's Tom Pelissero. We had a few other responses during the break to our prior discussion about, well, really the list of movies I haven't seen. What else did we get there, Brockman?

What are some of the top ones? So, one of our long time callers, Kathy in Philadelphia, she just said she's never seen a single Rocky movie. From Philly.

What are we doing? She's from Philly? Yes. Yeah. That's odd. Say that. Kind of odd.

They would have a statue of the guy. Diane Moretti tweeted us, never seen E.T. That's a strange one. Understandable. Why is that understandable? E.T. 's generational, I think. Well, yeah.

I'm sure the animation on the Alien's not as great now. No, but I mean, it's like, I get E.T. You've got some. Oh, I got bad ones. I got two bad ones, and you guys are going to, do you want me to tell you?

Bring it on. Wedding Crashers and Old School. Just not a fan of those guys.

I'm not a fan of that. My dark period was the early 1980s. Your dark period apparently was 2000s comedies. All of 2000s? Not all 2000s comedies.

Those comedies. Have you seen American Pie? Yes. Have you seen Road Trip? Yes.

OK. But I just... You're in the genre. You just haven't... But how did you miss Wedding Crashers? Yeah, that's a strange one.

I don't know how I missed that. Like, I watched The 40 Year Old Virgin, that's another one after that, years later. But I mean, I never, I just never, I've seen bits, but... Like homework. Homework.

You got homework to do. You've seen Swingers. Oh, yes.

Love Swingers. But you didn't go Vince Vaughn... No, and I love Vince Vaughn. He was kind of in and out for a long time there, and that was kind of the comeback role for him. It's like Ben Affleck.

He's slip-locked through Dodgeball. I haven't seen, what's it called? The Academy Award.

The winning. But they won, him and Matt won the Academy Award for writing. Good Will Hunting? Nope. Never saw it. You've never seen Good Will Hunting?

Nope. What? That was on my list for a while, but I knocked that one out a while ago. I don't find that one so egregious, though. I mean, Shawshank Redemption was the one that was killing these people.

That was really bad. By the way, knew how it was going to end, though. I knew it.

He was digging through. Swinger's released 26 years ago today, I believe. Such a good movie. Another great anniversary. This is a good movie anniversary day. Good movie anniversary. Swinger's is like, that's a good LA early 90s perfect, perfect movie that just shows what LA was like when I first met her. I will say that Swinger's, I mean, literally, in actual fact, changed the trajectory of my life. I can't explain. I came to LA to visit in 98.

And of course, you know, come there from Pittsburgh. My mind's just blown away of everything I'm seeing. And my friends had Swinger's on VHS. And so we'd watch this movie and I never seen anything like Swinger's.

And it was to me the one of the coolest things I'd ever seen. And then we go to the same bars with no names on the outside and we'd be at the same places. And it was just like I probably in two weeks watched Swinger's four times and I took it back home with me to Pittsburgh. And over the next 13 months, because I moved back, I moved here in ninety nine, I literally guys probably watched Swinger's a minimum of four times a month for 13 months. Because it was like anyone that came over to my crib, I'm like, you got to see this movie.

This is what L.A. is all about. I watched Swinger's so much. Like, yeah, that was one of the movies that made me go, I got to get out of here, man.

I got to I got to go to L.A. So Swinger's has a solid place in my in my heart, made with no budget, no budget, no time cast of people that prior to that movie, no one had heard of. No was Rudy before that. Rudy had to have been slightly before that because Vince Vaughn is in that movie was before. Yeah, that's the only role he really had right prior to that on that movie. Yeah, they met well, yeah, of course. And yeah, they were both. But yeah, going to the Dresden and seeing Marty in the lane. And I thought this is the greatest thing in the world. You know, and so it was love Swinger's a trip in the early 90s.

What's that? L.A. was a trip in the early 90s because clubs like it was just the what's your best early 90s L.A. story Del Tufo. Mike, when did you get here again?

Do you want a real quick one? So I go to the Roxbury, the actual Roxbury that the night at the Roxbury was created from, which became Miyagi or whatever on Sunset. Me and my ex-wife, Ellen Kaye, the morning deejay with Ryan Seacrest is in there. I get I can get in the T.J.'s watches and Brockman's. Well, I can get into any deejay booth in the world. I can I just talk my way in.

Chris saw it when I was next to Shaq at one of the Super Bowl parties. Good talk. I can get myself in.

Well, Ellen Kaye decides to come up and give me a like a hug and a kiss. Needless to say, got thrown out of the club with my ex-wife because she started a fight. So that is my good. So I never can go to Roxbury after that because I was thrown out. You can talk your way into any deejay booth? Yeah, like any club or deejay booth. That's such a niche ability on your resume that's on there can talk his way into any deejay booth.

I'm pretty good at it. What's the hardest one you've ever talked your way into? The Shaq one was tough at the Super Bowl because I had to make it through like three or four Minnesota, Minnesota. Toughest one.

I can't I got I got to really think about it. I've been in so many deejay booths. New York City. Tom, Tom, he's got too many we've dived into. He's been in too many New York City with Funkmaster Flex playing live on the radio.

That's pretty good. Snuck in Funkmaster Flex is deejaying. I'm in the booth with him and we're doing shots while he's like basically live to like a couple million people in New York. What year is this? Ninety two ninety three. Hot ninety seven.

It was great. And he's sitting there and showing me what he's doing. I'm like this. How do you talk your way in? Tom, you just go to the you just got to be like, yeah, can I go in? And you just got to just do it. You just go up and ask? Yes.

You you have to ask for nine. It's weird to say you talk your way into the deejay booth when most deejay booth is not like there's a door. No, they're used to being in the old days. Walk up. You always had a there was a bouncer in all the clubs I worked in and the booth was like trying to get on the field at a football game. Probably trying to run onto the green and celebrate with your buddy after he wins the Canadian Open.

Yes, for the RBC. I got a lot of questions about that. The entirety of that incident. That was so funny. On the 72 foot putt, you know, the first Canadian to win the Canadian Open in however many decades. Your buddy runs out there to celebrate and gets form tackled. Right now, got taken down the last. Because it's not he's not running.

I can listen. I think that in that case, like I'll side with the security guard for a hard job. You don't know what anybody's doing, but you didn't run up to hug him. He's ten feet away with the champagne bottle. Are just normal people walking around with bottles of champagne on the golf course? Did you have a high concern that this was just a deranged fan who was about to commit murder by champagne pop?

Murder by Moet. Well, it was Canada and it was a Canadian trying to win. And, you know, they get a little rowdy north of the border and, you know, they like to be, you know, libated for for events.

And so, yeah, I don't know. The guy's just doing his job. I'm not going to fault the security guy.

It's good to know that, you know, they got everybody's backs and they're well intended. That was insane. But the slow motion replay where Nick Taylor, is that his name? Nick Taylor is the golfer and his caddie. They're like hugging and celebrating. And then the security guard runs in and plants the guy.

Do you see them both turn around and the caddie starts going? Hey! Hey!

That's Adam High! Boom! Other than that, great moment for Canada is really what matters here. Great moment for Canada. DeAndre Hopkins in Nashville today, visiting the Titans, got there last night, posted on Instagram that he was at the CMAs.

Again, I don't that's the first I've heard of that on an NFL visit. There he is! Look at that! Seeing Tim McGraw. Can we get him some better seats? Well, he's in a box, right?

Hop's a unique guy. I think that in terms of the potential fits city-wise, Nashville probably a little bit more his speed than Foxboro. But he is supposed to visit the Patriots later this week. Do we have that sound, by the way? Do we have the Bill Belichick?

Can we use that? We have a segment on the show, right? Bill Belichick press conference moments. There was one today when he was asked about DeAndre Hopkins. Let's roll that now. Today's Bill Belichick press conference moment.

Oh, we prefer to win. Bill, when you mentioned some uncertainty about whether or not Hopkins might visit, is that because... They asked about the date. I wasn't, I'm not sure. Okay.

But is the plan for him to be here this week? Well, we were working through it, so I don't really have anything to add to that. I didn't know if the uncertainty was on his end or on your end, whether or not you wanted to end here. I don't think it relates more to the logistics and things like that. So I'm not really a travel agent here. I'm not going to say it's going to happen here or not going to happen or whatever. There's a lot of other stuff going on that I'm not directly involved in, so I'm not going to say anything.

And then, you know, you turn around and sit up and misled you in some way, because that's not what I'm going to do. Not a travel agent. Wow. It's the FYI, Bill's not a travel agent. God bless Mike Reese, just doing the Lord's work every single week in Foxboro. I just love how whatever the previous question was, Bill's smiling after his answer.

And then the moment the question starts to come out and you just see the face droop, he knows what he's got to do here. By the way, Hopkins, I'm told, is visiting on Thursday. So to the extent that anyone cares on the timeline of it, it's supposed to be on Thursday.

A beautiful June day in New England. Which gives the Titans time here. I think that it's a really interesting fit in Tennessee. It makes a lot of sense because it's no secret Mike Vrabel was really frustrated with what they were working with at wide receiver last year. They obviously drafted Tralen Burks. He's a young player. They've tried, you know, went out traded for Julio Jones a couple of years ago.

That did not work out. They traded for Robert Woods last year. He actually led them in receiving, I believe, but he's gone. He's in Houston now. Hopkins is a guy who goes back to the Houston days with Mike Vrabel.

He saw Hopkins up close and personal for four years when he was on staff in Houston. Then he had to play against him twice a year when he was in Tennessee as the head coach and Hop was still on the Texans here. I think that, and remember we talked about this when I called in the day that he was released and Rich was asking about like they couldn't get anything for him. And I think between that and the Delvin Cook situation is a reminder of how hard NFL trades are particularly when you get beyond the draft. Because the compensation changes in terms of when those draft picks are if you're pushing them out a year.

Because teams have spent so much of their resources in terms of cash as well as cap. And in a lot of cases, players have to do what Allen Robinson, who we had on the show earlier, did with his contract, which was we're willing to rework this here. And the Rams paid some money and he took a little bit less and then the Steelers are left with a number that they could stomach.

And you get to the best place. With Hopkins, there were multiple teams that were inquiring, the Chiefs, the Bills among them. There was at least one trade that was pretty close to happening. Then Odell Beckham Jr. gets paid on a deal that's got $15 million fully guaranteed upside to 18.

And Op goes, well, I'm not taking less than that. So at that point, the Cardinals are in a position where they can't trade them. Nobody's going to take on the 15. Nobody's going to spend that money right now on Hopkins. That's not where the market is.

And so they have to release them. Delvin Cook, different situation. And there was another trade that was close back in March.

I shouldn't say close. There was another trade that was discussed in advanced terms back in March with Miami. And at that point, the Dolphins would have taken on the full contract.

It didn't happen for multiple reasons. Then once you get past the draft and teams have spent money and they may have drafted guys at the position, it's a lot harder to justify trading for an $11 million contract. Now, again, like I said earlier, Delvin Cook is going to get money. I don't know that it's $11 million hard, but he probably gets upside to somewhere in that range. And he certainly, I would anticipate, gets a strong contract in terms of the base value of it, just because he's still a very unique weapon. I got a text from somebody earlier in the show with a different team in the division saying, I'm glad he's gone.

Asking what happened and then just saying, I'm glad he's gone because he is a difference maker. The Vikings think they can get similar productivity from Alexander Madison. They want to conserve resources to go pay Justin Jefferson, TJ Hawkinson.

Cook wasn't going to redo his deal and take a cut to get traded to a team. So what happens? You get to a certain point, you don't want to drag it out with a Ring of Honor type of player and you release the guy.

Now he's sitting out there and we'll see exactly when the market comes together here. But I think that people have gotten spoiled, frankly, in terms of fans, in terms of media. There have been so many trades over the past couple of years and somebody like bonkers, fantasy football, Madden style trades. Everyone's like, why, why couldn't you do this and that? It's like, it's complicated. Everybody says, you know, the cap isn't real. Here's an example of why it is. This is exactly the type of example here, because teams have to figure out in terms of short term and long term asset management.

What can you really afford right now? It's not that you can't you don't have 11 million dollars in cash. Most teams do. It's not that you couldn't rework contracts to fit 11 million dollars in for a Dalvin Cook.

You could in a lot of cases, but then you're pushing that stuff out to the future. And if you're a Vikings team that's got these other priorities and you're trying to do what they've called the competitive rebuild, continue trying to compete. They won 13 games last year.

Right. They went 13 and four. And since then have released Eric Kendricks, Adam Thielen, Dalvin Cook, traded Zaderia Smith, let Pat Peterson leave in free agency. That's a lot of turnover with your core parts.

What have they done in all those cases? They've replaced them with somebody younger and cheaper. Alexander Madison, who's not that much younger than Dalvin Cook.

I think he is. He's like 25. He's he's a younger guy, but he hit him for three point five million dollars. You get Jordan Addison in the draft. You figure that's going to replace Adam Thielen, who's getting toward the end of his career. Got a really good contract with Carolina because they valued the veteran receiver presence.

But you go and you go and get that guy. These are the complicated decisions that GMs have to make. And the cap is one of the reasons for that. So the salary cap exists.

You do have to manage it in a longitudinal way. Even if short term, you can do what the Saints have done for years. You can do what some other teams have periodically done, which is max it out, redo contracts, push your pain into the future, go for your window right now. And you can tell when you look around the league at the teams that are doing that versus the teams that are amassing assets for future years.

What type of position people are in. Go back to the draft in April. The Cardinals picked up an extra twenty twenty four first round pick. And I want to say two twenty twenty four second round picks in that draft just by their trades back at a time that they're clearly going into. We need to really tear it down and build it back up mode. They know they're not going to win this year.

Kyler Murray's not going to be healthy at the start of the season. You're going to be challenged. You're trying to get a program going the right direction. But you put all of it. All right.

Push it all out here. It's not tanking in the classic sense of the term. You're not trying to lose, but you're not trying to win right now. You're trying to win big picture long term. It's not Mark Madsen shooting three pointers here.

It's you're just simply using your resources differently. Then look what the Broncos did. It's the same thing that Sean Payton did for years in New Orleans, which was max it out. Spend big and free agency trade up. They trade a future pick to go up into the third round and get Riley Moss the corner from Iowa.

They trade a future pick for that on a team that last year was bad for a lot of different reasons. And it's competing to maybe the toughest division in all football because Sean doesn't think in terms of, well, let's tear it down and we'll take two years to build this up. No, Sean's ready to win.

Sean's ready to win right now. I asked him about this in March when we sat down at the league meetings. And I said, you know, in New Orleans, you had this history where you maxed out the cap.

You pooled assets. You kept your veteran players around. What if anything we do different Denver? And his answer and paraphrasing paraphrasing only slightly here was, why would we do anything different?

It worked. That's his mindset, which is he's going to go to Denver and do the same thing. Is Russell Wilson going to perform up to the level that they can do that in 2023? We'll see.

There's a lot of different things that go into it. He has dropped weight. You can see visibly Russell Wilson looks different right now. So if his mobility's back, if it helps him stay healthier, they are going to be better on the offensive line.

They spent so much money there. They've you know, they think that they've upgraded some other positions around the field. They're one of the teams I have no clue this year. I know Sean Payton's a really good coach.

I know Russell Wilson has been previously in his career. You have to go back a little ways, but he's been a really good player in the league. And they've put some really good young talent in there in terms of Javonte Williams is going to be coming off an injury. Pat Sertan's a really good young player. They've had good drafts with George Payton. They do have pieces there, but are they going to go all the way to competing with the Chiefs or even the Chargers?

One of the Raiders this year? I think it's all fascinating. I want to at some point this week to get into the Jimmy Garoppolo situation again.

One of the classic stories that only exist in May and June. Let's put it that way. We'll talk about that later on. Yeah, real quick, Tom. You mentioned how wild the trade market has been in the last few years in the NFL. What's been that one trade for you where you were just like, whoa, I did not see that coming? What is that number one trade? I try not to get caught off guard.

Of course, of course. There are trades that like pop up kind of out of nowhere just in terms of like, oh, that's going to happen. And it might not happen that day. It might not happen for a week.

It might not happen for a month. But, I mean, there were all those quarterback trades a couple of years ago. I mean, those were, again, we basically broke or were right there on all of them. So you kind of knew.

But when you took a step back to go, whoa, this is big time. I mean, the one in free agency this year that I broke was when Darren Waller got traded from the Raiders to the Giants. And that wasn't like shocking in terms of we all knew Darren Waller was available. He had been available since the previous year. I still had a draft in my in my Twitter account, which I have all kinds of different things.

I just like refuse to delete because someday they might happen. And I had one. It was the absolute oldest tweet draft I had. And it was from over a year earlier. That would be a fun bit going through Tom's draft. Darren Waller traded to the Packers.

Right. I remember which was going to be part of the Devante Adams trade until that didn't work out for a variety of reasons, including the fact that it had to have been two separate trades because you can't trade franchise tag players. But I had the Darren Waller one in there. It was seven minutes from when I got the call that this is happening to when I reported it. Because it was just like it was out of nowhere. There was, yeah, it's being finalized right now. And it was shocking only from the regard that no one had talked about that. No one had been talking about the Giants and Darren Waller. There wasn't a rumor.

There wasn't a report. Nothing. I mean, now that was a that was a good one. I think that the sheer scope of, you know, the the size of the Russell Wilson trade. Right. The compensation was one that people off guard.

But they were talking in those terms for a long time leading up to that. We'll see in year two of Russell Wilson, year one with Sean Payton. Even Tyreek Hill, that was the one that apparently caught fans and people off guard as well.

That was it. That was a unique one because they had his agent, Drew Rosenhaus, have been calling around to teams like several days before because contract talks gone sideways with the Chiefs. I heard on like a Friday or Saturday night, I got a text from a team. Why is Drew calling us about trading for Tyreek Hill?

Which made me go, huh? OK, so this is going to be real. And it happened like three or four days later. And so we knew he was getting traded and it was down to the Dolphins and the Jets. He ended up choosing the Dolphins. But, yeah, I mean, that's again, why did the Chiefs do that? It goes back to my original point here, which was the Chiefs did that because a Tyreek Hill contract is 30 on paper.

Truly twenty five, twenty five million dollars. With that twenty five million dollars, they went out and they signed Juju and they signed Marcos Valdes Scanling and they picked up picks. And they had additional resources. They could completely change the way that they were set up from a resource management standpoint, because they just weren't going to pay him at that type of a level. So for the Chiefs, it worked out great because they got a first rounder and more for a player who probably did not have a future there. They weren't going to be able to work out a contract with them. And the Dolphins get a guy that they were willing to pay and they thought he was a missing piece.

So go out and get him. Right. What did Jalen Ramsey get traded for? There's a lot of these examples of these trades where, again, you kind of know who's out there and who's available. It's a matter of where does that compensation settle?

And it's based on so many factors between the contract, between timing, what teams are willing to... Is there competition? Is the player willing to go multiple places? The player can nix the trade by just going, I'll just I'll retire before I go there. And you can call their bluff or you can say, all right, we're only going to negotiate in this direction. So we got to take a break here.

But I do want to get back to that at some point. You got some overreactions for me after this break. Overreaction Monday. Let's do it. Overreaction Monday coming up right after this on the Rich Eisen List Show. Tom Pelissero in for Rich.

I did not approve this, but, you know, that's that's part of me delegating to you, our social media grand maester. You put out on Instagram a photograph. It says Breaking Bears trading for Russell Wilson. And what's today's date? What's today's date? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. It is April 1st. And that is what it is.

April Fool's Day. So it's five minutes to air. My phone's on the desk and it's buzzing.

And yeah. And I see it is, you know, it's it's it's Jeff Garland. Is the caller there? Is the caller there on the.

Jeff from Chicago. What's funny about it? Nothing's funny about it.

Nothing is funny about it. Our friend Doug Robinson texts me. Yes. Capital.

Russell Wilson. He says, you know, Rich doesn't usually get the scoop. Well, that should have made me suspicious. But no, I have so much respect. For the Rich Eisen show that I know that they have connections that nobody else has.

That's true. Well, you know what, Rich? I'm not going to swear, but I got to tell you, you're a little social media boy. He's going to get it. TJ, do you have anything to say to Jeff Garland? Yeah. Happy.

All right. Hey, J, you don't know what you brought down on yourself. You don't even have a clue of the power that I have, especially in practical jokes. I'm going to nail you so hard. You know what? I hope you enjoy your testicles right now because they're going to disappear.

No, but I need them. Welcome back to the Rich Eisen Show radio network. I'm sitting at the Rich Eisen Show desk furnished by Grainger with supplies and solutions for every industry. Grainger has the right product for you.

Call click Grainger dot com or just stop by. I am Tom Pelticero with NFL Network. We've talked a lot of NFL already. The course of the show, many camps getting going.

Buddha Baker in the Neil Hunter out. Saquon Barkley, very out, very out as of this moment. And we shall see for how long right now. It's Monday.

And that means I believe we've got some overreactions. Let's go. That was terrible. That was crap.

That was garbage. Just like overreaction Mondays, Monday. All right, Tom, it's Monday.

Yes, refresher. I know you haven't been here in a while. You haven't been here on a Monday.

I've never been here on a Monday. I'm always end of the week guy. All right.

Here's the deal. I just say a bunch of crazy stuff. And then you say if it's an appropriate reaction or if it's a complete and utter overreaction. Speaking of inappropriate reaction, is the start of that sounder for the overreaction Monday supposed to sound like a fart? Because it definitely.

Oh, good question. No one's ever brought that up one more time. All right.

Let's hear it. I thought I've actually never thought wrong initially. Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope. All right. What is that supposed to be?

Just kind of like. I thought it was still two for you. All right.

Here we go, Tom. Ready? I'm ready.

I'm ready now. Yes. If D-Hop signs with the Pats, we're making the playoffs. Oh, there's a lot that has to happen for the Patriots to make the playoffs difficult division. I mean, right now, if you are just objectively stacking up the division, I know that's difficult for you.

You got a Red Sox hat in front of you. You are objectively stacking up the four teams in the division. How do you stack objectively? Objectively.

All right. The bills are first, obviously. They're very good football.

Very good. Josh Allen's on the cover of Madden, though. So, you know, could go sideways. I think Miami is better than the Jets. I just don't think Aaron Rodgers is going to be good this year. But I mean, I guess you'd put New England fourth. If you're just going by betting odds.

I mean, if you're just thinking about it logically. They have a really good roster, really good young core. They added an old quarterback who was last year. Yeah. And bills are a perennial playoff team. Sure.

So it's an uphill battle just based on the sheer numbers of it. Yep. Does Hopkins help them? He has best years playing for Bill O'Brien in Houston.

If the two of them can be on the same page here. And he can fill the same role they did in the office. And the biggest thing with Hopp is he's got to stay healthy. Two years in a row, he's been hurt.

He's not been himself. He's thirty to thirty one. He's not not getting younger at this point.

So thirty one. He's he's got to stay healthy. That's the biggest thing. Would it help them? I think absolutely.

Assuming that, again, they're running the same offense that he flourished in as a multi-time all pro. That's a yes. We're making the playoffs. Cool. Good. All right. Moving on. You know, you know that I don't give direct answers in these types of segments. I try to bring you. I try to lead the horse to water here. You've got to make it. So it's an overreaction then?

I think it's an overreaction to think that that absolutely makes it a guarantee. All right. Did you see who I mean, we mentioned it, TJ. Did you see Aaron Rodgers was at the Tonys last night? I heard about this guy's been everywhere. The Rogers New York Love Fest has to end at some point, right, Tom?

I don't know. I mean, it's Rogers loving New York as much as it's New York loving Rogers. At this point, if they come out of the gate and play badly, look at the first six games in their schedule, put the first six games in their schedule. They come out of the gate with a really difficult run that they've got to get through in the early portion of the season. And that's where Breece Hall is still going to be working his way back. They think Robert Solis said he thinks he's ready week one.

Is he a full go? Look at that. Buffalo in the opener on a Monday night. You've got to go to Dallas. You've got to host the playoff-bound Patriots, according to Brockman.

Now we're talking. You've got the Chiefs in week four. They're real good. You've got to go to Denver, which I think is a tricky type of a game. Home game for the Broncos with the altitude and the whole thing. They'll hopefully have a little bit of, you know, show signs of life there by week five for Sean Payton. And then you host the Eagles in week six.

They're not bad either. If you get to the bye at four and two, you have to be ecstatic. If you get to the bye at three and three, you're probably like, OK, it can still be happening. But it's New York.

I think they're going to be one and five. But, you know, three and three, though, that sky is falling because that's what I mean. That's not why you brought Aaron Rogers here. Right. You have literally last year's two Super Bowl teams. You've got the Cowboys who are really, really talented. It's a tough road game.

I mean, going to Denver is hard. Right. I don't think there's anything wrong with three and three with that schedule.

Correct. But in New York, it will be here's all the things that are wrong right now with this team, even though the schedule after that opens up a little bit. So the love fest, the love fest only lasts so long for everybody, for every player, particularly in that market. And if there's three and three out of the gate, it's going to be.

Did they blow it? But that's just that is the actual overreaction here in terms of Rogers. I am entertained by Aaron, who didn't show up for OTAs the past couple of years, didn't do any of the voluntary stuff in Green Bay. He's now out there almost full time and he had something to do every night.

He's at a Taylor Swift concert. He's at the Tony's. He's at the Rangers games everywhere. He's everywhere in Green Bay. I lived in Green Bay for three years. Aaron lived there at the same time. It's not an overreaction to say there is more to do in New York on a nightly basis than there is in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Yeah. He had he had his places going to Fox Harbor, eating dinner at Chives. You know, we'd see him out like all the time, you know, in downtown Green Bay.

But it's like you went to the same few places all the time in New York. It's all of a sudden I can do all this different stuff. What's that going to mean when we get into training camp in the regular season? And it's not all about what you're doing on Monday night after the game.

It's how you play on Sunday. That's where it'll get interesting. But they've they've got a tough road. If somehow they can come out of that schedule four and two at the buy, they should be ecstatic. And we should be talking about them as a potential Super Bowl contender. Wow.

How's that for an overreaction? It's good. I think they're going one and five. We still haven't heard and it hasn't been announced yet.

Who's doing hard knocks? It's way late. Usually this gets announced by now. Well, usually that means that there's some pushback. Right. From from certain teams. The Jets don't want it. There's four eligible teams, quote unquote, eligible. Right.

Washington, Washington. It's Chicago, the Jets and one other team that's probably not very interesting. But I'm saying the Bears would be the most interesting hard knocks eligible.

Overreaction. What's interesting about the Bears? I don't mean that negatively in terms of football. But like, do you have any dynamic like out, you know, huge personalities on that team? Matt Eberflut is a really good guy.

He's not a Dan Campbell style quote machine. You know, your quarterback is Justin Fields is a very straight laced, straightforward, no nonsense type of a guy. Who are the big stars on that team that you're excited to see? I'm excited for Fields. I think he could be a superstar this year. He's got he's going to go top five quarterbacks in fantasy.

And I just think there's an opportunity there for him to kind of announce himself nationally as a as, you know, that type of player. I want that over the Jets or even the commanders, because I don't know what would happen on the commanders season. I would believe anything you tell me, because that team tends to find itself 10, 15, 20 times a year in some situation you never even could have conceived.

How does this happen now? Dan, Dan Snyder at that point, maybe on the way out, depending. The goal, according to the owners who have spoken, is that by this month or next month, they'll get together. They'll approve the sale to Josh Harris and his group. And Dan will be gone. But the possibility that sale is not finalized and Dan maybe rolls up to a practice, maybe not really always come to his games for several years now, he hasn't spoken publicly in a decade. But him showing up, you get that storyline, you got a legit quarterback competition.

Well, I should slow my roll on that. They say it's Sam Howell, but they've also at other times said it's going to be a quarterback competition. You got him. You get to Kobe Bressett. You've got at least got competition at that position. Brian Robinson got shot last year. It's a pretty good story to dive into.

They got some unique guy, Chase Young situation. You just take place. That's me. Watch. It should be Washington.

They can get moved to a different state. I just don't want to see the Jets, that's all. I'm just sick of Jets stuff. Get out of here with the Jets. Your New England bias really keeps coming through here, Brock.

I'm just glad the cheerleader's not here this week. We're going to have to talk about it. Giants, talking a lot about Saquon. Don't break the bank for this guy. Giants shouldn't do it. Well, what's break the bank in your mind? Well, we talked about $13 million a year.

I think that's kind of breaking it. It's only two guys make that amount. If he had a real $13 million a year on the table right now, I think the deal would be done. So, you know, the way that teams usually look at this, and agents too, the tag is $10 million and change this year. The second tag next year would be $12 million and change.

So, you're somewhere at least $11 million if you're going to do a long-term deal. With Saquon, he's the best of the bunch, arguably. Josh Jacobs again, NFL rushing leader, so I'm taking nothing away from Josh here.

But Saquon, high draft pick. He's already made some money. Maybe he feels like he's got more leverage here. Joe Shane's a tough negotiator.

Kevin Abrams has been doing it there for a long time. I don't see them getting out over their skis. I don't see them doing anything close to a McCaffrey or Camara-style contract. I just don't think that that's going to happen here. What they've got to figure out is between the base stuff that's guaranteed and the incentives, the upside.

Where is that, you know, where is that path forward here that makes sense for everybody involved? That may well not happen until July 17th, but at least they've had negotiations back and forth. Do you think the Giants make the playoffs this year? I mean, Brian Dable did a hell of a job last year. They're more talented now than they were a year ago. I mean, adding Darren Waller alone, he saw who Daniel Jones was throwing to for a good chunk of last season. They had all the different injuries here.

They had one breakout player they claimed off waivers late in the season who had some good games. Isaiah Hodgins. Hodgins? Hodgins?

That's how much we don't know about him. I can't remember his name. It's Isaiah Hodgins, I believe. But you had a guy like Darren Waller, another player who kind of like Hodgins? Hodgins.

Hodgins. Another guy kind of like DeAndre Hopkins, where Darren Waller hasn't been healthy. Definitely not last year.

And he was probably that fit culturally, schematically wasn't the best for him. He's going to go to the Giants, and if he's healthy, they're going to pump him in football. Darren Waller's going to get the ball a lot. Assuming that Saquon is back, there's no reason that they shouldn't be pushing to be a playoff team. They got one of the best defensive coordinators in the league in Wink Martindale.

That's another division, though, that's tough. I mean, the Eagles are, until proven otherwise, I mean, look at the Eagles' record going back to like the midpoint in Nick Sirianni's first season. They've been unbelievable since then, and they were that close to winning the Super Bowl. You got the Cowboys who are still talented. I'm fascinated by what that offense is going to look like, with Mike McCarthy taking over. I think that just based on how smart Mike is as a play caller, that they've got a chance to be even better offensively than they were with Kellen Moore, maybe in different ways. I think that they've got a chance to be really good.

And then you got the commanders who, again, I have no idea what's going to happen on a daily basis. Are they going to unveil a wire statue? Are they going to accidentally leak their own logo? Are they going to put the wrong championship years on the logo? Are they going to... Are they going to change the name again? I mean, right? The name could change during the show.

It could all of a sudden be guys, like, taking off the, taking off that W, the block W, putting on, like, we'll try out different things here. Washington Hogs, the commanders. Red Hawks.

Does commanders survive? I think it's a great, it's a great question. They nailed it with the football team, in my opinion. I love the football team, but I like, I mean, I don't know.

Washington football team couldn't be trademarked, and apparently neither can commanders. Right, that's what I mean. I mean, every step of the way, there's just different types of things. Football-wise, too. Just strange things happening. You know, Eric Bienemey's there as the offensive coordinator now.

I think that that's one of the, you know, we haven't talked a lot about that, but to me, that's a really fascinating storyline. He's running the show now. There's going to be no ambiguity about who's running that offense. He's got a fifth-round pick in Sam Hollows' quarterback, but Sam Howell also, going into his senior year, was a potential number one overall pick. He's just shorter and didn't have a very good year passing. It was on a horrible North Carolina offense where they had him run, literally, I want to say he had like 192 rushes his final year in North Carolina. So, you know, you're thinking, oh, he's a young quarterback.

How good can he possibly be in year one? Everybody knows their jobs are on the line. Like any other coaching staff, when you've got a new owner coming in, the new owner could wipe everybody out.

I think, yeah, there's so many different levels to that. I know this was not the question we were actually talking on at this point, but the commanders or the Jets. I would easily take either of those two for vastly different reasons. 183 rushes. 183 rushes. That's 15 a game. That's a lot.

He's really not very tall. No. All right, last one, NFL-wise. TJ, I can't help but think about it because my fantasy draft is in like 10 weeks.

I'm already thinking fantasy. Ten weeks. Right? It's a very exact number of weeks. Who says 10 weeks? It's been a couple of months. Who says 10 weeks? All right, it's in two and a half months.

What do you want me to say? Come on. Don't be afraid, guys, to take Bijan Robinson top five. Don't be afraid. Depends what type of league you're in, but if you're in a keeper league, he may be the number one overall pick.

It's a gamble. We talked about this before the show. I mean, I was in a league with like limited keepers, two per team, where Clyde Edwards-Elaire was the number one overall pick, and I think he was the number one overall pick in a lot of drafts. That was back in 2019? 2020.

2020, I think it was. And he went number one in all these drafts, and then, you know, we're three years later here, and obviously, you know, his option got declined and he's kind of disappeared. Bijan's in a little different category just because of the style of running back he is, because the offense he's going to, the same guy who was coordinating the offense when Derrick Henry was running for 2,000 yards and Arthur Smith. They've got these big dudes. Look at their three draft picks there. And since Terry Fontenot got there, it's been Kyle Pitts, who's an absolute monster.

It's Drake London, and it's Bijan Robinson. You want to tell me what style of football they want to play? They want to physically dominate people, and Robinson's going to be a big part of that. I mean, he's a special running back who would have gone even higher if he weren't a running back. Quite frankly, he still goes number eight overall. It would have been awesome if the Lions had done what they considered doing, which was they would have done. If they got stuck at number six, their play was to trade back, which they did. If they got stuck at number six, they were going to stand in and take Jameer Gibbs. And Bijan would not have even been in the top running back.

That's how much they love. Jameer Gibbs had more fans within the league. The final calls I get every year before the draft are usually coaches who are like kind of catching up on tape, just trying to figure out like what does the league think of these guys? And everybody loves Jameer Gibbs.

Just difference maker, unbelievable player. There were mock drafts where he wasn't even in the first round. And then by the end of it, I was pretty convinced he was going in the top half of the first round, and the Lions did take him really high in that draft. Lions would be a fascinating team, too. We already got them on hard knocks last year. I think both of those running backs are going to ball out with fantasy-wise this year. Jameer Gibbs might be the one. Now, they got David Montgomery there, too, in Detroit.

So you got to kind of figure out what's the split going to be. But Gibbs is like the home run hitter. Gibbs is the DeAndre Swift. And Swift was unreliable just because he had, you know, a variety of little injuries that kind of added up. But then he'd have games where he has no yards at halftime and 200 yards in the second half.

You know, and it just was like out of control. Gibbs will be kind of in that same type of mold, and they really like David Montgomery, too. So we got to take a break here. Plenty more running back talk to come as well. There's more on Delvin Cook. We'll try to get to the bottom of that. Let's get some callers to discuss. Let's get some calls.

844-204-RICH. Tom Pelissero in for Rich Eisen on the Rich Eisen Show. . What could you do? Like, what's the move that you could actually perform right now? Oh, man, you know what? I can kick a guy in the nuts without actually kicking him in the nuts.

Yeah, I'm going to pass on that. Hold on a minute. No, it's my party trick.

I guarantee it. I won't hurt you. So is this a...

I'll take my tin kickers off. Could this be sanctioned? Could she try to... Yeah. Okay. Let's see.

Who would volunteer for this work? Come on. You just have to spread your legs and wish for the best.

Mike, Del Twofold. I mean, yeah. We'll both do it. We'll both do it.

What are we about to attempt to do right here? Kick him in the nuts. Without actually hurting him.

Kick him in the nuts. Yeah, exactly. But you will make contact.

I'll make contact, yeah. Absolutely. Okay, but you will not hurt him. No. Well, it doesn't matter.

You'll have children anyway from here on out. No, I'm good. Yeah, exactly.

WWE Superstar Paige. We'll see. Do we have the... Go ahead and hit it there, Jay. Here we go. All right. Spread them for me. Okay, ready?

If I was you, I'd pull your shorts up a little bit just so I can have a ball's eye. There you go. Got it. Jeez. This is great.

Let's see if this works or not. I don't think she's laughing. I don't know. I know. All right, Paige. How about it?

Superstar Paige. Here we go. Got it. There we go. No contact. I just slapped him in the face.

No contact. Yeah. You're up next. That was a good slap on this. Yes. Chris is up next.

Ready? Spread it. You're the one who was making fun of her, so there you go. It just hurts on your butt. I'm sorry. Are you serious? Are you serious, Chris? I'm selling it.

Vince McMahon, take note. All right. Fight with my family. Fight with my family. Go check it out. Well done.

Fantastic. Game five of the NBA Finals tonight in Denver. Nuggets up 3-1 on the Heat. I am, by my own admission, a cursory NBA fan. Don't dive in a ton. Catch a decent amount in the playoffs.

Kind of busy with other things. One of my favorite aspects of the NBA playoffs, and I can't think of anywhere else you get this in all of pro sports, is the one big name veteran or notable guy who somehow is always at the end of the bench doesn't play, but like, for instance, tonight, DeAndre Jordan might finally get that ring, right? Yeah. Kevin Love would have been that guy, except he's actually played a bunch in this series. Blake Griffin was on Boston. Blake Griffin was the one I was thinking of, too, with the Celtics, and he's like into it, and he's yelling at the rest. He's like, Blake Griffin is on the Celtics? DeAndre Jordan's over here.

Love it. Kevin Love finally has to play, hit a couple of shots in that last game, and then goes to the bench, and there's sticking ice packs down his shirt. He can barely even function out there. In baseball, you'll sometimes have the pinch hitter, right? There'll be some guy who's been hanging around.

He's probably not going to play a lot, but maybe with the expanded rosters in baseball postseason he gets out there, but that guy still has to play. He still might have to come in in a big moment. It's not like tonight the Nuggets. It's a one-point game, and they're like, you know what?

Thirty seconds to go, let's drop a play for DeAndre Jordan. It wouldn't happen. There's no maybe you can argue backup quarterbacks sometimes, but generally guys who are starting quarterbacks make a bunch of money. They don't then just go to the second quarterback and the third quarterback, and eventually like Peyton Manning's not inactive for the Jaguars in the playoffs, just like holding on for one more shot, practicing, and not getting into the game, right? Peyton never came up. There's nowhere else hockey.

You just, you go away. Guys, some guys can play longer, but eventually you just kind of run out of juice. I mean, Peyton Manning felt like he was inactive on that Bronco Super Bowl run. I mean, Peyton Manning, I was at those games. I was at that Super Bowl. I was compared to it looked when the ball was coming out of Peyton Manning.

This is post the next surgeries. He had the year that he threw 50 touchdowns, and then they lost the Super Bowl. Two years later was when they won the Super Bowl, and Peyton missed a bunch of time.

He had like, I think it was plantar fasciitis or something at a foot injury, but really he couldn't throw either. And I always compare it to when you watched it live, it was like watching a t-shirt cannon where, you know how the t-shirt gets shot and the initial thing looks really powerful and then it just kind of goes and slowly drops down? That's what Peyton Manning's passes looked like. It was this huge windup because he always had a very tight windup, but he was throwing everything he had into it. And then the ball would just kind of go up and flutter, but he still was able to function at such a high level mentally at that point.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He knew where the guys were going to be open. Drew Brees did that toward the end of his career, too, until eventually it just became very hard for him and he ended up walking away. He paid that 9 and 17 that year. He only had 10 starts.

Right. I mean, Brock Osweiler kept them on track and then parlayed that into, what was that deal, three years, 51 million or something like that with the Texans. It was a big deal that they then had to, and then the Browns paid $18 million to buy a second-round pick for the Texans for Brock Osweiler, one of the most unique transactions in NFL history. But Peyton Manning was like, even then, he's still on the field. He's still on the team.

There's no equivalent that I can think of. I guess, you know, LaShawn McCoy at the end of his career, I guess, he was a multiple, however many times, 1,000-yard rusher. He won two rings at the end, right? He was in two Super Bowls, at least, with the Bucks and the Chiefs. He won back-to-back.

He won back-to-back. That's the closest comp I can think of, but even he was playing in spurts in the playoffs. But he was inactive for the Super Bowls. He was inactive for one of the Super Bowls. Andy Reid deactivated him, I think. But there's no DeAndre Jordan.

There's not just a guy who you know. There's no circumstances under which this guy is getting into the game. TJ, I gotta say, if the Nuggets are up 20 at the end and they're just running out, put in DeAndre. Can we throw him a lob?

No, absolutely. Let's do it. They're going to unload the bench for sure. But why is he on the team?

What's the upside? He needs a backup big man. Just if you have some matchup where you need two seven-footers on the floor. But also, you know, it's like when you have a vet, you have a veteran presence. You know, he can see things maybe from the bench that Joker maybe didn't pick up on, which that seems hard to believe because it seems like Joker, you know, takes account for everything.

But, you know, you just never know. Practice is a big thing. And just a big body to go up against for him, you know. But every team, it's like a requirement. Like, as far as I know, there's nothing in the NBA's CBA you need to maintain one extra guy who's never going to see the court unless something goes drastically wrong. Nicole Jokic also is a fascinating player to me because, again, and I'm a cursory NBA fan.

I don't consume it. Not nearly to the level that I do with the NFL. But Nicole Jokic, to me, looks like a player just cut directly out of the 50s and not just because the haircut. But that's definitely it. Not just because he's a big old white guy who's a good passer in the paint. I don't know that if you isolate any single play, like are the kids big into Nicole Jokic, like highlight reels, because usually if you watch one single play, you just like, you know, you seem to think, oh, Arvitas Savonis used to do that.

Yeah. And you say, oh, it's a good pass or his shot is from up here, doesn't look natural, but he makes them. You're like, if you saw just one play of him, he'd be like, oh man, the big guy made one.

It's the way that he just kind of grinds down. It's every single possession, offense and defense. What he's able to do that I find, look how high that shot is. You're never blocking that shot. There's no chance of it getting blocked, but he can shoot it from his shoulder and he's not getting blocked by number two on the heat out there.

He's just, the game is such a throwback with him. There's never like, I don't know how many Nicole Jokic, like posters, did anybody got a poster? What's the poster?

It's an entry pass. We talked about this last week, you know, and it went back to the Tim Duncan thing. For as great as Tim Duncan was, a lot of people, because we're in this highlight society, found Tim Duncan boring, but I would take that type of boring efficiency over a highlight reel any day. And that's kind of where you're at with the Joker right now. Steve Ashburner from NBA.com has been covering this series. He's going to join us in just a little bit when this rich, eyes on this show rolls on.