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I'm glad this game is over, you know, there's a lot of emotions. The Rich Eisen Show. Today's guests. Three times Super Bowl Champion, Mark Schlereth. Sports radio legend, Chris Meddog Russo. NFL network host, Colleen Wolf. And now, sitting in for Rich, Suzie Shuster. Hey, you guys. Suzie Shuster back in the chair for Rich Eisen, who is making his way to Indianapolis.
Excited to be going to the combine for five days. I am thrilled to be back in the chair with you with Christopher Brockman. Good morning. How are you, Suzie?
What's happening? Hi, everybody. How are you? Hi, Suzie. Good to see you. TJ, I brought you your favorite breakfast. I'm just saying.
I mean, what up, Suz? First of all, you bring these croissants and they are the problem. And these things are huge. I did split a chocolate croissant like an hour ago. I bought those after failing to make my kids banana bread at five o'clock this morning.
Got a big complaint from Cooper this morning saying, Mom, what was this? Send me a picture of inedible banana bread. Apparently, I'm better at doing television than I am about baking. But what can you say? So is he third now in the rankings? I don't rank my kids. You have one. Why are you lying to everyone?
That's so ridiculous. OK, we know. Let me make this abundantly clear. Have you met my three kids?
They all jockey for that number one spot. People are out there on the sports network wondering what the heck is going on. Can I just introduce myself to the people on infinity sports?
But you do already. Hi, everybody there on infinity sports. I'm Suzie Schuster in for my husband, Rich Bison.
I can't be fired. That is the good news. But welcome to everybody on the Roku Sports Channel. Also, get excited. Everybody out there for women's sports now coming on the 20th of March, the only and first show dedicated to women's sports. It's going to be sick. Kelsey Plumb might make a little stopover.
TJ, you might be in studio that day, but being studio every day. Why not say hi to everybody out there on Sirius XM Channel three seventy five streamers for free on the Odyssey app or Odyssey dot com. Follow us on X Instagram advertising show.
There's a lot of ways. And of course, YouTube, Twitter. We'd still call it Twitter here. You call it Twitter. We still call it. I don't know what the other thing is. Whatever. There's a lot of ways to find this show.
And I really hope that you're going to find every single one of them. All right, guys, they slang us in airports, too. Let's not forget. We're up in airports around this country.
They play players. So it is exciting for that. Like what are we doing? We need nationwide billboards with all of our faces on. No doubt. Brock, not Del Tufo, because he's never here. We'll have to have the ads would be Del Tufo in the other half.
Well, like 40 percent. I didn't have Del Tufo on him. Here's my question. I did like seeing Felly in the Super Bowl promos. I thought that was excellent. Well, I didn't.
It felt like I'm going to have your back here. Didn't love the final edit. They cut out Felly's line. That's your line. Are the cheese going to three feet? Yeah, great.
And by the way, the answer was no. Hey, guys, I know. I know you guys want to chat. I'm sorry. I know you guys want to chat.
You guys are really cute. I know you want to chat, but there was some sports to talk about. Can we get to the sports here or do you just want to like to go get our nails done? One of the other sports. I always like a good pedicure. Well, by the way, I know you do.
And that's very cute about you. There's no sports. Guys. Rich came in last night at ten thirty after the Lakers game. He went to the game last night in the downtown hoops.
Rich. Jeez. I didn't go. Cooper's like, Mom, I want to go.
I'm like, so do I. He didn't take with him. No, no. He had to work. He was the plus one. He was the plus one. Rich was the plus one. And he got in late. And I said to him, like, what was it? And he was sitting right by that major Lebron dunk. You know, the outlet pass.
And guys, let me let me just set the table. Obviously, Lakers win one oh seven ninety nine over the Mavs and that Mavs the first time Luca was going to play his old team. Triple double. Right. What was he the fourth Laker to have a triple double in his first five games?
Not bad. Looked like he. But the first half looked like a kind of like a hot mess. Looked like nobody could settle in. Maybe there were a lot of emotions running high.
But Luca, I mean, I have to say I'm putting my glasses back on. Nineteen, fifteen and twelve. I mean, he looked like it took the first half to settle down and then he kind of went to town and had fun. But LeBron twenty seven, three and twelve and thirty seven minutes played Kyrie thirty five Kyrie.
I mean, and what I thought was so crazy was as I'm watching and I'm trying to do seventeen things at the same time. I mean, seventy eight, seventy seventh a half after the Lakers were up at one point by sixteen. And it looked like somewhat of like a I actually I texted Shaq during during halftime.
I said, are you falling asleep over there? What is like this? And we were laughing because it just looked a little bit like the first half. You know, you always talk about the tale of two halves. Second half, totally different game. First half.
Totally different game. And then, of course, the Mavs are struggling because they're missing so many players, including one Anthony Davis sitting on the bench. That was crazy. You saw him come out, wave to the crowd, get acknowledged, then go sit for the entire game.
And they were at what, four or five guys? Did they do a video for him? Because I'm a hater T.J. and you understand this because you're also a Laker hater. This didn't do much for me from the Lakers perspective. Like I knew Luca was going to be way too jacked up and that you could see that in the way he shot and his numbers last night, way off to beginning. I did like him doing some push ups before the game. Like, oh, you fat shamed me out the door. Watch this. But, you know, Dallas didn't have their best player, Anthony Davis to a bunch of their bigs.
And they kind of barely squeak. The Lakers kind of barely squeak by. So it doesn't do much for me from the Lakers perspective. But I do I do like that this is kind of our new NBA rivalry where the one guy has such animosity toward maybe not his teammates, but the front office, which I think is cool. So the Luca revenge factor and like what what will motivate him is kind of fun. And Anthony Davis still showing that he has a lot to prove, you know, as he hits his thirties. So future wise, I do like this rivalry in that respect for this year.
I don't know. We'll see how it plays out. And Luca did stare down the bench every time he scored. He stared down his former GM and he stared down the bench.
But I mean, what I thought was so crazy and of course, Cooper says to me, well, let's see you do better. But could anybody on the Mavs hit a shot besides Kyrie or Klay and Klay Thompson had a quiet first half and then went off and started hitting threes left, right and center. But it seemed like a lot of clanging last night. No, I mean, Dallas should have won that game handily, TJ. You know, I don't know if they should have won it handily. Like like Brockman said, they don't have Anthony Davis. You know, that's a big factor at the beginning of the game, though. You talked about the beginning.
It was like Luca and Kyrie back and forth for like a couple minutes, like Kyrie bang Luca bang, you know, Luca with the dish. And I thought, OK, we're we're in for something and Kyrie showed improved last year is awesome. Thirty five, seven, four, you know, twelve to twenty seven from the field. Klay got twenty two. You have to look if Anthony Davis is available and when he becomes available.
I don't know, man. Dallas is going to be feisty. You know, I don't know if you want to see them in the playoffs. I think from the Luca perspective to you talked about the highlights of the night. You know, Rich was sitting next to the LeBron dunk. The no look over the shoulder pass to Austin Reeves was just unbelievable. And then, you know, Reeves all net. So, you know, that play means nothing if he doesn't make the shot.
So, you know, shout out to fifteen for knocking that down. That's what Luca does, man. That's what he brings. He has he has not just two eyes. It seems like he has 17 eyes all around his head because he's able to see the whole floor and make passes like that. That's what makes him such such a special talent. It's not the 15 rebounds. It's not his ability to put the ball in the net.
What do you have? He had a 70 point game last year. It's not all of that stuff. It's the vision. It's the high basketball IQ. You know, say what you want about LeBron.
And I've said plenty, like one of the highest basketball IQ guys in the history of the league. And now you have two of those guys on the same team. So if you're a Laker hater like me and TJ, that's what's got to scare you the most about this team. You know, they're now what, 13 and three in their last 16 games. Their defensive rating has gone up. I had several people on Twitter point out to me that they're in the top ten in the last 20 games in defensive efficiency.
That should scare you if you're the West, especially about this Lakers team as we hit the did the final 25 games of the year. And there's no doubt the way he sees the court is special. I mean, his no look passes. Last night, for some reason, it was just great angles to see how he swings it around the perimeter to find the open guy.
And that is true. It's beautiful to watch. That said, watching Kyrie last night, I just thought to myself, would you want Kyrie back on your team?
If you're who? If you're LeBron. I watched him pull Kyrie and I know you said, you know, he can't do it, but I'm just this is a hypothetical. You know, I watched him pull him off the floor when when Kyrie went flying and they give the brother hug and they move on. But I just thought to myself, LeBron is so business. It's all business with LeBron, which is interesting because Lucas had been in so much trouble with his teammates in the past for being out of shape or complaining or moaning or what have you. I watched that and I just thought, would LeBron even want him back? Because Kyrie is so mercurial and just really he's he's so talented.
It's but what are you doing with that talent? He's had a nice kind of reclamation in the last couple of seasons. He's played really, really great high level basketball, you know, part of the math team that made the finals with Luca, obviously. But LeBron, LeBron probably would want him back because LeBron, if you look at his career, he's had great running mates. You know, he went to Miami with the run and he got Anthony Davis to the Lakers and he got Kevin Love to Cleveland. He likes to have these really talented, you know, basketball team who doesn't want great teammates around you.
Right. So why wouldn't he want Kyrie back with them? It's just if you're L.A. in two seasons, you're going to have to pay Luca four hundred million dollars or so much money to keep him around. And so is LeBron going to take a discount?
Is Kyrie going to take a discount later in their later in their careers to create a big three like that? I don't know. Let's take a minute to listen to Luca talking about what the night was like for him. Luca, how did you just handle the emotions of the day and playing against your former team? I don't know.
Honestly, I don't know. This is so weird. The moments felt like I don't know what I was doing. And I'm glad we got the win. Luca, were you looking for some kind of closure with what happened tonight to allow you to move on?
And if so, did you feel like you got that? I mean, the closure is going to take a while, I think. You know, it just it's not ideal. But, you know, like I said, I'm glad this game is over.
You know, it was a lot of emotions, but we go little by little, you know, and every day is better. I thought the funniest thing was after the game on TNT, he was asked about his emotions as well. And T.J., he said, I can't wait to go home and go to bed. Relatable. I mean, I thought that was hysterical.
I can't wait to go home and go to sleep. And then Shaq followed up by saying, if I were him back in the day, I would have gone to the clubs. Right. And I was like, yeah, I remember that. I remember him heading out to the clubs. And that was a nightly thing. And Luca was like, I'm going to bed. He's like he basically was like, I want I want a snack in bed. Right.
And that was it. We had an emotional day, though, like you could just see the photo that was making the rounds last night, maybe one of the most viral images in the NBA this season is the one that appeared to be Luca staring down. Luca was blurred. And then Nico Harrison was in focus in the background.
It appeared to be Luca really staring him down. If you're Nico Harrison. Right. Why would you show up last night just to have twenty thousand Laker fans chant?
Thank you, Nico. Like that's got to be the most humiliating thing in one's career. You know, you would have thought fake an illness or something, either that or go to one of the million suites upstairs. So just hide. Yeah. Right. I mean, why would and then Mark Cuban sitting courtside. And I'm thinking, is he I mean, the pride he had in his team. And yes, he's got a several billion reasons why he's still happy. But he spent so many years building this team in his own image, so to speak, and just, you know, being always available. You'd email Mark Cuban. He'd get right back to you.
It was like fantastic. And he's sitting there watching his pride and joy. Wearing purple and gold. Oh, and I just thought to myself, why would you come to that? Except, you know, he's got several billion reasons why.
But yeah, I'm with you. I'm not sure why. And I wasn't sure that that photograph was A.I.
or you never know anymore what anything is. But it did say every time he hit a shot, he would stare down the bench. And it wasn't like with Animus. It was a combination like you watch him. And it's like a little bit like watching a kid play because he stares and then he laughs.
He stares down. It's like cage a little bit. Yeah. Maniac. Right.
How is that little maniac? Fifth birthday to Kate. No, thanks. Thanks for the invite, by the way, to the party. Well, you wanted to hang out with twenty five, four year olds. I would have gone. That's that. That's not that wasn't the question you wanted.
You wanted to do that anyway. So the combine starts tomorrow. The combine starts tomorrow. Four o'clock in the morning. Rich got up to go to the airport.
He sat courtside at the game last night. Not sympathetic at all. No time. He had to wake up. No, I don't feel that bad.
Then again, like anybody who watches this show knows like I don't feel that bad that often. So there you go. Yeah. So exciting week. And he's excited to be there. Colleen Wolf will zoom in. She's going to the combine after she comes on our show.
Nice. And Mark Schlerath will come on. I want to just say, you guys, he's he's coming up in a couple of minutes.
Not to pat myself on the back, but maybe I will. The tush push conversation that has taken over the National Football League and has taken over Indianapolis. One man named Jim Nance did bring it up on what the football with Amy Trask and Suzy Schuster a couple of weeks ago. I think we have that soundbite done with the tush push. I think it needs to go away. And I know that's a big part of the arsenal for for the Eagles. I think it needs to change now.
They executed better than anyone. So Philadelphia fans will there be an outcry, say, why are you penalizing us? I don't like the play. Why? I just don't like the play.
It feels too automatic. Stay at a point where they settle for a field goal. First and goal at the four. Why wouldn't you have just run the tush push? You got four plays to get it across.
You're probably only going to need three, maybe two. Jalen doesn't fumble that snap. He does. I mean, he's going to get a yard and a half every single time. But I don't like the play. I just doesn't feel like football to me. And maybe you could do something to phase it out a little bit and not totally penalized. Maybe it's like coaches challenges.
Maybe you get to a game. Oh, interesting. Very creative. Yeah. Don't take it completely away, but you have that in your hip pocket.
If you're going to use it, you can use it twice in a game. I've got a lot of thoughts on this. We're going to talk about this throughout the show today because I've strangely become a fan of it in the last two weeks. I've done a lot of research in the tush bush.
And I know that sounds like that's one hell of a tease. Wow. I don't want to see your browser.
No, that's my son's. Okay. You check a 16 year old's browser. My browser's clean. Oh my goodness. What is happening? Does he know about incognito mode? Oh God, please don't tell him about that in the incognito mode. Mark joins us. Back that thing up like coming up next on the rich guys and show you guys are, you guys have dirty minds.
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And we played them earlier, played them early. And so the first thing in the morning when I get up is I have a waffle, you know, the whipped cream, strawberries, and I'm flipping through the networks trying to get either ESPN or NFL network who's going to give me the forecast. There's NFL network.
I got it. I'm eating my waffle and they pan down on Russell Wilson and Drew Brees throwing a football on the field in their graves. I'm going to tell you where I was supposed to be at that moment when they're throwing a football, I am supposed to be meeting with the officials, discussing the inactive's.
All right. And getting ready to say the Lord's prayer and give our players a peptide. That's where I'm supposed to be. When I run to the shower, call my assistant, can't get him.
The waffle is spilled on the floor. I get back. My assistant says, Hey, what's up? And I said, when did the buses leave? No one called. He said, coach, the buses haven't left yet. They had taken B roll from the Monday night game. Someone in the tape room ran the wrong tape.
Can you imagine I text fall? He's on set with rich. I said, what are you guys doing? I had a cow.
I'm telling you, you have no idea. We're talking about being like, this is the divisional playoff game, not being there for the kickoff as the head coach. That's how late I was. And Sean, just Marshall showing me the text. We went back and forth.
I arrived. This guy now is live on the field and I peek out at the stadium only because of the conditions. And I take a look and rich says, good to have Sean Payton here at the stadium.
Just some, some slight comment that not one person's going to understand. Back here on the rich eyes and show on the Roku channel radio joins us soon and Mark Schlereth will as well. And we're going to go touch push again, even though you guys are dirty birds. Welcome back to the rich eyes and show radio network. I'm sitting at the rich eyes and show desk furnished by Granger with supplies and solutions for every industry. Granger has the right product for you.
Call click ranger.com or just stop by. Yeah. It's a, I mean, I was going to say all tush push all the time, but you guys are dirty birds and you guys, your brain's going really weird directions. I don't know if I appreciate that.
I'm just saying, you know, trying to enjoy this lovely croissant you brought that of course I bring to you Nick Sirianni. Meanwhile, not so happy with the fact that the tush pushes taking center stage at the combine. Here is thoughts on it. We work really, you know, I almost feel a little insulted because we work so hard at that play. The amount of things that we've looked into how to coach that play, the fundamentals is always, there's a thousand plays out there, but it comes down to how you teach the fundamentals and how the players go through and do with the fundamentals. I can't tell you how many times we practice the snap. We practice the play because it's not a play that it's easy to practice. There's different ways we figured out how to practice it.
The compliments that come off of it that can create explosive plays. You know, I, again, we saw it in big time games this year and like the fact that it's an automatic thing that like we work really, really hard and our guys are talented at this play. And so it's a little insulting to say it's just, just be, you know, we're good at it.
So it's automatic. We work really hard at it. And Mark Schleras does join us now, and I'm curious your thoughts on the tush push. Should it be banned? Yeah, it's interesting, right? I mean, it's obviously very interesting. I would tell you that I agree with everything that Nick Sirianni said that they work really hard at it. They've developed it. One thing about stealing plays from other teams and we all do it. Everybody looks at a play that somebody runs and goes, wow, we really like that. We're going to take that play and we're making part of our offense. But the issue is that when you do that, you don't necessarily know the nuance that's involved in actually running that play and running that play at a high level. So I'm a hundred percent with Nick Sirianni that they have established it. They have busted their ass to make it work. They are better at that play than anybody else. But here's my issue with the tush push and why I think it should be banned. And I'm an offensive guy.
So a lot of people always look at me and go, what are you talking about? You can't do it on the defensive side. I was, I was a member of, of, of the Washington Redskins back in the day where we would be on PAT field goal block and we would actually line up. We had a guy by the name of Mike Tyson, great tight end in the league for a long time. Mike Tice, not Tyson, but Tice, great tight end.
So Mike was a six, seven guy. I would line up behind him on PAT field goal block. We get in the A-gap and my job was to shove him through the A-gap in hopes that he might block the extra point of the field goal. And the NFL banned that. So I would tell you if you lined up on the defensive side of the ball with linebackers sitting behind defensive tackles and linebackers shoving defensive tackles through the, through the line of scrimmage, I think that's illegal.
You can't do it. So why is it okay for the offensive side of the ball to be able to do that? But the defensive or special team side of the ball can't do it. It's illegal. So if player safety is really the concern and you're putting two or three guys at the point of attack, shoving one guy through, shouldn't that be it?
What's good for the goose is good for the gander. If you can't do it on the defensive side of the ball, why is it allowed on the offensive side of the ball? And you know, what's interesting about you saying that, and I'm curious from your perspective as a guy who played in the trenches, I was watching Ken Tula, one of our great producers sent me the piece that Kyle Brandt did with Neil deGrasse Tyson, the physicist about the tush bus. And he basically said, as you mentioned, that it's, it's not defensible and it's because of physics and it's because all the defenders are flying in the air, which means they don't have any momentum.
All the guys that are pushing from behind are using the force of the earth. I mean, this is really next level stuff to push Jalen forward. Now, Sean McDermott employees, the tush push second most to the Eagles and he's on the competition committee and he's saying it should get banned, you know, potentially.
So if the defense can't defend it, you know, it's going to be six. So is it a football player? Is it not a football play?
No, I see that therein lies. If there's a juxtaposition here, because it is something that's worked on. It is something that they created. It is something that they run better than anybody else because they developed it.
So they know the nuance. You know, I always say I didn't learn what I didn't like in the national football league until I got my ass kicked doing something. And then I was like, Oh, you know what?
That's a really bad idea. I need to change that technique. They've been through those things. The other thing is if you implement that in the beginning of the season, when do you ever get to practice that? When do you ever line up in live drills and work on that? Like they have, they have established it, they perfected it, they have worked on it and I'll give them all the credit in the world for creating the play.
And it's awesome. But just the picture that you're showing right now, you see the defensive linebacker flying through the air. He is not here. There's no ground force there. He is not grounded. So as that pile gets pushed, he's just going to get pushed with the pile. So yeah, it becomes one of those situations. Again, if it's about player safety, you know, and if I line up on the defensive side and I have somebody shoving a defensive tackle through there and a quarterback gets hurt, guess what the legal do?
They'll ban it. And this is a problem that's endemic in the national football league in general is all the rules are bent towards offensive success, right? And they're all bent toward the offense doing things. And like, if this would have been something, like I said, it used to be, it used to be a very prevalent thing on special teams, PT field goal, and they deemed it too dangerous to keep using because it gave you an unfair advantage of shoving people through the line of scrimmage, right?
So if it was deemed too dangerous and, and potentially harmful from a safety concern, why is it okay now for the offense to be able to do that if the defense and special teams can't do it? No kidding. Mark Schlerath joining us here on the Rich Eisen show.
Susie Schuster in for Rich Eisen. It doesn't make much sense to me. I, when we had the, the conference call before, actually after the show yesterday, I mentioned, you know, you watch Tom Brady get lauded for years and years with a quarterback sneak and understand that he's not getting pushed from behind.
He's fighting the slots and you guys are there on the line opening up slots for him to go. And you're right. I mean, he, for years and years would, people would say what a genius he was because of the quarterback sneak. There is no way to defend a tush push, but there is a way to defend the sneak.
So is that where the nuance lies for the competition community to decide whether or not this lives or dies? Yeah. I mean, obviously the quarterback sneaks been something that's been around forever. Um, and you know, there's technique to that as well. Like the teams that really do it well understand how the quarterback kind of almost watched Tom Brady do it. He'll take a step back and he'll let the blocking scheme develop.
Then he'll go from a gap, very much like a running back from a gap to B gap to all the way to C gap, depending on how they pinch, how they execute the defensive strategy on stopping it. So there is nuance to it. There is a system and in a way to do it, to be successful.
And he was incredible at that with using snap count to his advantage, quick snapping, uh, people. So they're not ready or they're not, you know, set to defend it, all those different things. But the nuance on this is, Hey man, we're bigger, stronger, and we're going to take our quarterback and essentially shove him. It's interesting to me because they allow that on the offensive side of the ball, but you know what you can't do on the goal line. You can't pull a runner, a ball carrier across, but you can push them across. It just is like, there's a lack of there's it's just not, the rules are not congruent. They don't make sense to me. Like, again, it's all about offense and protecting the offense and allowing the office to do this where the defense cannot have the same advantage.
They don't get to do that. So the lack of congruent nature of that, of the way they call that and the way they allow it is the only thing that really bothers me. I think the play is awesome. I love the play, but I'm just saying if it's okay for the offense, but it's not okay for the defense, then we inherently have something wrong with the way we call the games and the way we implement the rules of the game. And the fact that we can't defend against it, I mean, Chris Jones can't defend it. No one can defend it. Then you have to wonder, like, it's either everyone's going to start doing it and figuring out how to do it effectively.
It'll just become prevalent or widespread, or you get rid of it. I see both sides. I see why some of the guys don't want it.
It's usually the guys who can't defend it that want to have it go away. By the way, I'm curious when you played, who was the toughest guy for you to block? They're all tough. I mean, you know, when you're talking about guys like John Randall and Warren Sapp and Reggie white and, um, you know, there's, there's guys that are lesser known, Dan, Sally, um, uh, um, John Parela, there are a lot of guys that may be lesser known Cortez Kennedy, um, and a lot of great players.
And, you know, the thing is, is everybody is a little bit different. And I think the thing that makes the great ones great is their ability to be multiple in what they do. So they've got the quickest to get around the edge. They've got the pass rush moves to, to really, you know, stymie you, or they also have the power.
They can do it that way. So they've got, um, various different ways to, you know, to essentially attack you. It's the guys, like if you're a super strong guy or you're just a skilled guy, like that's all you have. You can always, as an offensive lineman, take something away, but when you're multiple, that makes you really tough to contend with. So, you know, then you have to start game planning based on stance, based on which foot's back, based on what you think you're going to get in the situation. Um, you know, all, all the little nuance tricks that you try to get. And, you know, one of the things that we always discussed all the time was, Hey, if it's third down and 12, and it's a guy to have it play, what's this guy's number one thing that he does.
And I'm going to set to take that away a hundred percent of the time and hope to live with the rest of the results. So, uh, you know, there's a lot of gamesmanship and game plan that goes individually for an offensive lineman when he's blocking or trying to block, um, you know, one of the premier players in the league. Mark Schlerath joining us here on the Rich Eisen Show. Let's pick your brain for a couple of things going on. What do you think the Titans should do with the first overall pick? Well, ultimately, um, I think you already know what your quarterback situation looks like. So obviously free agents starts before the free agency starts before the draft. So are you going to go down the road of, Hey, can we, you know, can we explore Kirk cousins?
Um, is Aaron Rogers as an option is, is Sam Darnold going to be a guy that's going to leave Minnesota? Do, can we solve our quarterback con conundrum that way? The worst thing you can do is what the giants did, you know, just decide, Hey, we're going to kick the can down the road.
We're not going to rip the bandaid off. And then all of a sudden, midway through the season go, yeah, you know, you know, Daniel Jones is who we thought he was. And, and now we're stuck, right? So you address it in free agency. If you can, if that's what you think the fix is, if not, then you decide, okay, there's two guys that everybody considers first rounders here and should do her Sanders and cam ward, which guy best fits what we want to do.
And who do we think has the opportunity to lead us into the future? And we saw a great success this year, you know, with Jayden Daniels obviously in Washington with bone Knicks, uh, in Denver. So we've seen some guys have some great, you know, some, some great success as rookies. But the bottom line to me is you've got to decide what you want to be the way you want to address that quarterback position. And then once you, you know, establish that, then go to build the rest of your football team.
You mentioned Bo Nix, what do you think the Broncos should do in free agency in the draft? You know, free agency is always interesting to me because I think you pay a plus money for B minus players and free agency. Uh, if you're allowed, and I was free agent that signed in Denver, like I understand that I had an injury history.
I understand that I was damaged goods. And usually when you're allowed to hit free agency, the team that knows you best decides you're not worth the money to spend on you. And, and I'm not saying that you're not a good player, but I don't want to spend, like I said, a plus money on a B minus player.
And so you've got to make that decision from a free agency standpoint. I believe in second wave free agents, right? Guys that are up and coming players, guys that are really good players. Um, maybe a guy that has been good for a long time. They can serve a purpose, but he's, you know, he's on the downside of his career.
We saw that was Zach Ertz and how great Zach Ertz was in Washington this year, especially converting 4,000. So there is that aspect of, of what you're trying to do, how you're trying to plug some holes when it comes to free agency. And then, you know, the draft thing is interesting to me because you got to not only draft a guy, but you got to develop a guy and you got to put a guy in the right system to succeed, you know? And, and I think one of the big things that a lot of teams get wrong is before you start attacking guys and putting guys in positions, you know, to really execute, you got to mitigate potential disasters first. So you got to take some of the problems away from a young player and say, Hey man, we're not going to ask you to do X, Y, and Z, but we think you can be really good in A, B, and C. So we're going to live in A, B, and C, and we're going to mitigate that potential disaster of X, Y, and Z. And there's, you know, that's coaching, that's development, that's getting the right guy that fits in what you want to do, which I think is a big thing. Oftentimes we draft a guy and we say, Hey man, this guy has never done this, but I think he's going to fit in our system. And I think you've got to really develop your system to that guy's strengths and, and really kind of morph your system and what, what that particular guy does well, especially at the quarterback position. What about Miles Garrett?
What do you think is going to happen there? Well, you know, the Browns keep saying they're not going to trade him, but Miles Garrett's a war daddy, right? So, I mean, if you're lined up and you're Washington or you're Buffalo, or you're one of these teams and we, what we saw with Philadelphia, which I think is really interesting is, you know, we get so enamored by wide receivers in this league, right?
We go, Oh, we've got to have a, you know, we've got to have a, you know, a number one, and we got to get, you know, we got to pay these guys all this money. You show me a team that dominates the line of scrimmage. I'll show you a team that wins a lot of games and the Philadelphia Eagles case in point, they dominate a lot of scrimmage in the super bowl.
I believe they had 30, I think it was 38 drop backs, 37 times. They rushed four and played zone behind it. Like our front four is better than yet. Even if we bring some type of zone blitz, we're only rushing four. Like we're better than you.
They they're the classic example of global gym. We're better than you. And we know it. And when you dominate lines of scrimmage that way, you're going to have success, right? Your quarterback's going to be upright. You're going to run the ball. You're going to be in third down of manageable situations. When you can do those things, man, you can have great success.
Your play action's going to work. You're going to be able to get things over the top in the passing game. You're going to make big explosive plays when you control the line of scrimmage.
And, and so, you know, ultimately I look at a guy like miles Garrett and that guy automatically makes you a beast. You break the huddle and you got 95 on the other side, like the scramble, the just the, the pucker factor that he creates for an offensive line or an offense in general. Like the first thing you do when you break the line of scrimmage on every single plays, you're like, all right, where is 95 and how the hell are we going to block it? Because we cannot leave him one-on-one with even a tackle tied in, right? Or if we do leave him one-on-one, then we know we're all in the quick game like that, but that ball has gotta be out right now. It's gotta be out.
It's a three-step quick game, you know, bubble screens and all those things. He is that dominant a football player. So that dude would be the prize possession and whatever the price tag is for that.
Did you get that guy and instantly it changes your defense. One last question before we let you go, how do you feel about the Cowboys selectively aggressive approach to the season? Of course, Steven Jones saying that what does that even mean? Yeah, I mean, ultimately the Cowboys, like they wait till the very last second, they let the contracts of players, you know, expire. They wait the last second, you know, they dominate and the Cowboys strategy for building their football team the last 30 years is to be dominant, dominating the off season, right? They win the off season.
If there was an award for championships of the off season, the Cowboys win it every year because they just continuously make news. Is Dak Prescott going to sign? When is he going to sign? Oh, you know, he's going to walk into the stadium before the first game and sign Scott, whatever it is, right?
CD I have it now it's Micah Parsons, right? We're gonna go through this. Like it's so much better to take care of the guys that, you know, are superstars two years early, as opposed to letting these contracts expire and resetting the market set it two years early. And the cap goes up and a year later or two years later, the guy becomes a bargain. And the fact that they didn't truly address any of their holes or any of their needs in free agency, you know, that that's the way they do business. They've been pretty good at the draft for the most part.
Um, but just building your football team has been really interesting in the off season. And I will say this when you don't reward the best players on your team early with contract extensions, it permeates a locker room. You're like, Hey man, if they're not going to do it for CD or they're not going to do it for Dak, or they're not going to do it for Micah, what the hell are they going to do when my deals up like there I'm, I'm getting screwed. Like I'm not getting a new deal.
Like, so it creates this in a locker room environment. I believe it creates a feeling of, of being an independent contractor. I just got to take care of me and you just won't ever win anything. Like if that's what you are, if you're an independent contractor, if you've got a team full of locker room full, you got the greatest players in the world. If they're all independent contractors, um, you're not going to win that the way you win championships is being sacrificial the way you win championships is caring more about the guys you play with.
Then you care for yourself. That's how you win championships. And when you don't reward guys in your own locker room with longterm deals early, you know, ultimately what you become is a locker room full of independent contractors. And I'm sorry, but you'll never win anything with a rock or a locker room full of, of independent contract. It just doesn't happen. We've got a hand TJ, a little tissue over there.
You must be ready to pass out. Thank you so much for your time. Your knowledge is incredible. We really appreciate it. My pleasure.
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Select apps requires Google Gemini account results may vary based on input, check responses for accuracy. I'd like for you guys to be here for, for a big moment of, of this show's history in my mind. I know we've only had about a, um, a show and a half so far. And I don't mean to talk it up in this regard, but if I can have the security, bring in what was, what's, what's underneath this, uh, this drum roll, please.
Well, would you mind, would you guys mind helping? Oh yeah. You taking aside hall of famers, Marcus Allen. I have no idea what this is.
And Marshall Falk. This is the DirecTV people put this together for the set and it's going to be on here forevermore. Are you ready? Please, please reveal it. Here we go.
That is a bop. What do you think? What do you think?
See, it says that host. You look more like a president than a, it should be. Yeah. When I go to the hall of fame and walk into the bus room, you should kiss yourself. Yes. I thought it was Eisenhower.
That is very Eisenhower line. You should, Rich, you should kiss yourself. It's okay. It's all right.
Hey, Rich, we've all done it. This is studio heaven. Welcome to the club. Thanks very much. That's sweet. What do you think? Yes. Yes. Okay. Very good.
Thanks for guys doing that. How does it feel? You know what?
I'm appreciative that it has more hair than it really, really, really has. That's not how, that's not how you feel. That's what you're feeling. That's what I feel.
I want to thank my parents. There you go. And there you go. That's you.
That's the real deal right there. Well, you got broad shoulders on that. Is this blasphemous? Is this wrong?
Is this wrong? Not in the television network, Rich. This is, this is an accomplishment. Yeah, it is. Man, take pride in that.
If people knew where you came from back in the day when you were, when you had to set the camera up, start it, then get in front of it. That's, that's awesome, man. And if it's, if this was the real hall of fame ceremony, I'd speak for the next 38 minutes, right? It depends.
Marcus. Hey, I got to tell you something. I sit down for every one of those two.
I don't move. I'm going to say this. Believe me. I want to sometimes all of us know, you only get one chance to do it. And it's for a lot of guys it's their last chance to be recognized. Especially those guys have waited a long time and stuff.
So yeah, I give them their due. And we're wishing a very, very happy birthday to Marshall Falk, who by the way, is joining us tomorrow on the Rich Eisen Show here on the Roku channel, Roku sports channel. Marshall is having a nice birthday. Let me just say in a wink and a nod, he's having a margarita.
And that's my only little wink and a nod to what Marshall's doing on his birthday. And by the way, that sounds really good right around now, even though it's only nine 45 in the morning on the West coast somewhere tropical as we could make some. Usually I do champagne for TJ, but we could plan for a little margarita tomorrow. Well, most of the Fridays are always in effect. Should we do them?
I think we can do them again. Margarita Thursday. Well, most of Friday.
Well, I mean, I'm always open to possibility. Croissant Wednesdays back here on the Rich Eisen Show. Susie Schuster in for Rich Eisen, thrilled to be here. And you know who's not thrilled is Sean McDermott.
He's not thrilled about the Tush Push. I think he has a couple of things to say about it from Indianapolis. To me, there's always been an injury risk with that play. And I've expressed that opinion for the last couple of years or so when it really started to come into play, the way it's being used, especially a year ago. So I just feel like, you know, players safety and the health and safety of our players has to be at the top of our game, which it is. It's just that play to me has always been a or the way that the techniques that are used with that play to me have been potentially contrary to the health and safety of the players. And so, again, you have to go back, though, in fairness to the to the injury data on the play. But I just think it the optics of it, I'm not in love with.
And yet he continues to run it. And yet the Bills were the team fellow that uses the Tush Push second only, of course, to the Eagles. But here's Nick Sirianni on his reaction to that. Yeah, I don't I think those are I think when you look at that, because we've looked into that, too. There wasn't a lot of injuries there.
I think that's I think it's a little made up, to be honest. Now, the numbers will tell the truth, but I don't think there was many injuries with it this year. I know. I mean, how many I can't I can't remember one injury we had on that play.
And we brand it more than everybody else. And so, yeah, the injury numbers, the league will have that and the injury numbers will come out on that. And I'm all for player safety and for that. But I don't think that that play I think that's just something that was said. But I don't think the numbers on that play suggest that. But you guys can look into that.
And he's absolutely right. The numbers don't suggest that players are getting hurt, even though every time I watch a T.J., I sit there thinking, oh, God, someone's going to get hurt down below, what have you. I mean, it really does look like a hot mess of a play. That said, in watching the Neil deGrasse Tyson video, which I mentioned earlier, they can too low and sent me from the 45 hour long show that Rich does before the Super Bowl. It was fascinating. I don't know if you've seen it, Chris, but it really was not.
You have to watch it. I text Kyle during that, during the broadcast. And I was like, Chris, you appreciate this. I was like, Neil deGrasse in that category of way bigger than you think he is. Like he picks up, you know, Kyle's kind of sizable. He scoops Kyle up, bro. And it's just like, holy crap, you don't realize Neil's up. He was a former wrestler. I was going to say he looked like a wrestler. I did not know that.
No, that either. Yeah, it was a very interesting piece that Kyle did with him. And like you said, the physics and the earth using it was like it was definitely nerding out for like seven minutes.
And what Kyle said, and it's so true, this guy has basically discovered some of the Earth's biggest questions when it comes to physics. And yet he said, I don't have an answer to the touch push. So if it's unstoppable, what's the point of playing it? Well, then why aren't they doing it on first down? Why wouldn't they do it every single play?
But that makes no sense. It's two yards. It's a yard. Why wouldn't you want to... You don't think they could get four yards every play if they wanted on that? That would be awful. Awful for whom? Bad football. Bad viewing football. But in terms of the success rate, you're getting a first down every four plays, which is the point of the game, right? But you only really see the touch push in the end zone.
I mean, you see it... And when it's fourth and one, maybe at midfield or something. Right. Look, I don't know. You can't really ban the play because it's a target on one team, right? So you can't do that. If you want to do it, you have to finagle the language. So it's, you can't push another player or move them forward if they don't, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You'd have to do it that way. So if you just come out and say, look, this play's over, then, you know, the Eagles should really take that personally.
And other teams should be like, look, if you can do that to their play, why can't you do it to our play? So it's going to be here to stay. And everyone just has to deal with it. Yeah. This is like, you know, this is a don't play, don't hate the play or hate the game. Exactly. Chris Russo ahead here in the second hour of the Rich Eisen Show. Yeah. I still on real quick here and I just think... It's not the most appealing visually thing to see.
But it works. And Jason Kelce has said, look, it really only sucks for the center. He's the one that takes the brunt of the physical pain. And if you're talking about injury, that's every single play in the NFL. And I saw that Cam Jurgens is out here basically getting his back worked on, had some nerve pain and went to go see Dr. Watkins, which a lot of the guys do. And I'm like, of course he is.
Yeah. Of course he's hurt. The year that he had, he wasn't used to that type of, you know, pain and beating that he took, you know, executing this play. But hey, man, they could just give it to Saquon if they wanted. They literally could have just handed it off to Saquon and he would have had seven, eight more touchdowns and probably an MVP in his trophy case. But they want to run this play because it's, it's virtually unstoppable. I'll say this, though. Shlerith had the best argument I've heard about why to make it illegal simply because the defense can't do something like that. So they're really at a disadvantage. And I never thought about it from that point of view. And if you guys didn't see it, go back, watch the video.
I'm sure we'll post that on YouTube shortly. But it was a very compelling argument as to and that comes from the offensive guy as to why it's unfair. Yeah. So usually you think about just what you said, T.J., usually the offensive player would say, oh, absolutely, it's fine. And it's the defensive player that would say this is not defendable. But for Mark to say.
It's OK, we should go ahead and ban it. It's it probably doesn't make sense from an offensive perspective. I was surprised he said that.
Yeah, me too. And he had, like I said, compelling argument as to why it's not fair. But you have to do it with the language, because if you just say we're banning this play, right, they're going to figure out a different formation and basically run a different version of it that looks a little bit different, but is essentially the same. So you have to do it with the language wise of a non player in the back, push it, helping move another guy. You have to do it that way. That's the only way to get a band if you want to do that. But, you know, can you get 20, you know, twenty two, twenty three owners to vote that way?
I don't know. There's always going to be something. There's always going to be some new play, some kind of nuance that someone's going to be upset about because someone's going to get to it first and know how to do it better than everybody else.
And then people catch up. It also seems like there are lots of other things in the league that we should be fixing before we attack this play. Lots of other things need amended. We will ask Chris Russo what he should do to amend. We should stop owners from having postgame press conferences and doing radio shows when it's unnecessary and put words out there that I got to hear about all offseason.
Again, that seems like a one team issue. I'm not sure that. Stop being so selective, TJ. Rich Eisen's going to zoom in. You know who that guy is, right?
When we come back, he's somewhere in an airport at a cinema. The Bigger Pockets podcast network is your home. Get it for real estate investing. I am very tired of people saying that your primary residence is not an investment. Get real talk from real estate pros about investing strategies that work. I bought a house for a dollar and it makes me a million dollars. You can become a real estate millionaire over the course of like five or six years. No one needs a stock. No one needs cryptocurrency. They need a house.
