Charles Davis, CBS Sports NFL Analyst

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Delivery fees may apply. And away we go, our number 2 of our radio program. It is the Zach Gelb Show Coast to Coast on CBS Sports Radio.

The NFL Combine is in the books and now we gear up for the NFL Draft, which will come your way in Detroit at the end of April. Let's go out to the guest line right now and welcome in one of the best NFL on CBS. And that, of course, is Charles Davis, who's kind enough to join us once again on the Zach Gelb Show. Charles, always great to see you.

Thanks so much for doing this. How you been? I've been well, Zach. Thanks for having me on. I hope you're doing okay.

Yeah, I'm doing fantastic. So, I always find the Combine interesting because I love to see where players' stocks are before the Combine and then how much they rise or fall after the Combine. I don't think anyone's stock has risen more than J.J. McCarthy, though, who I thought was perceived to be a first-round quarterback. Now, some people are saying, though, he could be a top-five pick.

Where do you think J.J. McCarthy is going to fall in this upcoming NFL Draft? Yeah, I think that's a great, great observation, Zach, about J.J., because going into it, of course, we got into the, well, he has not been asked to do as much as the others in their offense. In other words, they were throw first. He was on a run-first offense. And nowadays, there is a true distinction with that, especially the way Michigan ran the ball. I mean, I'm still trying to process during the middle of the season watching them go to Penn State and the second half officially throw zero passes. They threw one. And there was a penalty play. They ended up getting wiped off.

So, it never went into the books as a pass. I think it was like 28 runs in the second half. And, you know, that wasn't against me and me and my friends in the backyard. That was Penn State. The Nittany Lions. Linebacker U.

The place has prided itself on defense. So, was he asked to do all those things? But what he was asked to do was run the offense. And a lot of times, you run your offense with the head as well. So, it doesn't mean that you got a fling at 75 yards downfield all the time.

So, you're right. If we're starting to talk about it, I really think, you know, the top three quarterbacks could easily come off the board at 1-2-3. That's no surprise to anyone right now. But if anything happens, maybe someone drops to 5-6. The Giants all of a sudden are in the sweepstakes.

Or whoever wants to rise up there. And in order to get in front of the Giants, I believe that's why you're saying top five. Because if you really want to have that quarterback, you may have to get up there ahead of the Giants. Because at 6, they are definitely in the quarterback market even though we know Daniel Jones is expected to come back next year with a big contract.

But I believe the Giants have one year with Daniel Jones in that contract before they can start to make moves and get out of it. I'm also fascinated to see where Jayden Daniels is going to go. I have him as the second best quarterback in this draft class. Caleb Williams won, Daniels too. And then I have Drake May being three.

What do you think the ceiling in this league could be for a player like Jayden Daniels? Zach, let's just go ahead and say, if it's okay with you, let's say that Chicago is taking Caleb Williams at one. We're going to have a lot of smoke. We're going to have a lot of things that go on between now and then.

My theory is this. Whoever the supposed number one guy is in the draft, he is that number one guy until about the time we hit the combine and come out of the combine. Then we start to really pick at his nits. Now we start to come after his flaws. Now we start to come after all these things.

Because frankly, we're bored. We've said the same thing for a long time. So who can we bring into the conversation? Well, for Caleb Williams, we're going to bring Jayden Daniels in. We're going to bring Drake May in. We're going to rise up J.J. McCarthy. It's going to come in. All these things are going to come into it.

Right. And then about two weeks, three weeks max before the draft. You know what we're going to do? Caleb Williams is the number one pick. He's the guy. That's how we operate this. Let's just say he's number one going to Chicago. It's going to happen. Right.

Two is where it gets interesting. And my theory is this brand new general manager in Washington, Adam Peters. Where do you come from? San Francisco. What do they do in San Francisco? Play defense pretty well.

OK. I know they just may change the coordinator, but all in all, they always play defense well. OK. Who's new head coach in Washington? Dan Quinn.

What stands your background? Defense coordinator. Every defense coordinator I've ever talked to likes to have an offense that causes them trouble. What caused the defense coordinator the most trouble?

What keeps them up at night? Quarterbacks who can make the off schedule plays. Quarterbacks who can get out and not just run the football, but hurt you running the football.

Have we not said that the closest we've seen to Lamar Jackson running the football as a college quarterback since the Mars come out is Jayden Daniels. That's why I think it's going to be very interesting it to Zach. Tell me if I'm wrong for a long time. Not most mostly penciled in Drake made it to.

Guess what? That fight is going to continue all the way up through there. I just think that when it's all said and done, Dan Quinn's going to offer his opinion that the quarterback that I like better is Daniels because I know what he does to defenses. That's just what I think. Not that Drake may can't run. OK, I can hear the North Carolina people now. I'm not saying that. But Jayden Daniels runs it as close to Lamar Jackson as we've seen without being Lamar Jackson.

And I agree with you. Williams will go one. I do believe Daniels will go to and then sitting at three. I think the Patriots have a fascinating decision to make because they need a quarterback. But you don't just take a quarterback to take a quarterback. You know, could the Patriots trade down?

Do they take who I think is the best player in this draft in Marvin Harrison Junior? I can't wait to see if it goes that way. Williams won Daniels to then what the Patriots do at three.

It's a it is going to be fun to watch and see it unfold if let's go along with what you're thinking. Let's say the Patriots decide to get creative, trade out of three. Right. Right.

Let's start there. Let's say they try out trade out of three and someone comes up for the third quarterback. And we'll assume it's Drake may. Right. But the Arizona, if they're going to do that, they're going to protect themselves. I mean, excuse me, doing like protect themselves, make sure they get who they truly want. Now, I don't know that they'll go into it with two quarterbacks in mind because to your point, could they trade out of it and still pretend to get Marvin Harrison? Absolutely. You still have anyone to throw the ball to Marvin Harrison.

So you got to where you got to have that solved. So let's say if you're going to get Marvin Harrison, your backup plan is I might get him, but also have a stopgap plan to get me a quarterback. There's someone else I like. Is it J.J. McCarthy? Is it Bo Nix?

Is it Michael Pennix? Because that's who I think are the guys that are in line for all this. That would be how it would have to go to me, because otherwise you get Marvin Harrison Jr., which they've needed desperately. Who's playing quarterbacks that like right now, if you're saying here's my quarterback, what confidence do you have that we're hearing all the reports about what went on last year with that quarterback room? They've got to get a quarterback. They can't overthink this one if you're the Patriots, though. That's the one thing I would say.

It's a new time for them, a new start. I don't think Gerard Mayo is going to want to do it. I guarantee you, Elliott Wolf's not going to do it as a new decision maker there. And his bloodlines and decision making comes from a guy as a Hall of Famer and it'd be his dad, Ron Wolf. So I'm not too worried about that part. I think above all else, they can pull the Kevin Costner in. It was a draft day.

Put it down on the Post-It no matter what. The quarterback I like. Something along those lines. Yeah. Vontae Mack, no matter what.

I think what was on the actual Post-It. This time it's not going to be a linebacker. We had a linebacker go number one.

I remember watching the movie and even then I thought, this is very cool, but this isn't the time of Dick Bunkus. Okay? Nobody's going to take a linebacker at the top of the food chain no matter how good they are. You pancake eating mother bleeper on the trade negotiations.

One of my all-time favorite lines in a movie. Charles Davis here with us. I'm also curious because we talk about trading back. And I just said what I said about Marvin Harrison Jr.

I think he's the best player in this draft. How big of a difference is there for Marvin Harrison Jr. and Roma Dunze? Because if you're a team that is looking for a wide receiver, like let's say the Cardinals, but then quarterbacks start going. And if you trade back a few spots, you may lose Marvin Harrison Jr. But then if you settle on Roma Dunze, how big of a separation when you evaluate those two players do you think there is from one to the other?

Not as much as maybe one would think. I'll put it to you this way. Let's take the quarterbacks out of the discussion and we start to say, okay, who are the best players in the draft? You could say Marvin Harrison Jr. would be one. Roma Dunze from Washington would be two. Malik Nabors from LSU could be three. Although right now, if Malik Nabors heard me say three behind the Dunze and behind Marvin Harrison, he is ticked off. Have you ever seen anyone so upset over a Blitnikov award in your life than Malik Nabors was? No. That's who he is. All right. If you talk to the LSU people, like we always joke about Baker Mayfield doesn't have a chip on his shoulder, he has a boulder.

Meet your twin in Malik Nabors. That's how he operates, all right? He'll perceive that as a slight. And by the way, Brian Thomas, his running mate at LSU, not so bad. He could easily be the fourth receiver in this draft. I realize Xavier Worthy's got all of our attention running 4-2-1, but A.D. Mitchell is probably a better receiver at Texas. So we're going to go and get a lot of receivers and we're going to be deep all the way through. And we're going to mention Puka Nakua went in the fifth round until the cows come home and this draft is over.

You know how it is like. We're already invoking him with Keon Coleman, not running as fast as people expected. But the GPS thing had him going the fastest in the gauntlet, just like who last year? Oh, that's right.

Puka Nakua. So this is where we're going to go with this. Zach receiver is going to be all through this one. But right at the top, not as big a separation as one would think. If Harrison's one, I think a lot of people feel like a doomsday and those guys are 1A, 1B, 1C.

So it's really not a huge, huge deal. And it's a matter of picking your flavor at the top. Charles Davis here with us just going back to the quarterbacks, your top five quarterbacks.

How do you rank them one through five? Just just to make it clear and get on the record. Yes, sitting here right now. And look, there's plenty of time between now and then. And we'll adjust as we go along because I'm diving into it later than others coming off an NFL season.

All right. But if you're asking me, Caleb Williams is one. Jayden Daniels is two. Drake May is three. J.J. McCarthy is four. And I've got Michael Pennix at five ahead of Bo Nix. So this is going to be a very interesting deal. And let me tell you something. The Bo Nix Michael Pennix conversation is really going to get intense.

But watching them throw at the combine, because remember, Williams, May, Daniels, none of them did anything. Is it going to bother them and affect them? No.

OK, that's not an issue. They'll do all this stuff with their pro day. They'll get measured. They'll do this.

They'll do that. Trust me, the days of those scouts and teams going, I didn't throw at the combine, darn it. Get him off my board.

Those days are long gone. All right. But it was interesting to me that the next three quarterbacks figured that part out and said, OK, let's try and fill the void. Can we up our stock if indeed you can up it at the combine? I think McCarthy probably did the best job of that. I thought Pennix threw the ball better than Bo Nix did in that one sample. But that's what you have to remember.

It's a sample. It's not the overall tape and how you feel about these guys. But to me, it's those six. And then you got to decide if there's a seventh.

And I'm not talking about the first round. Who's the seventh quarterback? Who's that first one that we're going to pick? Probably Spencer Rattler. And I'm not sure after that how deep we're going to get. Truthfully, Zach, I think it's a tough one after that one.

I really do. Joe Milton looks the part. There's no question about it. He's gorgeous. For a while there was talk he'd be this year's Anthony Richardson.

That's not going to happen. But you're going to take a shot at him because anybody can throw a 70 yards just falling out of bed and not even straining and looking the way he looks. You're going to take a look. You absolutely have to. So, you know, and listen, if I'm drafted as jealous as I am with no hair, I got to get Sam Martin.

Sam Hartman on the team and just let the flow Charles Davis here with us. Just to follow up on that. Why do you have McCarthy in front of Michael Pennock's junior? Because when I watched it, when I watched the Michigan tape in the games that I've watched.

Yes, we're telling we're talking about not asked to do. But you see those things. He can do them all. He can throw the deep ball. He moves better than you thought. You see his three cone time.

I know for everyone at home, listen and go, what the heck's a three cone? You know, it measures your ability to change direction and your agility in a short distance in a short time. It won a better three cone shuttles that you're going to find for a quarterback. So that just told me about athleticism way better than maybe people want to give him credit for. He did as close to a pro style offense, although I have to say that we're going to start being careful about that.

Did he run a pro style in college or did he run a college office? If you watch the pros play, a lot of it is mashed together. Now, the pros are operating at a gun, you know, 80 percent of the time. So this whole idea that the pros are so different than college. Well, you'll see more coverages, you'll see better athletes, blah, blah, blah. But what you're running on offense and how you're getting there, it's never been as mashed together as it is right now. It's still going to be more nuanced, of course.

But at the same time, it's not the same difference in what you're looking at, what you're watching as we used to have. But I do have to give him credit for that. You know, he was trained like a pro quarterback under Harbaugh. How you huddle, how you call plays, how you take snaps from center, all that, a little bit extra advantage. And yeah, he played a few big games along the way as well, just like Pennix and just like Bo Nix did.

That part's not in question. But I just think McCarthy is a little more polished on him at the moment. Let's say you're running the Falcons. Charles Davis is here with us. Do you sign Kirk Cousins or do you trade for for Justin Fields? If let's say it's a second round pick, you got to give up for Justin Fields. Yeah, I think that I think Cousins is the guy that I think that they were that they would probably target.

That's just me off the top. I realize there's so much smoke about Justin Fields and going back home to Atlanta. I think I'm going to just call it fit. If that's OK, Zach, in my mind, Pittsburgh, I'd probably be screaming and go and get Justin Fields because they're going to be a run first offense. The way that they finish here with Najee Harris, Jalen Warren. And now you now you're bringing in your new offense court and Arthur Smith, who knows how to handle running backs, who beat you up running the football. See, Henry, Derek, Tennessee. That fits really well. And what are you going to do with the big arm?

Throw it over the top off of play action. Now, the flip side to that is Kirk Cousins. Does it not look like Brian Tannehill when he took over that Tennessee offense a few years ago? So if you're Arthur Smith in those conversations, Pittsburgh, you're whispering to Mike Tomlin's ear, you know, you show you some tape and tell me if Cousins doesn't look a lot like what Tannehill did when we really had it cranked up.

So it's going to be interesting how it goes. I think that big arm for fields be able to go over the top and find George Pickens. And they need to add receivers. Don't get me wrong on this one because they need dependability out there. We know Pickens gives you big plays.

We know Deontay Johnson does. But how many times did we talk about them last year as not being dependable at key times? Hopefully that goes away for them. But it shouldn't go away in your mind. If you're the general manager, Omar Khan, you should still be saying, I got to get some guys.

I know I'm going to do the job, going to do the job for me. But yeah, it's going to be fun to see where all these people end up. But where does Russell Wilson go? Where does Kirk Cousins go? Where does Justin Fields get traded? And by the way, except for fields, Zach, wherever Cousins or Wilson goes, that doesn't mean that team's out of the quarterback market in the first round.

Last thing I'll ask Charles Davis, let's say we're talking five years from now. Who are the five players in this draft class? Offense, defense, doesn't matter that you think are going to be the five best players from this past draft class. Heck, I might take three centers right out of the gate.

We're going to play and going to be starters for day one. Jackson Powers, Johnson out of Oregon, Zach Frazier out of West Virginia. Graham Barton, the left tackle from Duke is going to go inside. Did you see Tanner Bordellini?

People weren't talking about it. He's going to start for someone right away at center out of Wisconsin. I'm just going to talk big guys interior.

That used to be a spot that we kind of went, oh, God, you're drafting a guard early. That's not a great idea. Guess what? You get your pivot right now. That's a big, big deal.

Flip it over to the other side. I'm very interested. And I know what your question is. I'm not avoiding it.

But it's hard for me to do a top five, Zach, but I've got some intrigue with different people. Chop Robinson from Penn State sure looks like he should. When you watched him go through the combine, did you not say to yourself and rush back to the stats? My God, did he get 20 sacks last year? How many sacks did he have last year?

He had four. Now, I'm not saying that to damn him at all, because there was a kid who came out of Penn State a few years ago. Remember his name? Yeah, Micah Parsons.

Owey. Remember him? Owey, yeah, he went to Baltimore, right?

Yeah. He went to Baltimore. How many sacks did he have his last year at Penn State? He had zero.

Okay? Went in the first round. Sometimes the traits are there.

Sometimes you get them unlocked later at different spots. But Chop Robinson sure looked like a guy that's going to be a solid, solid player. And I'm just going to tell you right now, he's not a first rounder, but he's a kid that I am crazy about. I develop these crushes every year for different players.

I developed it earlier in this draft process. He gave it to me at the Senior Bowl, and he gave it to me even bigger at the combine, because he ran like 4-4-5, and everybody went, whoa, whoa, whoa. I didn't know he had that in him.

You know what I'm talking about? Is a safety from Utah named Cole Bishop. And I'm not saying he's Eric Weddle, because Eric Weddle is a guy that I really had a crush on, and he turned out to be right on that one. But Cole Bishop, safety, Utah, did not fall asleep on that young man. He had about as impressive a workout in Indianapolis as we've seen at that position with this grouping, and some eyes had to have been opened somewhere. And somewhere, some scout had already fallen in love with him, and he was just sitting there telling his colleagues, I told you, I told you, he was that good. But there was so much talent out there, Zach Flowen. We could do 10 shows on this, and I'd tell you 10 different guys each and every time.

He is the great Charles Davis, NFL on CBS, does a tremendous job each and every Sunday when you hear him in the booth alongside Ian Eagle and Evan Washburn on the sidelines. Charles, I'm sure we'll be talking to you throughout this process. Always appreciate you giving us some time. Hey, I certainly hope so, because when I talk with you, Zach, that makes me question everything I'm doing to make sure I get it right. Call me anytime so I can get my convictions down. In about a month, I'll feel really good about where we are, but I have to tell you, I'm starting to feel a lot better already. You got it.

Sounds good to me. We'll make sure we'll talk to you soon. There he is, Charles Davis, joining us on the Zach Gelb Show on CBS Sports Radio. Always love how many people we get to hear about in the draft process when Charles Davis comes on with us. No one does homework like Charles Davis. All righty, we'll take a break when we come on back.

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