Falcons Failure (Hour 1)

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Enjoy. Live from the play show, yet not overly ostentatious studios of the infinity sports network. This is a football Friday edition of the Zach Gelb show across all the great local infinity sports network affiliates Sirius XM channel 158, the free Odyssey app, and of course streaming live on YouTube. 855-212-4227 is the number. If you want to jump on in, you could always get at me on Instagram where I'm straight flexing or via the good old cesspool of Twitter at Zach Gelb.

That's Z-A-C-H-G-E-L-B. We're rocking and rolling all the way up until 6 p.m. Eastern, 3 p.m. Pacific today. I got Moist Mike. I got Stuart Kovacs with me, and we'll have some guests join us along the way. NFL draft analyst Mike Renner will stop by 40 minutes from now. Brian Finneran, the former Falcons wide receiver, will join us at 4 20 p.m. Eastern, 1 20 p.m. Pacific today, and then the final hour of the show.

James Palmer is going to join us as well, the longtime NFL reporter. Alrighty, I got to start off the show with the Atlanta Falcons. By the way, that was the craziest first round of NFL draft I've ever seen. We had six quarterbacks go in the first 12 picks. If you would have told me that before the draft started, I would have never believed you. I knew there was a chance that no defensive players would go in the top 10. I would have never thought, though, that we would have had to wait until pick 15 to see the first defensive player go off the board. But the biggest stunner is the Atlanta Falcons at 8, taking Michael Penix Jr. And before that, like we all knew Caleb Williams was going 1 to the Bears.

We all knew Jayden Daniels was going to the commanders. Drake May was going to the Pats. Marvin Harrison Jr. going to the Cardinals. I was surprised by Joe Ault going to the Chargers. It makes sense for how Harbaugh builds his team. But Joe Ault joined us the Wednesday before the draft, right, the other day, and he said, I didn't even have a top 30 visit with the Los Angeles Chargers.

So surprising, but not a major stunner. Giants passing on a quarterback, a little bit surprising, but a lot of people thought they were going to take Malik Nabors since Ault was off the board. J.C. Latham, the offensive tackle out of Alabama, goes to Tennessee. And then you had Adam Schefter. I was watching the ESPN coverage.

You had Adam Schefter pop up on your screen. And I guess he wrote about this the day before the draft, that there was buzz picking up about Michael Penix Jr. going in the top 10. And he said, don't be surprised if the Falcons end up taking him.

Now, Perloff, to be fair, when he joined us in studio the other day, he brought that up and I was like, what? That would make no sense because Kirk Cousins just signed a four-year contract with $100 million guaranteed. So why would they draft Michael Penix Jr. who turns 24 next month?

Like if I'm Terry Fontenot and let's say they said Zach Geld, you get to switch lies with Terry Fontenot for one day and it was draft day. At pick eight, when you signed Kirk Cousins in the offseason and you were just missing a quarterback last year, you have a good young secondary. You could use another pass rusher, obviously.

And on offense, now you have Kirk Cousins, Bijan Robinson, Drake London, and Kyle Pitts. At that pick at eight, I would have taken Roma Dunze. That's what I would have done. I would have drafted Roma Dunze and I would have went for the explosive additional playmaker on the offensive side of the ball. But if you said to me, no, we don't want you taking Roma Dunze. Like if Arthur Blank called me up and said, Zach, we don't want Roma Dunze.

I would say, well, Arthur, this is why you should take him. He's going to be a great wide receiver in the NFL. But if he said pick somebody else, I would have gone with Dallas Turner, Jared Verst to try to go get to the quarterback, even Lotu Laitu at that moment. But to take Michael Penix Jr, I just couldn't believe it. So I'm trying to justify the pick. Because every Tom, Dick, and Harry that gets on the radio or gets on your TV set today is going to say it's an awful pick. It's a terrible pick. It's a pick that makes no sense. And don't get me wrong, I will make this abundantly clear right out of the gate.

1010% clear right out of the gate. I disagree with the pick. The pick should have been Roma Dunze. When you sign Kirk Cousins, you shouldn't draft a quarterback that you're going to have him sit for two years.

That's about to turn 24. And I'm a Penix fan. I thought Penix was underrated in this process. I thought he was disrespected. He's the best deep ball thrower in this draft. My concern with him is not only staying healthy as we saw the injuries pile up at Indiana, but it's the underneath throws when Michigan in the national championship game after his amazing semifinal game up against Texas, where it was one of the best deep ball performances you'll ever see from a quarterback in the history of college football. But in the national championship game, Michigan said with our great secondary and pass rush, we're going to take away the deep throws and you have to beat us underneath. And he couldn't do that.

And he made mistake after mistake. I know you could chalk it up to one game, but that's a concern that I have with Michael Penix Jr.. And if Michael Penix Jr. got drafted by the Falcons and let's say Kirk Cousins wasn't there, I would say that's a good pick. I'd be like, that's a good fit because you could have him start right away.

You got Bijan, you got Kyle Pitts, you got Drake London. OK, I'm all in, but we have to address the elephant in the room. And it's one hundred and million dollar guaranteed elephant. One hundred and sixty million dollar contract over four years. It's Kirk freaking Cousins.

He is there. That's why you can't make that selection. But I'll try to justify the pick here.

I'll try to listen. I'll try to have an open mind here and see if I could come around on what the Falcons did last night, because I think ninety nine point nine percent of us in the moment last night were shocked. We were stunned. We were irate.

We couldn't believe it. But then you sleep on it. Then you wake up this morning. You hear the justification.

And I wonder how many people now have a change of heart. So let me take you back because it's crazy. And I told you I was not a good test taker.

But even when I get the answers to the test, sometimes I can't figure it out. We were at the Super Bowl and we were able to talk to the owner of the Falcons and Arthur Blank. And I said to him, how do you find your best quarterback?

What's the best approach? Is it in free agency? Is it in the draft?

Is it via trade? And Arthur Blank pretty much told us that day on February 9th in the year of twenty twenty four how the Falcons were going to approach this. The last great quarterback we had was Matt Ryan. I mean, that's really what you want. It's really the kind of franchise transitions you want to see.

It's not easy to do. Obviously done in Green Bay. They drafted Jordan Love early, kept him on the bench for a while, played by Aaron. Aaron moved on.

Jordan stepped up this year, played at a high level. So you're looking for a long term solution. Sometimes in a long term solution, you have to have an interim solution too.

So you've got to do some sometimes mixture of both. But ideally, long term, you're looking for that franchise quarterback. Do you want a long term solution? But sometimes you need an interim solution before you get the long term solution.

Well, the interim solution, you usually think, is like a stopgap guy, right? Jacoby Brissett, Gardner Minshew. Maybe, you know, like what the Jets are doing, if the Jets would have taken a quarterback last night, you have a quarterback that is significantly older, right?

In the last year or two of his career. And then you take a stab at a quarterback and you have him sit and wait. Or like what the Packers did, right? Even as Arthur Blank said, where, yeah, Roger still had some good years of football, but you draft Jordan Love at the time was twenty one. But that interim quarterback, if he's not already on your roster, you don't usually sign a month or two before and guarantee him one hundred million dollars.

It just bonkers to me. And I hear Arthur Blank say that. And even on the back end, OK, an interim to a long term solution, then the long term solution, if he's got to sit, you would think that long term solution would be like, I don't know, J.J. McCarthy's age of twenty one.

And not about to be twenty four in May that Michael Pennock's junior is about to turn next month. Let's hear from Raheem Morris. So this is after the fact.

This is late last night. The pick is made. Everyone shocked.

Now let's hear the justification. That was Arthur Blank setting it up back in February. Now we know, OK, you have Kirk Cousins, you have Michael Pennock's junior. This is the new head football coach, the Atlanta Falcons, Raheem Morris on drafting Michael Pennock's junior. When you get Kirk Cousins and you talk about short term winning, you talk about winning right now, which we know we're going to be a position to do, which we want to be a position to do. We won't have the ability to be picking this high again with the guy that we got.

And these guys go off the board pretty quickly. And we thought it would be important for us to address our future quarterback right now. We're picking this low Green Bay model. The Green Bay model was something that we talked about and it's been proven to be right last year.

So hopefully we'll be right with them. Now, that's their best argument, even though you have some flaws in the age of Michael Pennock's junior. It's the Green Bay model because this does feel like Green Bay. We're at the time everyone crushed the Packers for not taking a wide receiver. And why did they trade up to go do so in at 26? Like what the heck are they doing with the Green Bay Packers taking Jordan Love? Rogers won two more MVPs, then got hurt, wasn't great in the last season in Green Bay.

They miss out on the playoffs. And now we know after one year, oh, Brian Gudekunse actually looked like he got it right because Jordan Love looks like he's on his way as a pro quarterback. But the Michael Pennock's junior argument and comparing him to Jordan Love, that's the great disconnect for me. And maybe if I'm trying to justify it, if I'm trying to have an open mind on it, maybe Tom Brady, as crazy as this sounds, and people would be like, oh, here comes Gelb working in Tom Brady once again. But maybe Tom Brady has fooled us all as NFL fans. And what I mean by that is Tom Brady played for 23, 24 years. Now everyone thinks their young quarterback's going to play for 20 plus years. That's one of one.

That's an anomaly. So maybe with the Falcons, they look at it, OK, yes, we gave Kirk Cousins a four-year deal, but we could find a way to get out of it after two years. And then you're looking at Michael Pennock Jr. being 26 or 27 if it's two to three years. And if he could give us eight or nine great years, then it'll be 34, 35. Like if I say to you, get eight or nine great years out of your quarterback, you would sign up for that. So maybe that's how the Falcons, and it's the only way the Falcons look good here, but I think the Falcons are a little naive because the difference with the Packers and the Falcons is the Falcons and their fans have no emotional attachment to Kirk Cousins. There was an emotional attachment to Aaron Rodgers. He was the rock star.

He was the guy. People were annoyed with the pick and they never wanted to see Aaron Rodgers off the field. Kirk Cousins coming off an Achilles injury. That takes time to recover.

Like even if you're on the field, mentally, there's still things that you have to overcome. He has a few games like back-to-back games where he struggles and you have Michael Pennock Jr. who's not a developmental project. He's NFL ready. You think Falcons fans are going to care about the money? No, they're going to be calling for Michael Pennock Jr. And then this genius plan, this creative plan, and I say that kind of roll in my eyes, then it's going to blow up in your face before the end of year one with Kirk Cousins in Atlanta. And the other part too is they talk about, and you heard where he and Morris talk about, we're not going to be picking here again. We're going to be winning.

Okay, you're probably right. This team this year should be winning nine or ten games, but there's a difference in winning and actually winning. When I talk about actually winning, I talk about going for a Super Bowl run.

They'll just be winning where they'll win their division and probably do nothing else. They could have drafted a defensive player. They could have drafted Roma Dunze on offense, another big time playmaker, and actually gave you a chance in a weaker NFC. This is the AFC where it's loaded, where you could actually contend. But they want to try to get the best now and also the best in the future.

And that doesn't usually line up in being able to win a Super Bowl. Here is the GM Terry Fontenot on drafting Michael Pennix Jr. Very excited about today, about the outcome of today being able to add Michael Pennix Jr. When you can add a high caliber player like that with his intangibles, those tools, he's a winner. Very, very excited. You don't pass up that opportunity.

You can. And Kirk Cousins is our quarterback. We're very excited about Kirk. Very excited about this team. And Michael Pennix is, we're talking about the future. The draft is, you look at the future and you look at big picture. But we are very excited about that quarterback room. And again, Kirk is our quarterback.

But adding Michael Pennix is thinking about the future. Whenever you have to say who your quarterback is, he's only your quarterback for so long. Like you, you're in a good relationship. But you know that this isn't going to go to marriage, but you've been dating for a few months.

And you have your eyes wandering already. And you're trying to secure who you're going to pursue once you break up with Kirk Cousins. And you basically told Michael Pennix Jr. to move in right next door. Or you basically created him a guest room and said, hey, go take some real estate in the guest room.

Like what are you doing? That to me is just a bad sale job by one Terry Fontenot. And it's something I just roll my eyes at. And I can't really believe him.

Now, here's the one that really made me laugh. Because there's no way that Kirk Cousins is going to be the guy there for four years. At most, it's going to be three years.

Probably going to be two years. But I'm trying to be open minded. I'm trying to listen.

I'm trying to understand. I even said, you know, you sit him two years, three years, then he's 26, 27. You get eight or nine great years out of him.

Then he's 34, 35. Okay, I'm hearing your vision. But when you start to tell me, Terry Fontenot, that Michael Penix Jr. could sit for four or five years, that's when I hit the floor, roll over, and keep on laughing. Here's Terry Fontenot basically saying that. If you believe in a quarterback, you have to take him. And if he sits for four or five years, that's a great problem to have because we're doing so well at that position. So it's just as simple as if you see a guy that you believe in at that position, you have to take him.

Four or five years, the BS meter is at a thousand listening to Terry Fontenot try to talk his way through this election. Maybe it ends up working. We've seen controversial draft picks before that it ends up working.

I gave you the formula how it could work. But if you were really going for this, if you were really trying to win now, which you were trying to do, bringing in Kirk Cousins, you know, try to get to a second round, try to get to an NFC title game, then you would have bolstered the defense or bolstered the offense for the now. Not try to set up for two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight years from now. It's just something that it makes me roll your eyes.

And I could see, I know what Sam's going to say. I know exactly what you're going to say, because I saw you roll your eyes when I talked about Kirk Cousins, you're probably going to say, well, Kirk Cousins, not really a one-off, but a one-off, Kirk Cousins, not really a winning quarterback. He's not a guy you go win a Super Bowl with. Then why'd you pay him $160 billion?

Like you knew you had eight. If you didn't really believe in Kirk Cousins and you brought him in, you should have just not brought him in, saved the money, go and prove your team in free agency, and then draft the quarterback that you wanted at eight. Michael Penix Jr.'s NFL ready.

This is not a developmental project. This guy is ready to play. So I'm trying to hear what the Falcons are selling. I'm trying to see their reason. But yes, still, even after having it marinate for a little bit, I would not have done what they did last night. I would have taken Roma Dunze. 8-5-5, 2-1-2, 42-27. Do you agree with what the Falcons did?

We will take a time out when we come on back. If you would have told me last night that Bo Nix would have gone at 12, I would say that's the biggest surprise of the first round. Ends up not being the biggest surprise because it was Penix at eight to the team that he went to in the Atlanta Falcons. Do you trust what Sean Payton is doing with the Denver Broncos?

Give you my take next. Alright football fans, the NFL draft is almost here and the free Odyssey app brings you the latest coverage from the biggest sports radio stations across the country. Which players will help your team the most? Who will make a draft day trade?

Will they be ready for week one? The local conversations about the team you love. All streaming free right here on the Odyssey app. A-U-D-A-C-U-Y.

Download it today. Hey, I'm Andy. If you don't know me, it's probably because I'm not famous. But I did start a men's grooming company called Harry's. The idea for Harry's came out of a frustrating experience I had buying razor blades.

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Like buy a world class German blade factory. Obsessing over every detail means we're confident in offering a 100% quality guarantee. Millions of guys have already made the switch to Harry's. So thank you if you're one of them. And if you're not, we hope you give us a try with this special offer. Get a Harry starter set with a five blade razor, weighted handle, shave gel, and a travel cover. All for just three bucks plus free shipping. Just go to harrys.com and enter code smooth at checkout. That's harrys.com code smooth. Enjoy.

All right, it is the Zach Gelb show. We opened up the program with the stunning news that Michael Penix Jr. is now the backup to Kirk Cousins in Atlanta, and the Falcons had to use the eighth overall pick on him. Now we will go to the last quarterback that was picked to the first round. And it was with the 12th pick of the draft.

And that was the Denver Broncos selecting bow necks. So you try to separate this time of the year, when you see things go down, which what was the narrative? And then what was the reality?

So we all knew, right as of yesterday, anyone could have told you that Caleb Williams, Jaden Daniels and Drake May were going to be the first three picks of the draft. That was the narrative. And that ended up being the reality. Then the thought process was, and I gave you my quarterback rankings, and I said, I have Michael Penix Jr. rated in front of JJ McCarthy. But everyone's telling me, and I believed it too, that JJ was going to get selected in front of Michael Penix Jr. That was the narrative. It wasn't the reality with the Falcons surprising everybody and taking Michael Penix Jr. at eight. And there was talks of other teams interested in Michael Penix Jr. for what I was reading. I remember the Seahawks being one of them, the Saints potentially being one as well that were potentially looking to trade up to get Michael Penix Jr.

So once you have the first surprise, after that, there's a domino effect. And that means that there were two potential first round quarterbacks left when you had four go in the first eight picks. And those two quarterbacks were JJ McCarthy and Bo Nix. So once the Falcons selected Michael Penix Jr., the antenna was already up for the Minnesota Vikings, who tried to get to three and tried to execute a deal with the Patriots, just like the Giants reportedly did as well.

But once you lose out on Drake May, then you have to panic. And they went from 11 to 10. Now I know Sean Payton just did a press conference a few moments ago, and he said that they tricked Minnesota thinking that they wanted JJ McCarthy to protect their pick of their guy with Bo Nix.

So I don't know what's true and what is false of that. But Minnesota did trade up one spot, and they swapped with the Jets and added some other picks to New York. So the Vikings could go get JJ McCarthy.

Let me be clear. JJ McCarthy, I think, can be a good quarterback. The fit for JJ McCarthy was everything. And for the last two weeks, I think every day I got on the radio and I said, JJ McCarthy goes to the Giants, JJ McCarthy goes to the Patriots, will be a disaster. But landing in Minnesota for him is massive because you get Justin Jefferson, you get Jordan Addison, you get an offensive minded coach, and Kevin O'Connell's had some success in this league.

And then you still have Aaron Jones right now, at least for this year, in your backfield. So I believe McCarthy, I didn't think he should have been a top 10 pick. I think he was going to be, though, a top 10 pick, even though I would not have done it. But for Minnesota, there was panic, there was need, there was a concern because they no longer have Kirk Cousins, and them getting McCarthy was pretty damn good.

And I think he could have success there. And McCarthy is NFL ready, he should be starting week one over Sam Darnold. So once McCarthy goes off the board, then there was a decision to be made. Who was going to take Bo Nix, right? Like Stu, your Raiders, I don't know, you would have felt that they would have taken Bo Nix, but the Raiders were a team that they thought, all right, if one of these quarterbacks fall, it probably would have been Pennix or McCarthy, you would have been one of the landing spots at 13. Not the case.

All six are off the board. The Saints were even talked about about potentially being one of those landing spots if a quarterback was going to fall. And then the last destination would have been the Seattle Seahawks. And then during this week, during this week, you started to hear some some buzz. And I will say, and I've said this before, I am always skeptical of the buzz that you hear leading up to the draft.

But sometimes things come out of left field and they're so bizarre that even though you don't want to believe it, you may start to say, hmm, that's got a chance of being true. And I would not have fully believed that 12 that Denver would have taken Bo Nix leading up to the draft. But maybe they would have found a way to move back up in the first round to go get him because he was the guy that was a borderline first round pick and he ended up going 12th overall because Pennix going eight set this whole thing out of whack. So I know Sean Payton's going to tell you he knew this was his guy.

And whether you believe that or not, that's up to you. But that's how he landed him because you had a rush. You had Minnesota have to rush you at McCarthy. You had Pennix go off the board at eight. The Patriots did take a quarterback.

Some people thought they weren't. And then Bo Nix goes to Denver. And my first reaction is, okay, what do I think of Bo Nix as a prospect at Auburn?

He was really disappointing. He didn't meet up to the hype at Auburn. When he went to Oregon, I would have never thought you would have been able to see this consistency from Bo Nix. And the last two years, Bo Nix played some stellar football.

With all that being said, he had two opportunities this past year to beat Washington with Michael Pennix Jr. and Roma Dunze, and he couldn't do that. When I'm taking a quarterback in the top 10, in the top 15, it sets an expectation that that quarterback's going to be great. I don't believe Bo Nix is going to be great.

I think his ceiling is just being good. And I know everyone's going to slobber over the fact and make the comparisons to Drew Brees and say, oh, this is Sean Payton getting his guy. And I know Sean Payton is an offensive genius, all that stuff. But the luster and the shine of Sean Payton in the last few years, at least for me, has worn off. He made it out, he was retiring with the Saints. He retired because then he walked away to go do the Fox gig for one year because he wasn't in the spot where he had a quarterback. And then when he gets back in on a job, and we all know he wanted a Chargers job a year before, but the Chargers didn't fire Brandon Staley at that time. And eventually they did right because they got Jim Harbaugh the next year. But for Sean Payton, he didn't really want to make it work with Russell Wilson.

And I didn't like how that whole thing did go down. And now you look at this Broncos team. What do they really have? Like, I look at their weapons. They don't have a number one wide receiver.

And maybe that changes. I know they don't have a second round pick, but right now they don't have a number one wide receiver. Javonte Williams, I like him, but he's hurt a lot. And I just look at, okay, you got the piece, but it's not as if you could sit Bo Nix because he's 24. Like he should be starting week one. You can't, you can't throw out Zach Wilson on week one.

That would be stupid. Like this guy's NFL ready. He's ready to go. And if he can't beat out the other garbage QBs on this roster, then he shouldn't have been the 12th overall pick of the draft. So I do think Bo will be the best QB on the roster. I do think Bo will be starting week one, but I think a lot of people are going to say, okay, this is Sean finding his next Drew Brees and who would have expected Drew Brees would have gone on to the career and the illustrious career that he had when he elected to go to new Orleans.

But I don't think this magic is going to happen again. And Denver, and I know this is kind of a weak argument at times, but there have just been teams for years that just mess up the quarterback position. And ever since number 18 won a Superbowl and walked off into the sunset, that quarterback position for the Broncos has been a disaster.

And I may be being polite. When I say a disaster, you could list like seven or eight guys that have failed there. So if Sean thinks it could work, you take your guy when you could get him. But this does feel like a reach for the Denver Broncos.

And I don't think this is going to work out. We're a few years from now. We're like, Oh, Sean's a genius. Oh, this is why Sean's a hall of fame coach up the Broncos. They're going to be a Superbowl contender. Like, do you think the Chiefs today are shaking in their boots because the Broncos drafted Bo Nix?

Does this close the gap at all or sets it up for the future to close the gap? No, it's like the Raiders, they got Brock Bowers. Sure, the Raiders have a bunch of weapons, the tight end from Notre Dame. You got Bowers out of Georgia. You got Devontae Adams.

Like you got some pieces there. You got Jacoby Myers, but you don't have a quarterback. And then for the Chargers, you have a quarterback. You beefed up that offensive line.

But now with no longer having Mike Williams or Keenan Allen, you got to improve those weapons. Now, I'll believe in Jim Harbaugh, I'll believe in Justin Herbert, but all likelihood, they're probably going to be the second team for years to come in that division. You need a superstar to contend in that division at the quarterback situation. You need a superstar to go compete with Patrick Mahomes. And I know that's not an easy task, but I don't look at Bo Nix at 12 as a necessity. I don't think Bo Nix has a ceiling of being a superstar. I think at best, if everything comes together for Bo Nix, when he's with Sean in Denver, it's just being a good quarterback. And just being a good quarterback in the AFC, isn't really going to win you, Jack Bleep. It is the Zach Gelb Show on the Infinity Sports Network.

We'll take a time out. We will recap the first round of the NFL Draft, which was the craziest first round of the NFL Draft I've ever seen with Mike Renner, who's a great NFL Draft analyst. He was on the show last night with Lefkoe, Micah Parsons, and CJ Stroud, which I thought was a fascinating listen. I thought Saban was great before the draft. I thought Belichick with McAfee was great. Belichick showing a little bit of a personality.

Who would have thought that? But we got a whole lot more to do on the other side when we connect with Mike Renner. This is Zach Gelb Show on the Infinity Sports Network. Here is the Ackman, Rich Ackerman.

All right, it is the Zach Gelb Show. We're talking draft, draft, draft, and more draft after the craziness of last night. That is the craziest first round of an NFL Draft that I've ever seen. One of the best NFL Draft analysts is Mike Renner, and he's kind enough to join us right now on the Zach Gelb Show. Mike, I know it's a busy time of the year for you, so I appreciate you giving us a few minutes today.

For sure, it's busy, but it's the best time of the year in my opinion. Well, let me start you off with this. I'm going to actually start you off with Bo Nix because I would have never believed that Michael Penix Jr. would have been the pick at eight, but I really would have never believed that Bo Nix would have been the 12th pick of this draft. I know he's going to be working with Sean Payton. We know what his track record is in this league, but what do you think Bo Nix could turn into as an NFL quarterback with the Denver Broncos? You're probably talking to the biggest Bo Nix fan in the NFL Draft media right now.

I watched his tape and did the final eval on him back in January after the senior ball, and I was just watching. I was like, this guy is built for Sean Payton's offense. After that, I mocked him to the Broncos, I think every single time, just because of what he does in that offense at Oregon and obviously what Sean Payton has done for the course of his career with the Saints and now with Denver Broncos and what they want to do. And it's the quick passing game. He was the best quick passer in this draft class.

And I think a lot of people want to pigeonhole him into that. And it's like that he could only do that, but he put up statistically one of the greatest seasons of all time at the collegiate level. He broke the NCAA completion percentage record this past fall, and he didn't do it with first round wide receivers. He didn't do it with first round offensive linemen. A lot of it was Bo Nix just being high level processing in terms of being able to read defenses quickly, get the ball where it needs to go. Now, a lot of that's what Sean Payton's going to ask me to do.

It's throw underneath, read the defense, get the ball there on time. And now when things broke down, when he had to get to a second, third read, I think that's when he saw Bo Nix struggle, but he couldn't have gone to a better situation for him. And I think that's why Sean Payton was saying to everyone who would listen to him yesterday that I was watching the tape and I was like, this guy is a lot better than these people are letting on. So if you want to go on elsewhere, you know, I might not have been as high on them, but where he went with Denver Broncos, I think he can succeed.

Now, when we talk about succeeding, what does that mean? Because fair or not, he's in a division that for the foreseeable future has Patrick Mahomes standing in his way as a giant roadblock with the Kansas City Chiefs. Yeah. I mean, everyone, there's different levels of franchise quarterback, right? And I don't think if you're the Broncos picking at 12, no, you were never going to get to the Mahomes level, right? In this quarterback class, no one was going to let you trade up to the top three. Obviously, all three of those teams wanted the guys they got.

And I think those were the guys in this class with the real, that kind of ceiling, right? But I do think that quarterbacks on rookie contracts, at least when you got them for these next four years and with Bo Nix, with an experience, five years of college football should hit the ground fairly ready. There shouldn't be this massive transition for him that you just need to build out of the roster around him. And obviously roster is depleted as well. It may take a few years, but your three, your four, when you're not paying him a ton of money, maybe then you can start to compete.

So there are levels to this in terms of like how good he's feeling could possibly be, but it's the first piece. Now you put the rest of the pieces around him in Denver, talking to Mike Renner right now. Alrighty. Let's go back to eight. I was talking to Arthur Blank at the Superbowl and he said to me, sometimes to find the long-term solution, you got to find an interim solution first. I don't really know too many interim solutions that cost you a hundred million dollars guaranteed, but now you got Kirk Cousins there. And also Michael Pennick Jr. the next day, are you in on this pick of Pennick Jr. at eight, or are you out like most people? As a Packers fan, Lifeline Packers fan, I really can't criticize the pick, right?

This was what the Packers have done twice famously over the last 20 years with Aaron Rogers and then Jordan Love and both times it's worked out. And so if you are Raheem Morris, new head coach, this basically gives you a runway of we never have to worry about the quarterback position while I'm here. And that's something that if you want long-term job security as a head coach, this is your path towards that because now your three, your four of Kirk Cousins contract, when they obviously, when it starts to, they can get off from under that, maybe his play starts to slip. That's when Michael Pennick Jr. is going to be handling your offense. And there's no like big transition period for him.

He's already mastered. He's been in the system for forever. So I think that's, I see the rationale, but in this class specifically with guys like Roma Dunze on the board there with guys like Olufashinu on the board there with guys like Dallas Turner, Byron Murphy on the defensive side on the board, they're like, those are darn good prospects that maybe in another class where, you know, when Tyree Wilson went eight last year, I would have maybe gone quarterback then. I didn't think he was that great of a prospect to go top 10. It was just a different class, but in this one specifically, it's just hard for me to see the rationale with how quickly you could have taken over the NFC South drafting one of those guys I just mentioned. If you could give Terry Fontenot a do over today, do you think he would have never issued that contract to Kirk Cousins if he knew that he was going to end up drafting Michael Pennick Jr. at eight?

I don't think so. Honestly, I think this is, I think he believes in it and this is, I think the coaching staff believes in it too. I don't think they have any reservations about their process here. So no, I think that they just want as many swings at this quarterback position as they can. And if you're the Falcons and what you've had a quarterback after Matt Ryan, it's hard for me to really be too upset about that for them.

Alrighty, let's get to the bears. We all knew Caleb Williams is going to be the number one overall pick. I know a lot of people thought a dunes a was going to go there nine. I didn't think he was going to be available, but they get him there with what Williams is walking into with Roma dunes, a Keenan Allen and DJ Moore. I know the bears haven't had a franchise quarterback in like forever, but if they can't make this one work, then this franchise is just curse, right?

Yeah. Somewhere Justin Fields is crying into a pillow because I mean like he's just like, where are any of these guys? He didn't have any of these guys, you know, over the course of his bearish career. And so for Caleb Williams, he doesn't even really have to be, you know, always build to be right. Like this is enough talent that, you know, like a Brock Purdy could succeed with this. Like a, like an average quarterback could be elevated into putting up good numbers with the wide receiver talent. So it's a unique situation and man, what a year to have the number one pick and what they had in this draft class.

Ryan Polis, like they were really no sky really is the limit for the steam, maybe not year one. Obviously it's a ring quarterback, but if you're not thinking Superbowl year two, year three, or four with what they have in this roster, if they're not in that mix, I'd be surprised. Do you think the better quarterback Mike Renner will be Jayden Daniels or Drake May when it's all said and done?

I think it's Drake May. I trend towards youth at the quarterback position in terms of like when a guy figured it out. I think we saw, you know, with Kenny Pickett, how, when a guy really, after a lot of years of starting starts to figure it out that it can be fool's gold to a degree and just not say fool's gold. I think Jay Daniels is going to be a darn good quarterback, but I just think May has special ability. You know what he did as a red shirt freshman at North Carolina was high-end stuff. And I think his NFL readiness is being undersold a little bit because I flip on his tape versus Jay Daniels tape. And, you know, Daniels has two first round wide receivers.

He might have two first round offensive tackles going next year. And he could just kind of facilitate and just put it in their hands. And they made the plays. If Drake May wanted to win games, it was on his arm. He had to make the plays himself.

He had to put it to perfect spots for his guys to then create. So that's, I'll give me that all day every day because in the NFL level, that's what wins. Facilitating can only get you so far, especially when you're going to play behind the kind of offensive line Daniels is about to get subjected to. So yeah, May has no talent around him as well, but I think I'll just lean towards the youth guy starting to develop more than Daniels at his age.

Do you buy the IU? Do you buy the Deebo Samuel rumors with the Patriots who have the second pick in the second round tonight? I do because for the 49ers, it's just untenable, right? You can't pay all those guys. They're going to have like highest paid, like top three wide receiver, top three edge, top three off ball linebacker. They're going to have to pay Purdy here in a couple years. Like the cap situation at some point becomes such that one of them has to be moved and then they just after a wide receiver in the first round, who with Kyle Shanahan's offense, he won't see the field. Otherwise, if they keep those two guys there. So yeah, I'm buying that one of those guys gets moved tonight, Mike Brenner, who was the pick last night? Like not at all like Marvin Harrison Jr. Okay. I think he's the best player in the draft him going for the Cardinals.

I absolutely love it. But who was the player in the draft last night that you were like, where he went to the fit? Let's say it's let's say it's not a quarterback that that was one that really impressed if you want to give me a name or two.

Ah, there I'll give you to that. I really liked Byron Murphy to the Seattle Seahawks. I had him as top 10 player. I had him as the best defensive player. I thought his upward trajectory towards the end of the season is exactly what I want to buy into. And then obviously like his combine was off the charts for a 300 pounder who can play anywhere along the defensive line he showed at Texas. So the Seahawks get him at 16 when it's like that's exactly what Mike McDonald wanted for his defense. You know, he wanted his Justin Madabuki there in the middle.

That was an awesome fit. And then Terry on Arnold to the lions. You know, if you mock Terry on Arnold to the lions in the last month, no one would have said, you're crazy.

They fall on that bar, right? All of a sudden and they get to jump the Packers to do so. You know, the Packers would have ran that card in at 25, I think to get a guy like Terry on Arnold. So kind of the one piece, they had one need at corner on this lion's team, but that was kind of built and had no real holes after free agency and the work they've done this off season. The one thing they needed was a guy who a lot of people has an M1 cornerback in this draft class, get them all the way at 24. I thought that was a great fit.

I like what the Vikings did. I know they had trade up the one spot, but I thought if McCarthy's going to succeed, he needed to go to the Vikings compared to the giants or the Patriots, but then to also get Dallas Turner too. I would have never thought, I know no defensive player went until pick 15, but I would never thought Dallas Turner would have been available at 17.

Yeah. The Turner fit. I couldn't believe to now have him and Grinnard and everyone talks about them losing to Neil Hunter. Their pass rush might be better this year. Now that they have two guys that can actually get after the quarterback because Dallas Turner, you know, in a weaker class, I keep raving about how good the top of this class was, but you know, you go back two years ago when Trayvon Walker in Hutchinson go one and two, he's probably top three pick in that draft, Dallas Turner. That's the kind of talent we're talking about is a guy who could have gone top five.

It's just such a stack class. So for them to get them at 17 and yeah, they gave up a little bit in the trade, but they didn't have to give up any future first rounders to get a prime time pass rusher and a prime time quarterback, the two most valuable positions from a cap perspective in the NFL. I think that's a great move from Plessy. Who's the wide receiver Buffalo's taken tonight with the first pick of the second round? I keep saying Adnai Mitchell, the Texas wide receiver to them.

If there's any guy left on the board that I could see being a number one and that's what they need, right? You know, they got the ancillary piece in Curtis Samuel. They got the tight ends there. They need the stud number one type of wide receiver.

He has those kinds of tools. So that's who I think they were fine trading back for, because I think he's off a lot of teams boards because of some of the off-field stuff that he has that he's going through. But for the Buffalo bills, this dealt with Stefan Diggs for a while. I think they're fine with some off-field issues there and the guy who maybe have some locker room concern. So yeah, I think Adnai Mitchell is the guy that I'm looking for. If I'm the Buffalo bills, I only got 45 to 60 seconds left, Mike Renner.

Just give me a few names to monitor early tonight after that. Yeah, I love him and I love Jackson Powers Johnson, the Oregon center. I couldn't believe he didn't go in the first round. He had some of the best tape I've seen from a center recent years. And then I'll also throw in the corners Cooper Dejean, Kool-Aid McKinstry, first round grades on both those guys.

They should go early. He's Mike Renner. Mike, I loved the coverage last night with Lefkoe and Parsons and CJ Stroud. It was good to see you obviously on there. Your coverage is always great. Appreciate you jumping on board with us for a few minutes today. For sure, Zach. Thanks for having me on.

There you go. He is Mike Renner, one of the best NFL draft analysts in the country, breaking down all these prospects and all the craziness from what was round one last night. That saw six quarterbacks go in the first 12 picks, no defensive player until pick number 15. And when stuff like that happens early picks tonight in the second round, you're going to have a lot of guys that you're looking at said, wow, I can't believe that guy was there. And I can't believe that that guy wasn't a first round pick. And you even started to see it last night when we talked about some of those players, like a Byron Murphy out of Texas, being there at 16 to Seattle, Dallas Turner being there at 17 to the Minnesota Vikings, Quinon Mitchell, 22 to the Philadelphia Eagles. He was rising as a top 15 pick. Terry Arnold, 24 to the Detroit Lions, Darius Robinson, 27 out of Missouri to the Cardinals.

Just a few of those names as well. Okay, we're coming on back. We got some more NFL Draft reaction for you.

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