# Why are there more NFL Trades?

An episode of [NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/680904259), 9 Jun 2026, 44 min.

Audio: https://pdrl.fm/91be81/podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/claritaspod.com/measure/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/9ce11dad-e86a-444f-ba83-ae27003475be/45ef6202-3d52-45db-b18f-b463017a2f11/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=deff018f-4b51-4501-937c-ae27003475d1

Gregg Rosenthal and Jourdan Rodrigue discuss the trade landscape in the NFL and talk about the influx of trades over the last decade, why some teams choose to build via trades rather than lean on free agency, discuss how some of the more successful teams in recent memory use trades, owners roles, and how cap space across the league has influenced the changing landscape. NFL Daily YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/nflpodcasts See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:04] Speaker 1: Welcome to NFL Daily, where the trade tsunami of my
[0:08] Speaker 1: dreams has finally happened all over the NFL. I'm Greg Rosenthal.
[0:13] Speaker 1: I'm with Jordan rod Reeg. We're in different parts of
[0:16] Speaker 1: Los Angeles. She's wearing the official Los Angeles celebrity hat,
[0:21] Speaker 1: which is the black Greg.
[0:25] Speaker 2: Can we tell the listeners our airport story? Greg came
[0:28] Speaker 2: into the airport. We were on our way I think
[0:30] Speaker 2: to the Combine a couple of years ago, and Greg
[0:33] Speaker 2: and I were on the same flight, and he came
[0:35] Speaker 2: up looking so famous with this hat pulled extremely low,
[0:40] Speaker 2: as if he just was waiting for people to recognize
[0:43] Speaker 2: him all across the airport or the pops.
[0:45] Speaker 3: It's just the pops.
[0:47] Speaker 1: Nobody knew that that that's a famous person's hat.
[0:50] Speaker 3: Oh you knew that.
[0:51] Speaker 2: But I go, wow, you look really cool in that hat.
[0:53] Speaker 2: I think I want to get one.
[0:55] Speaker 1: Yeah you did, and I've lost mine since, but I
[0:57] Speaker 1: have many similar ones. This is a show alluded to
[1:00] Speaker 1: it at the top where we talk about a big issue.
[1:03] Speaker 1: We've been talking about plenty, not an issue in a
[1:05] Speaker 1: negative sense, just something that's been popping up around the NFL,
[1:07] Speaker 1: and that's trying to answer a very simple question.
[1:10] Speaker 3: A whole show Jordan on answering the.
[1:14] Speaker 1: Question, why are there more NFL trades than before? Why
[1:20] Speaker 1: don't we just establish at least in this I was
[1:24] Speaker 1: wondering in my own head, was like, am I just
[1:26] Speaker 1: imagining things?
[1:27] Speaker 3: Are there more trades than before?
[1:28] Speaker 1: And I did just check over the last decade or so,
[1:31] Speaker 1: and this year has had thirty four players traded veterans
[1:37] Speaker 1: since the start of the new league year. That is,
[1:41] Speaker 1: you know, significantly more than any year since twenty eighteen.
[1:45] Speaker 1: But it's not like it's crazy more thirty four players traded.
[1:48] Speaker 1: There was twenty last year, there was twenty three the
[1:50] Speaker 1: year before seventeen. Before that, it was usually in the
[1:53] Speaker 1: low twenties. Twenty eighteen actually had more trades, So it's
[1:56] Speaker 1: not like totally out of bounds and out of the
[2:00] Speaker 1: realm of possibility that there would be this many trades.
[2:02] Speaker 1: But it's not just that it feels like there's been
[2:04] Speaker 1: more trades this season. There actually has been, and we
[2:07] Speaker 1: have we have a large amount of reasons why, and
[2:11] Speaker 1: there's obviously not just one reason. But if like one
[2:14] Speaker 1: reason stuck out to you the most, what do you
[2:17] Speaker 1: think it is? Put you on the spot here right
[2:18] Speaker 1: to start.
[2:19] Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that think. I think comes in waves
[2:22] Speaker 2: because you see these large fluctuations and condensed periods. Like
[2:26] Speaker 2: I think back to like the twenty twenty two off
[2:29] Speaker 2: season when a free agency started. But what was really
[2:32] Speaker 2: the conversation at that time was when the new leagu
[2:35] Speaker 2: year began, all of these trades were happening. There was
[2:38] Speaker 2: like something like eight players were traded over the course
[2:40] Speaker 2: of fifteen days, and a couple of them were very
[2:43] Speaker 2: high profile players, including Tyreek Hill at that time. And
[2:47] Speaker 2: it was I like, how it ebbs and flows because teams,
[2:52] Speaker 2: I think, are pivoting between models. Some teams are pivoting
[2:55] Speaker 2: between models with more fluidity than usual, and that would
[2:59] Speaker 2: be one of the hallmarks of this is the concept
[3:02] Speaker 2: of time, the concept of what teams see their windows as.
[3:07] Speaker 2: And we're talking about teams that do trade. There are
[3:09] Speaker 2: still some teams that just they just don't really do it.
[3:12] Speaker 2: But teams that do trade and trade frequently when they
[3:17] Speaker 2: see their windows of time in terms of contention windows,
[3:21] Speaker 2: what they see those as, whether they believe they are
[3:23] Speaker 2: in a build mode or whether they believe they are
[3:26] Speaker 2: in an actual contention mode. How those trades speed up
[3:31] Speaker 2: their timeline, in some cases backfire entirely, like the Denver
[3:35] Speaker 2: Broncos back in twenty twenty two, which we'll get to.
[3:38] Speaker 2: But to me, it's like how teams are viewing when
[3:42] Speaker 2: they can reach and push, and that it's happening in
[3:45] Speaker 2: faster increments than it was previously.
[3:48] Speaker 1: Yeah, and that twenty twenty two season, which I happen
[3:51] Speaker 1: to have open on my browser right now, Russell Wilson,
[3:55] Speaker 1: Khalil Mack, who stands out as one of the guys
[3:58] Speaker 1: that have gotten traded twice in recent years. Ramsey's another one,
[4:01] Speaker 1: Gino Smith's another one. AJ Brown is one that's been
[4:04] Speaker 1: traded twice. But in that season alone, Yeah, right there,
[4:06] Speaker 1: I think there was Russell Wilson, Khalil Mack, Carson Wentz,
[4:10] Speaker 1: Amari Cooper, and I'm just picking the bigger names. Drew
[4:13] Speaker 1: Locke was traded that season two, DeVante Adams, Deshaun Watson,
[4:17] Speaker 1: Tyreek Hill, Matt Ryan. All those trades like within a
[4:20] Speaker 1: couple of weeks. And so it's not just this new
[4:22] Speaker 1: phenomenon the having two June first trades of players of
[4:26] Speaker 1: this caliber, a future Hall of Famer and then a
[4:30] Speaker 1: guy in aj Brown, who's gonna have a candidacy for
[4:32] Speaker 1: the Hall of Fame.
[4:33] Speaker 3: That doesn't normally happen. But one thing doing.
[4:35] Speaker 1: Some research for this show, it very often was top
[4:40] Speaker 1: of the line players. Of course, there's like lower level trades,
[4:43] Speaker 1: but as I went through year by year, it's very
[4:45] Speaker 1: often some of the best players in the league. So
[4:47] Speaker 1: we'll go through like a lot of big bucket reasons
[4:50] Speaker 1: and I'm just gonna give you like a few ones,
[4:52] Speaker 1: and then we'll go through them as we go, like
[4:56] Speaker 1: on one hand, and I think they're all the right answers,
[4:59] Speaker 1: but it's just been hard to get good players otherwise
[5:01] Speaker 1: because free agency is harder. It's all connected the way
[5:06] Speaker 1: teams are managing cap space and cap management, the dead
[5:09] Speaker 1: money teams are willing to take on the younger gms,
[5:13] Speaker 1: the boldness kind of following the path of some of
[5:16] Speaker 1: the teams that have been successful, the Eagles, the Rams,
[5:18] Speaker 1: and the Patriots, and just like the way of evaluating
[5:21] Speaker 1: their roster. So let's kind of start with the idea
[5:25] Speaker 1: that it's been too hard to get players otherwise. And
[5:29] Speaker 1: I've noticed this doing the free agency one a one
[5:32] Speaker 1: list anymore.
[5:33] Speaker 3: And you can speak to how front offices see this.
[5:36] Speaker 1: I think one of the reasons we're seeing all these
[5:38] Speaker 1: trades to start with is because there just aren't enough
[5:42] Speaker 1: players available in free agency.
[5:45] Speaker 2: Yeah, that's part of it. And then those guys come
[5:48] Speaker 2: come off in clusters too. So like I look at
[5:51] Speaker 2: this again in terms of how teams view what their
[5:54] Speaker 2: timelines are. Let's say it's a brand new head coach.
[5:57] Speaker 2: We saw this with, you know, the Patriots. We've seen
[6:01] Speaker 2: this with new coaches around the league. We're seeing it
[6:04] Speaker 2: with second year coach Aaron Glenn for example in New York.
[6:10] Speaker 2: When coaches feel they need to go and sign a
[6:13] Speaker 2: bunch of I guess middle tier financially or lower tier
[6:17] Speaker 2: financially players, that is where they allocate their resources in
[6:21] Speaker 2: order to reset, you know, some of their floor of
[6:24] Speaker 2: their roster. A lot of that happens with these middle
[6:27] Speaker 2: to low tier either a players or deals or players
[6:31] Speaker 2: they're familiar with. If it comes to a point where
[6:35] Speaker 2: there is a player they are very familiar with, I
[6:37] Speaker 2: would say, you know, Mike Rabel aj Brown being very
[6:39] Speaker 2: familiar with each other, and it's a player of a
[6:42] Speaker 2: certain caliber, then yes, that's when you do see an
[6:45] Speaker 2: actual trade for that player versus letting them hit the
[6:47] Speaker 2: market and have multiple teams bid on that player. I
[6:51] Speaker 2: think that the core of a roster is often informed
[6:56] Speaker 2: by that like middle section, right, like that of players,
[7:00] Speaker 2: and so you're seeing teams being willing more teams than
[7:03] Speaker 2: ever being willing to trade for the high quote unquote
[7:06] Speaker 2: premium players of the elite players at premium positions. You're
[7:10] Speaker 2: seeing a willingness there which automatically shoves, to me, I
[7:14] Speaker 2: think down the middle pool of players who are available
[7:17] Speaker 2: in free agency because resources are going elsewhere. So I
[7:21] Speaker 2: think both of them they're very much hand in hand,
[7:24] Speaker 2: but one can't really exist without the other, is what
[7:27] Speaker 2: I also would argue, right.
[7:29] Speaker 1: And financially, it's just easier because there's more cap space
[7:34] Speaker 1: in the league in general, but there's less free agent
[7:39] Speaker 1: players to necessarily spend it on. And I think you
[7:43] Speaker 1: look back over the last decade and you look at
[7:47] Speaker 1: the Eagles. I wrote a piece on the Eagles and
[7:49] Speaker 1: the Patriots leading into the twenty seventeen Super Bowl that
[7:53] Speaker 1: noted the two most frequent trading teams in that decade.
[7:57] Speaker 1: So for so far, we're by far are the Patriots
[8:01] Speaker 1: and the Eagles that specific Super Bowl, which is almost
[8:03] Speaker 1: a decade old, now had seven starters I believe from
[8:08] Speaker 1: the Patriot. You know, five starters from the Eagles that
[8:11] Speaker 1: were required via trade, and like seven from the Patriots.
[8:13] Speaker 1: So it's not that it's a totally new phenomenon.
[8:17] Speaker 3: And yet the.
[8:17] Speaker 1: Way that cap space has exploded that so many teams
[8:23] Speaker 1: are so much better at managing the cap, it just
[8:25] Speaker 1: makes it more flexible to make these trades possible. And
[8:29] Speaker 1: even if you're a team like the Eagles, who have
[8:31] Speaker 1: been so frequently the aggressor, sometimes they can be the
[8:35] Speaker 1: seller with a mistake that they made. And you know
[8:38] Speaker 1: how much cash they spend, like they're they're always pushing
[8:41] Speaker 1: money into the future, and they're able to spend a
[8:44] Speaker 1: ton of cash, and they have void and they're willing
[8:46] Speaker 1: to take a ton of dead money. They have a
[8:48] Speaker 1: ton of dead money this season. But this has been
[8:50] Speaker 1: an exploding phenomenon, and they can do that and kind
[8:53] Speaker 1: of eat the negative financial end of a AJ Brown
[8:57] Speaker 1: trade because they've managed the cap so well, and so
[9:00] Speaker 1: many teams now are so easily managing the cap that
[9:04] Speaker 1: you almost build in all this dead money that you're
[9:08] Speaker 1: going to be spending anyways, into the cap. Going through
[9:10] Speaker 1: some of the dead money today, Uh, blew my mind
[9:13] Speaker 1: a little.
[9:13] Speaker 2: We really blown up. Yeah, that's that's what's really blown up.
[9:16] Speaker 2: Teams do not fear dead money anymore. Mostly again, we're
[9:19] Speaker 2: talking about the teams you see that are active along
[9:22] Speaker 2: the trade market. You see teams. These are teams that
[9:25] Speaker 2: are typically you know, playoff teams. You see. These are
[9:28] Speaker 2: teams that typically have continuity in their front office. These
[9:31] Speaker 2: are teams that typically build with very with real clarity,
[9:35] Speaker 2: that understand what their windows and timelines are. These are
[9:38] Speaker 2: also teams that don't fear dead money truly and even
[9:41] Speaker 2: and I just think that it's we were gasping in
[9:45] Speaker 2: shock a few years ago when like the Tampa Bay Buccaneers,
[9:49] Speaker 2: for example, decide to absorb a huge amount of dead money.
[9:52] Speaker 2: The Eagles prior to that, absorb a huge amount of
[9:55] Speaker 2: dead money. But if you can absorb it in like
[9:58] Speaker 2: one rip or like one calendar year of a rip
[10:02] Speaker 2: on and off your books, and you can draft very
[10:04] Speaker 2: well around that, then you can go be strategic again.
[10:08] Speaker 2: And the players you do trade for or the players
[10:10] Speaker 2: you do sign in free agency. It's why I think,
[10:13] Speaker 2: even if I don't know that it will work for
[10:16] Speaker 2: them in the short team term. It's why I actually
[10:19] Speaker 2: can see what the Dolphins are doing, why I actually
[10:21] Speaker 2: think what they're doing process wise makes sense. You got
[10:24] Speaker 2: to draft the right players, you got to pick the
[10:25] Speaker 2: right players. Their process, to me makes sense, and it
[10:28] Speaker 2: follows a very similar process as a lot of these
[10:31] Speaker 2: other teams who have done this in the last five
[10:33] Speaker 2: to seven years.
[10:35] Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll bounce around a little bit. The dead money
[10:37] Speaker 1: stuff I find interesting. The Dolphins are another level. That
[10:40] Speaker 1: was what opened my eyes. They have ared almost one
[10:43] Speaker 1: hundred and seventy nine million dollars in dead money this year.
[10:46] Speaker 3: My beer record.
[10:47] Speaker 2: Yeah, you say we don't fear dead money, hold my beer.
[10:51] Speaker 1: That has to be the all time record. I'd have
[10:54] Speaker 1: to go through it, maybe ask our research group. I mean,
[10:56] Speaker 1: they're only spending one hundred and sixteen million dollars on
[10:59] Speaker 1: players on their that on their roster, and one hundred
[11:02] Speaker 1: and seventy nine on players that aren't. But I mentioned
[11:06] Speaker 1: the Eagles, like, they are spending more than seventy million
[11:08] Speaker 1: dollars in dead money last year. A few years ago,
[11:10] Speaker 1: we saw it in the Final Eight when the Eagles
[11:14] Speaker 1: went far and won that Super Bowl that five or
[11:16] Speaker 1: six of the top teams were high in dead money,
[11:19] Speaker 1: and there are nine teams this season, it is not rare,
[11:22] Speaker 1: and a lot of them are expecting to contend with
[11:25] Speaker 1: over fifty million dollars in dead money. So the fact
[11:29] Speaker 1: that all the TV money has come in twenty two
[11:31] Speaker 1: teams have more than twenty million dollars in dead money. So,
[11:34] Speaker 1: like I said, it's just like part of the equation
[11:36] Speaker 1: for the vast majority of the league, Like teams are
[11:40] Speaker 1: just not afraid essentially of making mistakes. So it's a
[11:44] Speaker 1: long way of explaining that with some of these trades.
[11:47] Speaker 1: Either you can feel like you made a mistake with
[11:49] Speaker 1: the Miles Garrett contract, that the Browns kind like quote
[11:51] Speaker 1: unquote kind of made a mistake financially giving them that money,
[11:55] Speaker 1: but they can just eat it like they can deal
[11:58] Speaker 1: with it, and you can still be flexible with your
[12:01] Speaker 1: roster even if you're taking all these penalties financially.
[12:04] Speaker 2: I would say in terms of the acquiring team, specifically,
[12:07] Speaker 2: when the acquiring team is feels like it's able to
[12:10] Speaker 2: take on a lot of dead money or you know,
[12:13] Speaker 2: shed a lot of dead money, often it can come
[12:16] Speaker 2: hand in hand with understanding either you're about to go
[12:18] Speaker 2: be aggressive and get elite players at premium positions, meaning
[12:23] Speaker 2: quarterback meaning number one or one, B receiver meaning corner
[12:28] Speaker 2: meaning pass rusher, whether that's interior mostly most oftentimes exterior.
[12:32] Speaker 2: So either you know you're going to go out and
[12:34] Speaker 2: get those players. We joke around a lot. Teams call them,
[12:38] Speaker 2: you know, the Rams called them weight bearing walls. They
[12:40] Speaker 2: already had them for the most part on their roster.
[12:43] Speaker 3: You know.
[12:44] Speaker 2: Teams refer to them as bridges or players that can
[12:47] Speaker 2: you know, hold the foundation or whatever. It's premium player,
[12:51] Speaker 2: elite players at premium positions, which means you feel okay
[12:55] Speaker 2: not only taking on or eventually shedding that dead money,
[12:59] Speaker 2: but also so hand in hand spending the resources to
[13:02] Speaker 2: go out and get those elite players because they will
[13:07] Speaker 2: make your roster turn around very very quickly, and they
[13:11] Speaker 2: ease the pain of that dead money, especially if it's
[13:14] Speaker 2: another team that's acquiring it too. Excuse me, that's taking
[13:18] Speaker 2: on that dead money because they are giving away the player,
[13:21] Speaker 2: and that to me is why teams for a lot
[13:24] Speaker 2: of reasons, and we'll get to more, I know, but
[13:27] Speaker 2: value that as a hinge point or pivot point of
[13:32] Speaker 2: flexibility for their rosters that's worth more to them than
[13:36] Speaker 2: draft picks in a lot of cases. Yes, draft picks
[13:38] Speaker 2: are cost controlled, especially at those positions, but there are
[13:42] Speaker 2: some teams that just prefer the roster flexibility of what
[13:46] Speaker 2: trading those picks can do for them.
[13:48] Speaker 1: Yeah, I think we can get into some of the
[13:51] Speaker 1: teams that have been successful doing that, and that is
[13:54] Speaker 1: I think that's a huge part of it. That if
[13:56] Speaker 1: it's the Rams, the Eagles, the Patriots, when it was
[13:59] Speaker 1: the Belichick Patriot, it's not that way anymore. That are
[14:02] Speaker 1: trading the most, that are kind of pulling these leads
[14:04] Speaker 1: the most, and it's working. And I think you've seen
[14:08] Speaker 1: with the front offices and there's more and more not
[14:12] Speaker 1: just cap guys, but the blending of business school cap
[14:17] Speaker 1: guys and analytics guys all into these front offices. How
[14:21] Speaker 1: do you think like those teams, specifically Philadelphia LA, who
[14:25] Speaker 1: do it in very different ways, have influenced and maybe
[14:28] Speaker 1: made copycats around the league of some of the teams
[14:31] Speaker 1: doing similar ideas well.
[14:33] Speaker 2: I think the most important part is either the teams
[14:36] Speaker 2: that are the most aggressive in doing things like this,
[14:39] Speaker 2: either a have continuity already or they have the assurance
[14:43] Speaker 2: of continuity. And what I mean by that is, like,
[14:45] Speaker 2: we know that the Howie Roseman's of the world, the
[14:49] Speaker 2: less needs, Like we know that these guys are lifers
[14:51] Speaker 2: at their job. When they're done, when they say they're done,
[14:54] Speaker 2: that's when they're done, right. But there's other teams that
[14:58] Speaker 2: are also I would say the assurance of continuity. When
[15:01] Speaker 2: we saw what the Broncos did, when the Broncos tried
[15:04] Speaker 2: to go all in with George Payton and go all
[15:07] Speaker 2: in for what whispers were at the time not necessarily
[15:10] Speaker 2: the player they wanted to go all in for. The
[15:13] Speaker 2: whispers at the time were the preference of matching Aaron
[15:17] Speaker 2: Rodgers with their first year head coach Nathaniel Hackett. But
[15:21] Speaker 2: taking a swing that big with the assurance of continuity,
[15:23] Speaker 2: at least in the front office. On the other side,
[15:25] Speaker 2: you could try this thing. If it fails, and in
[15:28] Speaker 2: this case it failed disastrously, if it fails, then you
[15:32] Speaker 2: still if you have a plan on the other side,
[15:35] Speaker 2: you still have that assurance of continuity. The Panther is
[15:37] Speaker 2: getting more aggressive, especially this offseason. They were very aggressive
[15:40] Speaker 2: in free agency again to reset a lot of that
[15:42] Speaker 2: core and lift the floor of their roster doing so
[15:45] Speaker 2: via cash spending and in free agency spending. Now you're
[15:49] Speaker 2: seeing a little bit more of them maybe willing to
[15:51] Speaker 2: dip their toe in the trade waters. You're seeing them
[15:53] Speaker 2: be a little bit more aggressive at those elite premium
[15:56] Speaker 2: positions as well with the assurance of front office continuity,
[16:00] Speaker 2: and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers certainly are a team that
[16:04] Speaker 2: reflects that as well, And so I feel like that
[16:07] Speaker 2: is the biggest thing. You talk to any front office
[16:10] Speaker 2: person in the league and they'll tell you that that
[16:13] Speaker 2: is the most the biggest edge or the biggest weapon
[16:16] Speaker 2: that a team can have, whether it's along the coaching staff,
[16:18] Speaker 2: if it's an above average staff, or specifically in the
[16:22] Speaker 2: front office, is continuity because you're basically running game theory
[16:26] Speaker 2: against your own stuff all the time. You have your
[16:31] Speaker 2: own internalized set of data points, you have your own analysis,
[16:36] Speaker 2: you have like your own examples of it working or
[16:39] Speaker 2: not working within your own building. And there's also a
[16:43] Speaker 2: sense of, you know, some people in the league say
[16:46] Speaker 2: this all the time. There are teams that are just
[16:48] Speaker 2: afraid or they are making decisions that are fear based,
[16:51] Speaker 2: fear of losing their job, making decisions to not get fired,
[16:55] Speaker 2: or there are teams that are making decisions to try
[16:58] Speaker 2: to win Super Bowls and more and more, especially as
[17:01] Speaker 2: the cap continues to go up, especially as teams work
[17:06] Speaker 2: in these like like I really want to get to
[17:08] Speaker 2: the shorter windows of time that it takes to build
[17:11] Speaker 2: and then push with their team and their roster. Like
[17:16] Speaker 2: you're seeing the urgency increase among some teams, and you're
[17:21] Speaker 2: going to start to see the gap I think between
[17:22] Speaker 2: the we try this or we don't try this get
[17:25] Speaker 2: even wider than before.
[17:27] Speaker 3: Well and then like you can make a mistake.
[17:29] Speaker 1: I think a lot of the biggest gap hits in
[17:32] Speaker 1: recent NFL history are on quarterbacks, which is just you know,
[17:36] Speaker 1: part of the issue of doing of like it's just
[17:40] Speaker 1: part of the cost of doing business. It's it's Jared Goff,
[17:42] Speaker 1: which obviously worked out for the Rams, when when they're
[17:45] Speaker 1: trading him away for Stafford, it's to a tongue of bailoo,
[17:48] Speaker 1: which is completely disastrous.
[17:49] Speaker 3: It's Matt Ryan at the end of his career.
[17:52] Speaker 1: But then it's also Drew Brees, you know, and the
[17:55] Speaker 1: Saints would do that all over again. They were always
[17:57] Speaker 1: just pushing it into the future. It's a it's Aaron
[18:00] Speaker 1: Rogers with Green Bay, but you had the plan anyways
[18:03] Speaker 1: where you have a cheap quarterback so you can kind
[18:05] Speaker 1: of eat all the financial pain. That the problem is
[18:08] Speaker 1: when it happens with one of those middle tier guys
[18:11] Speaker 1: like a Derek Carr in Las Vegas or with a
[18:14] Speaker 1: to a Tungueai Loa you mentioned guys. You know, teams
[18:17] Speaker 1: potentially on shorter windows, and you think about the Dexter
[18:21] Speaker 1: Lawrence trade for instance, that felt out of character for
[18:25] Speaker 1: what the Bengals would normally do. But they're a different
[18:28] Speaker 1: They're in a different sort of part of their build
[18:31] Speaker 1: right now. Yeah.
[18:32] Speaker 2: I think that's another symptom of that leads to trades
[18:35] Speaker 2: like this. Is like I always think that it's there's
[18:39] Speaker 2: not really a neutral zone when it comes to the
[18:41] Speaker 2: teams that do this and don't. You're either you do
[18:44] Speaker 2: this because you're used to doing it and you understand
[18:46] Speaker 2: how to do it, and that's the way you want
[18:47] Speaker 2: to live. It's sort of a high wire walk that
[18:49] Speaker 2: you've chosen to walk as an organization, or you do
[18:53] Speaker 2: it because there's a real sense of desperation to maximize
[18:58] Speaker 2: either a rookie quarterback or a star quarterback in this case,
[19:02] Speaker 2: Joe Burrow's contract and prime window, a real sense of
[19:07] Speaker 2: urgency among the front office and probably the coaching staff
[19:10] Speaker 2: heading into a contract year. As Zach Taylor is, you
[19:15] Speaker 2: can act out of character when you have that sense
[19:19] Speaker 2: of urgency. To me, I don't think that is necessarily
[19:22] Speaker 2: quote unquote assurance of continuity like we just talked about
[19:25] Speaker 2: with those those Broncos of a few years ago. To me,
[19:29] Speaker 2: this is more of that other side of the coin,
[19:31] Speaker 2: which is get more aggressive, very very quickly, and act
[19:35] Speaker 2: out of character to make what I thought was a
[19:37] Speaker 2: very smart trade, but to act completely out of character
[19:40] Speaker 2: because of those factors that are are a little bit
[19:44] Speaker 2: unique to you, which is that quarterback and that a
[19:49] Speaker 2: little bit of a void on the other side that
[19:51] Speaker 2: you're not quite certain what's going to happen.
[19:53] Speaker 1: Right, Duke Toven's been there a long time, Zach Taylor's
[19:56] Speaker 1: been there a long time. It felt like to me
[19:58] Speaker 1: a little similar to what the Falcons did last year
[20:01] Speaker 1: when they traded away their first round pick to draft
[20:04] Speaker 1: James Pierce. That is such a strange build because they
[20:08] Speaker 1: were taking over Terry Foutineau the old regime, and they
[20:14] Speaker 1: were given a relative like a medium time frame. But
[20:17] Speaker 1: the first couple of years was just getting out from
[20:19] Speaker 1: under the Matt Ryan mess. But then they went into
[20:22] Speaker 1: last year essentially promising ownership like we think we can
[20:26] Speaker 1: contend right now, and they start to make maybe out
[20:30] Speaker 1: of character trades for James Pierce only one year after
[20:34] Speaker 1: making a trade for Michael Pennix. That you're making a
[20:36] Speaker 1: pick in Michael Penix that was very much thinking about,
[20:39] Speaker 1: like long term, it's not consistent philosophy. And then that's
[20:44] Speaker 1: how bad teams stay bad, because now you have a
[20:46] Speaker 1: new Falcons regime that essentially is pressing pause once again.
[20:51] Speaker 1: Even though the team that ended last season for Atlanta
[20:54] Speaker 1: you could kind of see the vision. They were decent,
[20:57] Speaker 1: and yet because ownership was sold one Billa goods and
[21:00] Speaker 1: they were pushing in theory and eight and nine wasn't
[21:03] Speaker 1: good enough, then you take a step back. So I
[21:07] Speaker 1: think it's how teams like the Eagles, Rams, you know,
[21:10] Speaker 1: for instance, stay ahead of the pack because they.
[21:13] Speaker 3: Have more continuity.
[21:14] Speaker 2: As you mentioned, well, owners owners have so much to
[21:17] Speaker 2: do with this too, like are they patient? Are they
[21:20] Speaker 2: not patient? And I think some of this too is
[21:24] Speaker 2: because they they have decided that if they're the ones
[21:29] Speaker 2: putting up all of the money or putting the money
[21:31] Speaker 2: into escrow for some of these contracts to assure that
[21:34] Speaker 2: they can pay them out, or the ones that are saying, okay,
[21:36] Speaker 2: we're willing to take on this dead money. Perhaps in
[21:39] Speaker 2: some cases that leads to a little bit more of
[21:42] Speaker 2: a of an influenc er A say, I think you
[21:45] Speaker 2: can say that with Arthur Blank and I think my
[21:47] Speaker 2: opinion it's a huge reason why Matt Ryan's in that
[21:49] Speaker 2: building right now is to say no, we're not doing
[21:52] Speaker 2: this to someone to say no, we can't do this,
[21:55] Speaker 2: or no, this doesn't make sense. I think when you
[21:58] Speaker 2: look at you know, jeff Luryjeffy Lewie is obviously very
[22:01] Speaker 2: involved in what in what the Eagles do, but you
[22:04] Speaker 2: don't necessarily other than very very rare cases, you don't
[22:08] Speaker 2: necessarily hear him ever overshadowing or overpowering Howie Roseman's voice
[22:13] Speaker 2: in that building. Stan Cronky is not even there, so
[22:17] Speaker 2: you know, it's like he basically says, you know, he
[22:21] Speaker 2: gets final approval on things. At that point, the case
[22:23] Speaker 2: has already been made. Among the power structure of Kevin
[22:27] Speaker 2: demof Tony pass doors, Lesneed and Sean McVay. That's it's
[22:30] Speaker 2: been that way for years. So I think some of
[22:33] Speaker 2: it's like it's on the other side. You see the Colts.
[22:37] Speaker 2: You know Carli ors Gordon heavily, heavily involved in the
[22:40] Speaker 2: acquisition of Sauce Gardner, wanting to be more aggressive in
[22:44] Speaker 2: that model, hand in hand with the fact that she
[22:47] Speaker 2: straight up said she wants to spend money like the
[22:49] Speaker 2: best teams in the NFL. This is a franchise that
[22:51] Speaker 2: maybe didn't necessarily do that in the past. So I
[22:54] Speaker 2: think there's all different kinds of ways of doing it,
[22:58] Speaker 2: But those particularly examples are I think show showcase a
[23:03] Speaker 2: range of owner involved. Maybe bad decisions are made in
[23:08] Speaker 2: light of that involvement. Owner involved, wants to spend more
[23:11] Speaker 2: money than previously, wants to be more aggressive previously. We'll
[23:14] Speaker 2: see how it goes. Owner involved, but doesn't overpower the
[23:18] Speaker 2: GM or brain trust. Owner basically not involved. Everyone else
[23:21] Speaker 2: is in charge. So those are kind of the range
[23:24] Speaker 2: of what you see in the NFL right now.
[23:27] Speaker 1: And when you mentioned ownership wanting to spend more money
[23:31] Speaker 1: and willing to spend more money, one thing I think
[23:34] Speaker 1: I could stand to understand even better. But I know
[23:38] Speaker 1: in my heart and I certainly talk about like, is
[23:41] Speaker 1: that the teams that are willing to just spend cash
[23:43] Speaker 1: year over year.
[23:44] Speaker 3: I mean, it is a huge advantage.
[23:46] Speaker 1: It is an extremely soft cap, like you can manipulate
[23:50] Speaker 1: this thing. And the owners, like the Browns, it hasn't
[23:54] Speaker 1: worked for them, Like the Eagles, it absolutely has worked
[23:58] Speaker 1: for them who are willing to just spend cash, like upfront,
[24:02] Speaker 1: cold hard cash that you can start spreading out into
[24:05] Speaker 1: all these void years in the future. It gives you
[24:08] Speaker 1: a real deal advantage against the teams that aren't willing
[24:13] Speaker 1: to do that, and that it has to do with
[24:15] Speaker 1: the salary cap, but it kind of doesn't because there
[24:19] Speaker 1: are teams that are like most teams are spending somewhat
[24:21] Speaker 1: close to the cap, like we're going to talk about
[24:23] Speaker 1: cap space in a second. But the teams that are
[24:26] Speaker 1: just willing to spend cash, it gives you not as
[24:29] Speaker 1: big a margin for error as you would get in baseball,
[24:32] Speaker 1: but it gives you a bigger margin for error than
[24:34] Speaker 1: other teams have.
[24:35] Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think we were just having this conversation
[24:38] Speaker 2: the other day, Greg. I think one of the things
[24:39] Speaker 2: that's really interesting about that is, if you don't necessarily
[24:44] Speaker 2: have that high of a cash flow, you have to
[24:47] Speaker 2: find other advantages elsewhere with which to win with. So
[24:51] Speaker 2: I would not say John Schniders made some great trades.
[24:54] Speaker 2: A lot of it's been, you know, getting rid of
[24:57] Speaker 2: players and bringing back in and roster turnover and continuing
[25:01] Speaker 2: to win despite roster turnover is a huge strength of
[25:04] Speaker 2: his and that front office. And I also think that
[25:07] Speaker 2: they draft and develop extremely well, especially in this new
[25:10] Speaker 2: Mike McDonald regime. So that's like one specific advantage that
[25:14] Speaker 2: I think the Seahawks, even though they don't necessarily I
[25:17] Speaker 2: would not call them the highest cash flow team, like,
[25:20] Speaker 2: they do this very very well because they maximize those
[25:24] Speaker 2: particular edges and they have continuity. So that's at the
[25:27] Speaker 2: third major edge less sneed Sean McVay. Sean McVay is
[25:31] Speaker 2: one of the better advantages for a team to have
[25:34] Speaker 2: in the NFL. And also they read the picks for players'
[25:38] Speaker 2: markets very very well in correlation to their roster build.
[25:41] Speaker 2: So those advantages and that willingness to take risks, and
[25:45] Speaker 2: also you know, less Sneed not fearing for his job
[25:49] Speaker 2: essentially is where you get some of these things So
[25:53] Speaker 2: it's like, what I like about the Eagles is that
[25:55] Speaker 2: they have exorbitant amounts of cash flow and they still
[25:59] Speaker 2: go out and take risk, and they still have continuity,
[26:00] Speaker 2: and they still try to get their hands in the
[26:03] Speaker 2: mix on every single trade. So I think that those
[26:06] Speaker 2: teams are good examples of like, if you don't necessarily
[26:09] Speaker 2: have that ultimate huge advantage of that cash spending ability,
[26:13] Speaker 2: then yeah you can. Also you have to find other
[26:16] Speaker 2: ways to other levers to pull that gives you a
[26:19] Speaker 2: better jump over the rest of the NFL.
[26:22] Speaker 1: Yeah, it is funny with the Rams because in some
[26:24] Speaker 1: ways they do not act like a big market team.
[26:28] Speaker 1: You know, they they act like they're in LA. You're
[26:32] Speaker 1: thinking they're doing everything possible. They are doing everything possible
[26:35] Speaker 1: to try to win, but they are not necessarily spending
[26:38] Speaker 1: as much cash as the other team's out there, and
[26:40] Speaker 1: the Seahawks it's next level. I mean, I know they've
[26:43] Speaker 1: had their looking for a change in ownership and that
[26:47] Speaker 1: is informing some of this. But when I went through
[26:50] Speaker 1: the dead cap situation that I said, you know, over
[26:53] Speaker 1: two thirds of the league are spending more than twenty
[26:55] Speaker 1: million dollars in diad cap, Like there's five or six
[26:57] Speaker 1: teams that are over seventy million. The Seahawks are spending
[27:02] Speaker 1: less than a million. There's no one else even close
[27:04] Speaker 1: to their ballpark, like everyone else is over like fight,
[27:08] Speaker 1: like they don't have any dead cap. Like it's just
[27:11] Speaker 1: it's like not something that they would do. That was
[27:14] Speaker 1: It was true of the Bengals for a while too,
[27:16] Speaker 1: but even the Bengals are getting a little more monitored.
[27:19] Speaker 1: So we've gone over you know, some of the reasons,
[27:20] Speaker 1: it's it's harder to get players in free agency, and
[27:26] Speaker 1: I think the Eagles ramp like some of these teams
[27:28] Speaker 1: have shown a model. It has to do with like
[27:30] Speaker 1: you can make mistakes now when it comes to the
[27:32] Speaker 1: dead cap. But ultimately, I think the biggest reason is
[27:35] Speaker 1: is that the cap is just easy now. It's just
[27:38] Speaker 1: used to be such a thing. It's just not a
[27:41] Speaker 1: thing compared to other compared to the NBA specifically, which
[27:45] Speaker 1: I feel like I have a better handle on. There
[27:47] Speaker 1: are fourteen teams now, Jordan, and we're in June, when
[27:50] Speaker 1: you don't really need cap stace. Of course, you're going
[27:52] Speaker 1: to use it to sign.
[27:54] Speaker 2: Players over three years. You have to use a certain
[27:57] Speaker 2: amount of it.
[27:58] Speaker 1: Yeah, and you also have to you know, it's good
[28:02] Speaker 1: to have some at this time of year to spend
[28:04] Speaker 1: on long term contracts, but that doesn't necessarily help your
[28:07] Speaker 1: cap space because you can spread it out. You have
[28:09] Speaker 1: to sign your rookies, although most of them are already
[28:11] Speaker 1: sign and yet almost half the league has over twenty
[28:14] Speaker 1: million dollars in cap space. Almost a quarter of the
[28:17] Speaker 1: league has over thirty million dollars in cap space. And
[28:23] Speaker 1: it just makes me think, like teams are smarter about this.
[28:26] Speaker 1: The money just keeps rising. The streaming money like helps
[28:31] Speaker 1: a lot. And it takes me back to the arrested
[28:34] Speaker 1: development phrase, like there's just always more money in the
[28:37] Speaker 1: bananas stand, Like teams can always find more salary cap
[28:41] Speaker 1: money in the banana stand.
[28:43] Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think contract structure is changing very slightly too,
[28:46] Speaker 2: at least among you know, the middle I would say
[28:48] Speaker 2: mostly the middle tier of players, because I think when
[28:51] Speaker 2: you're seeing, oh, you're seeing a huge increase. I wrote
[28:54] Speaker 2: about this this spring coming out of league meetings because
[28:56] Speaker 2: some people were talking about it. There's an increase in
[28:59] Speaker 2: these three year contracts, which on paper look very player
[29:03] Speaker 2: friendly because especially a player going into his second contract,
[29:06] Speaker 2: so out the second one, so after his rookie contract,
[29:10] Speaker 2: it's it's like they can maximize that window and then
[29:15] Speaker 2: also have another choice to make. They're not locked into
[29:19] Speaker 2: one thing for five years as it used to be.
[29:22] Speaker 2: But what's being unsaid or maybe not talked about as much,
[29:27] Speaker 2: is how friendly that is for the team too, because,
[29:30] Speaker 2: like I said, if you draft well in one class
[29:33] Speaker 2: and then you sign complimentary free agents and you don't
[29:37] Speaker 2: worry as much about dead money, and you do have,
[29:39] Speaker 2: you know, certain advantages, especially if you've gotten out and
[29:42] Speaker 2: traded for premier players or you've drafted to develop premier
[29:45] Speaker 2: players at key positions, you can turn a roster over
[29:48] Speaker 2: and around in two years, maybe even less, depending on
[29:52] Speaker 2: if you get really lucky, right. And I think that
[29:56] Speaker 2: that plays really well into how financial these teams are,
[30:00] Speaker 2: looking at how fast the money is flowing in and
[30:03] Speaker 2: out of their buildings, and how fast they and how
[30:06] Speaker 2: clearly they're willing to allocate a lot of that spending,
[30:09] Speaker 2: especially on the middle positions. We're also seeing a time
[30:12] Speaker 2: where some of the key contributions from certain positions are
[30:17] Speaker 2: still not being paid, as the elite, premium or premier
[30:22] Speaker 2: players are so like tight ends, everybody's using more tight ends,
[30:26] Speaker 2: they're still not being paid anywhere close to that of
[30:28] Speaker 2: a volume even like a volume two receiver. There's very
[30:31] Speaker 2: few tight ends that are being paid the same way
[30:35] Speaker 2: that you know, even a B or a C receiver
[30:38] Speaker 2: on a really you know, high volume passing team is
[30:42] Speaker 2: being paid running backs. Obviously we've talked about this at nauseum.
[30:45] Speaker 2: And then teams are also willing to not maybe invest
[30:48] Speaker 2: as much in the costs of their defense. A lot
[30:51] Speaker 2: of teams, especially if they have a quarterback and a
[30:54] Speaker 2: high volume passing game and like a medium to above
[30:57] Speaker 2: average run game on the other side. So I think
[31:00] Speaker 2: that in combination with if the bulk of your contracts
[31:04] Speaker 2: in like the middle cluster of your Excel spreadsheet that
[31:08] Speaker 2: shows you about how you're allocating finances, that's all set
[31:13] Speaker 2: in a certain window, then you can get really fluid
[31:16] Speaker 2: and flexible with the money that you spend on either
[31:18] Speaker 2: side of those three year deals. And I think it's
[31:21] Speaker 2: good for the players for sure, but teams are not
[31:24] Speaker 2: talking as much about how it's also creates more cat
[31:26] Speaker 2: flexibility for them, and it also creates more flexibility, like
[31:30] Speaker 2: with their picks if they know that certain players are
[31:32] Speaker 2: out of their building an x amount of time. Then
[31:35] Speaker 2: they can start drafting right out from under them quickly,
[31:38] Speaker 2: or they can use those picks to go after other
[31:41] Speaker 2: players maybe the same position. So I think I think
[31:44] Speaker 2: it all is very the puzzle. The puzzle is getting
[31:47] Speaker 2: more truncated, and yet the money around the puzzle is
[31:49] Speaker 2: getting a lot larger. If that makes sense.
[31:52] Speaker 1: It does, And I just think it's just easier than
[31:56] Speaker 1: ever on some level to keep your best play that.
[32:01] Speaker 2: Sign them, really sign them at three years. That's what
[32:03] Speaker 2: I'm saying. It's part of the three year contract. Thing
[32:05] Speaker 2: two is signing them early.
[32:07] Speaker 1: Like Darnel Washington and Christian Watson. Those two contracts to
[32:11] Speaker 1: me were incredible values. Those actually were longer ones where
[32:15] Speaker 1: I you know, and you're seeing this with quarterbacks too,
[32:18] Speaker 1: and in some of the bigger players where Okay, you
[32:21] Speaker 1: have them under control for four years, if it's a
[32:23] Speaker 1: three year extension on your rookie deal, and two years
[32:26] Speaker 1: into it, like we just saw with certain and Nico Collins,
[32:28] Speaker 1: you can give them a raise, you can adjust it
[32:30] Speaker 1: or whatever, but you're always controlling that player's career essentially financially,
[32:36] Speaker 1: and you don't need to be a super duper star.
[32:38] Speaker 1: It can be a Darnell Washington type who we love
[32:41] Speaker 1: and is incredible, but with all this cap space, and
[32:45] Speaker 1: I think just the way that the front offices are smarter,
[32:47] Speaker 1: I just think it's truer than ever that there are
[32:50] Speaker 1: exceptions to every rule.
[32:52] Speaker 3: But my rule is like, young.
[32:55] Speaker 1: Players don't really ever get to the market unless the
[32:59] Speaker 1: team doesn't really want them. Like, of course there's exceptions,
[33:03] Speaker 1: or teams just don't allow players that they truly want
[33:06] Speaker 1: to keep ever to leave. And that gets back to
[33:10] Speaker 1: where we started, was like, well, then how do we
[33:12] Speaker 1: get freaking good players? There's really only two good ways
[33:15] Speaker 1: to do it, Like, you can get some value in
[33:17] Speaker 1: free agency, but it's it's trades and it's drafting.
[33:20] Speaker 2: What plays into the hands of teams that do think
[33:22] Speaker 2: like that is a there's still a lot of unknown
[33:26] Speaker 2: ripple effects from what the COVID college seasons did. We're,
[33:31] Speaker 2: you know, we're what six years basically six drafts past
[33:36] Speaker 2: that initial one, but the after effects are really truly
[33:41] Speaker 2: being studied by I talk to teams who are studying
[33:44] Speaker 2: what this means not just for player output physically, but
[33:49] Speaker 2: also you know, longevity, mental health, those types of things.
[33:55] Speaker 2: And then also that was like an elastic band where
[33:59] Speaker 2: there's so much on and it was stretching and stretching,
[34:01] Speaker 2: people trying to figure out, Okay, what's on the other
[34:03] Speaker 2: side of this, what's on the other side of this,
[34:04] Speaker 2: what's on the other side of this. And then all
[34:06] Speaker 2: of a sudden, right when teams were maybe starting to
[34:08] Speaker 2: get a handle on it, and like picks, there was
[34:10] Speaker 2: a surge of picks for players trades. And then there's
[34:14] Speaker 2: still picks for players trades, but it's not a lot
[34:16] Speaker 2: of the middle guys like you mentioned at the very
[34:18] Speaker 2: top of the show when you were reading off of
[34:19] Speaker 2: that chart, a lot of like sort of middle guys
[34:21] Speaker 2: or backup quarterbacks or spot starter quarterbacks. And then and
[34:25] Speaker 2: then like they're starting to get an answer, starting to
[34:27] Speaker 2: get an answer, and then all of a sudden, boom,
[34:29] Speaker 2: here comes nil and players are staying in school for longer.
[34:33] Speaker 2: And so draft picks there are very specific picks that, yes,
[34:37] Speaker 2: will always be valuable, Top ten picks will always be valuable,
[34:40] Speaker 2: like all of that. Like, don't get me wrong, but
[34:42] Speaker 2: I do think among some teams there is a decrease
[34:46] Speaker 2: in valuation of middle to late first round picks that's
[34:49] Speaker 2: way more prevalent than it was when just a select
[34:52] Speaker 2: few were thinking about it that way. You know, seven
[34:56] Speaker 2: years ago. Now I think a lot more teams and
[34:58] Speaker 2: maybe a rise in maybe younger gms, younger younger evaluators,
[35:04] Speaker 2: younger coaches. The next era not trying to be ages,
[35:08] Speaker 2: but like the next era of what the NFL will
[35:10] Speaker 2: be built upon. Here are thinking a lot more along
[35:14] Speaker 2: those lines and how they can maximize maybe an inefficient market. Now,
[35:20] Speaker 2: the irony of that is if too many of them
[35:22] Speaker 2: do this at once, then it becomes then that becomes
[35:24] Speaker 2: an inefficient market, and then the cycle continues, over and
[35:26] Speaker 2: over again.
[35:27] Speaker 3: The story of football.
[35:28] Speaker 1: But I think the Jared Verse trade and the compensation
[35:31] Speaker 1: really spelled it out because I started to think, like, well,
[35:33] Speaker 1: what's Jared Verse entering year three worth like in this
[35:37] Speaker 1: year's draft or in next year's draft, in future drafts?
[35:40] Speaker 1: I said, definitely a one plus, whether that's a one
[35:44] Speaker 1: and a two, a one in the three, Like if
[35:46] Speaker 1: you just even had done it before this draft, would
[35:48] Speaker 1: I rather have a bird in the hand in Jared
[35:50] Speaker 1: Verse cost controlled going into year three, you know you're
[35:54] Speaker 1: going to have to give him more money, but you
[35:56] Speaker 1: also know you have Jared Verse versus let's say the
[35:59] Speaker 1: tenth pick in this specific draft. I think different teams
[36:04] Speaker 1: would answer that question differently, but let's call them like
[36:07] Speaker 1: the tenth best addresser in the league. Like I'd rather
[36:09] Speaker 1: have the bird in the hand. As great as that
[36:11] Speaker 1: contract flexibility is and how much value you get and
[36:15] Speaker 1: save by having a rookie contract, it's harder to find
[36:18] Speaker 1: good players than it is to get under the cap.
[36:22] Speaker 3: It's freaking easy.
[36:23] Speaker 1: Like the easiest thing ever is resetting and getting under
[36:26] Speaker 1: the cap and being financially reasonable.
[36:29] Speaker 3: Like everyone can do that. If you can't do that,
[36:31] Speaker 3: you shouldn't be in I could not.
[36:33] Speaker 2: I could not do that. Well, it's taken me ten
[36:36] Speaker 2: years to understand the cap, and I it's it's still
[36:40] Speaker 2: it's a good point.
[36:41] Speaker 3: It's a good point. Maybe I couldn't do that.
[36:43] Speaker 1: I mean, Mickey Loomis can do that for a long time,
[36:45] Speaker 1: although they were doing all sorts of different things, and
[36:47] Speaker 1: I don't hate them for approaching you know, the whole
[36:51] Speaker 1: strategy differently, but you know what I mean, In today's NFL,
[36:53] Speaker 1: you can find a front office that can do that,
[36:55] Speaker 1: and so yeah, finding good players, it's tougher I think
[36:59] Speaker 1: than find in cap space.
[37:00] Speaker 2: Right now, do you now, I'm going to put you
[37:02] Speaker 2: on the spot. Do you have like all of these
[37:04] Speaker 2: I think are exactly the reasons and sound very sound
[37:07] Speaker 2: logic and well stated, Greg, But do you have like
[37:10] Speaker 2: a galaxy brain reason why more trades are happening? Like
[37:14] Speaker 2: do you have a take that could get blurbed that
[37:17] Speaker 2: would get you you know?
[37:18] Speaker 3: Oh?
[37:19] Speaker 2: Like like do you have a sort of a pie
[37:22] Speaker 2: in the sky conspiracy about it?
[37:25] Speaker 1: You know, these kids growing up playing mad and it's
[37:29] Speaker 1: these kids playing up playing fantasy football. Now we're not
[37:32] Speaker 1: quite We're not quite there yet. I do think it
[37:34] Speaker 1: asked a little bit to do it generationally. I think
[37:39] Speaker 1: the younger we get, the more annalytic less this old
[37:45] Speaker 1: school football we maybe get, and the willingness to take
[37:48] Speaker 1: on risk, like your risk profile, I think there. I
[37:50] Speaker 1: don't even know if that's galaxy brain thinking, but I
[37:53] Speaker 1: do think that's a factor.
[37:54] Speaker 2: Yeah, I think too. Players these generations of players feel
[38:02] Speaker 2: like they can speak up a little bit more. I
[38:04] Speaker 2: think we're seeing we see that more often. If players
[38:07] Speaker 2: are unhappy, they a lot of times, especially if they're
[38:09] Speaker 2: a star player, they can talk about it. Or they
[38:12] Speaker 2: feel like the collective understands the sport and the structure
[38:16] Speaker 2: of the sport enough to understand why they might be unhappy.
[38:20] Speaker 2: We're a long way away from the absolute like earthquake
[38:25] Speaker 2: shot of you know, the Eli Manning situation. I think
[38:28] Speaker 2: there would be if that happened today, there would be
[38:29] Speaker 2: a lot more people who actually could understand that and
[38:33] Speaker 2: understand could understand why something like that was manipulated the
[38:37] Speaker 2: way that it was. And I also think this is
[38:41] Speaker 2: this is so Galaxy brain. But teams want more attention.
[38:47] Speaker 2: There are teams that want more attention. There are teams
[38:49] Speaker 2: that want to dominate news cycles. There are teams that
[38:51] Speaker 2: want the primetime games. There are teams that want to
[38:55] Speaker 2: If you look at a team like the Rams, for example, like,
[38:58] Speaker 2: I don't think it's a far I don't think it's
[39:00] Speaker 2: a reach to say there's a certain legacy of the
[39:03] Speaker 2: type of rosters on these sports that are built in
[39:05] Speaker 2: this city, and you you will lose the grip that
[39:09] Speaker 2: you are building in this in this culture and in
[39:13] Speaker 2: this town or in the city. That is so Dodger's focus,
[39:17] Speaker 2: that is so Lakers focus, that is so King's focus.
[39:22] Speaker 2: That's it for Eric Roberts, our producer Big Kingsman two
[39:27] Speaker 2: to say, like, okay, we we are right pace for
[39:31] Speaker 2: pace there with you, and you will look at us
[39:34] Speaker 2: because you can't not. So I think that that's that's
[39:37] Speaker 2: a that's a very galaxy brain. But to me, it's
[39:39] Speaker 2: like there are some markets where, like Philly, Philly builds
[39:44] Speaker 2: its team the way that you would want Philly to
[39:47] Speaker 2: build its team. They are a monolithic, destructive entity that
[39:53] Speaker 2: openly is openly emotional with each other quite a lot.
[39:57] Speaker 2: It's entertainment, it's something the fan based loves to talk about,
[40:01] Speaker 2: but they will kick your ass and like that. They're
[40:04] Speaker 2: just and and I think when teams reflect their market
[40:08] Speaker 2: and you understand that Seahawks do the same thing. When
[40:13] Speaker 2: teams reflect their market or what the ethos of the
[40:16] Speaker 2: market is, I think that also empowers you to maybe
[40:20] Speaker 2: build in different ways or build an attune to what
[40:23] Speaker 2: that is.
[40:24] Speaker 1: Yeahs, as we wrap up, I think those are all
[40:27] Speaker 1: really good points in the Like the player empowerment like that,
[40:31] Speaker 1: that's not just in the NFL. But players know their value.
[40:34] Speaker 1: You're not going to accept less than their value. They
[40:37] Speaker 1: have more control than they did in the past. So
[40:39] Speaker 1: using the Michael Parsons example. Cowboys run things a very
[40:43] Speaker 1: old school way, and I think personalities got involved there
[40:47] Speaker 1: of why that happened in the first place. But then
[40:51] Speaker 1: you get a team in the in the Packers, that's
[40:53] Speaker 1: willing to kind of deviate from their normal model and
[40:55] Speaker 1: have the flexibility to do so because of where they're at,
[40:59] Speaker 1: but also just because of all the caps bus space
[41:01] Speaker 1: we just talked about. So they make that trade, trading
[41:03] Speaker 1: Michael Parsons away, and what have what have the Cowboys done,
[41:07] Speaker 1: Like since they they traded for Quinn Williams, Uh, you
[41:11] Speaker 1: got you know, you got the Rashaun Gary situation. They
[41:14] Speaker 1: traded for George Pickens at one point. I know that's
[41:16] Speaker 1: unrelated to Michael Parsons, but what I mean is like
[41:19] Speaker 1: they're just free wheeling and dealing on the fly, and
[41:22] Speaker 1: they're not like that forward thinking in terms of how
[41:25] Speaker 1: they handle their cap space. And yet there's enough flexibility
[41:28] Speaker 1: in the league where they're making all these big time
[41:31] Speaker 1: deals with players just going in and going out.
[41:34] Speaker 2: Well, I would say, look at how Detroit turned the
[41:38] Speaker 2: Matthew Stafford trade, including bringing in Jared Goff, turned it
[41:43] Speaker 2: into an absolute foundation point for a complete narrative change
[41:47] Speaker 2: for their entire franchise and roster and had picks and
[41:52] Speaker 2: picks and picks right, And you could argue, you know,
[41:56] Speaker 2: they they picked the guys they want. You could argue
[41:58] Speaker 2: process those types of things. But it's not just teams
[42:01] Speaker 2: that are willing to acquire players. It's also teams, we
[42:04] Speaker 2: should say, that are willing to shed players or willing
[42:07] Speaker 2: to trade players for future assets. But unlike what the
[42:11] Speaker 2: Browns just did, which we have no proof that they're
[42:13] Speaker 2: going to turn that into something productive. You have to
[42:16] Speaker 2: turn it into something if you're going to be a
[42:18] Speaker 2: team that will aggressively shed quote unquote assets or shed
[42:23] Speaker 2: players for and recoup some sort of resource in return,
[42:27] Speaker 2: like you got to turn it into something. That's a
[42:29] Speaker 2: part of this. That's the other that's the other side
[42:31] Speaker 2: of this high wire walk where you know, you can't
[42:35] Speaker 2: just say, oh, we did the the analytically sound thing,
[42:38] Speaker 2: look at all of our fun picks. No, you've got
[42:40] Speaker 2: to go do something with them at this point. So
[42:43] Speaker 2: that's that's the other side of it, is the shedding
[42:46] Speaker 2: teams quote unquote that sometimes you see it work in
[42:50] Speaker 2: a big way. In Detroit is an example of that
[42:53] Speaker 2: and sometimes you have no proof that it does or will.
[42:56] Speaker 1: Yeah, the Browns are doing it for like a second time.
[42:59] Speaker 1: They have so much dead money. The Dolts time in
[43:03] Speaker 1: the middle of it. The Jets are kind of in
[43:05] Speaker 1: the middle of it right now. I think we did it.
[43:09] Speaker 1: I think we explained it all, Jordan. I think we came.
[43:11] Speaker 1: We got to the bottom of why are there more trades?
[43:14] Speaker 2: Now? Yeah, what's the other arrested development? Well, it never
[43:19] Speaker 2: worked for any of those people, but maybe.
[43:23] Speaker 3: Maybe it will. I love that this is the NFL now.
[43:26] Speaker 1: I love that we could take an afternoon in the
[43:30] Speaker 1: off season to try to explain or at least come
[43:34] Speaker 1: up with our reasons, bounce off each other why they
[43:37] Speaker 1: are more NFL trades. That's going to be it for
[43:40] Speaker 1: today's NFL Daily. You wore the Dodgers hat. Well, we're
[43:45] Speaker 1: going to be back on Wednesday. It's mini camp week.
[43:48] Speaker 1: Most of the league are in mandatory mini camps right now,
[43:51] Speaker 1: So the next time we talked to you, it'll be myself,
[43:54] Speaker 1: it'll be Patrick Claybah and we're gonna have takeaways from
[43:57] Speaker 1: all those mini camps. Maybe they'll even be a trade.
[44:00] Speaker 1: In the meantime, i'll see you then, mhm.

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