Hey guys, welcome in to the Cinkey Truth podcast, more alert alongside Mike Evans. Mike, how are you doing, buddy? How's it going? I'm good, I'm good.
It was an action-packed week with the owners' meetings. A lot of good stuff coming out of it to react to. And you know what I love about the owners' meetings? There's a little Lucy Gucci nature to, like, the coaches kind of let their guard down a little bit.
Maybe they've had a few pops the night before, right? They're a little bit loose. And I think you get a little bit of insight to who the guy is when he's not standing in front of a podium in front of the local or national media. Yeah, we got a chance to see.
Although it was still funny, not everybody drops their guard. You see Bill Belichick when he was getting ready. He doesn't even show up at these things, right? So he's sitting down.
He's just looking. I need a couple props here. Okay, okay. Give me your phone.
He's surly. He sits down, right? He's got his microphone in front of him, right? And, you know, so people reach over his shoulder, right?
You put their phones down and stuff like that. He's got to see this. He has this look of disdain on his face. And he's sitting there, and he's just looking at everything.
And he just goes like this. Pushes everything out of the way so he can put him around his face for himself. No disregard for people's equipment or what they're trying to do. It reminds me of the Adam Sandler movie with Jennifer Aniston that was, oh shoot, what was it?
I just had the title in my head. Just go with it or just go with it. You remember that movie at all? I know the movie you're talking about.
Right, yeah. So it is the, oh shoot, Dave Matthews. Dave Matthews is in the movie right now. Don't pour over me.
Don't pour over me. I'll bring my glasses to you, right? That was, that was Belichick. He was disgusting.
He is so surly. And I love it. He's just like, you know what else I love? Like what, you know, what kind of, what should we talk?
Like what kind of guarantees or why should we believe what you're doing about the last 25 years? Like boom, up yours. Love it. During your clockers on the table.
My man. Hey man, we got a special treat you guys here on the Stinky Tree Podcast. My good friend, former GM of the Atlanta Falcons for 13 years in the NFL for 30 years. Got some projects she's working on right now.
Thomas Demitrov is going to join the program. As a matter of fact, he's going to join the program right now. A long time GM with the Atlanta Falcons, doing a bunch of stuff now. And Mike, so Thomas tell me what exactly you're working on now because I know you had opportunities to get back in the NFL to get back into being a general manager.
But you're doing something completely different now. So tell me what it is you're doing and how this can affect the NFL. Yeah, first of all, thanks for having me. I'm out here in Atlanta still, by the way.
About a year ago, I joined a company with a long time Jones who wanted to create a football analytics company. So he and his son, Jack, and myself, we came into this business together. It's a roster optimization business. And as I've said to people before, and as I mentioned to you, every general manager understands that this is not an exact science.
And we all know that we can get better doing what we're doing as far as picking players, as far as acquisitions, as far as making sure that you are picking your optimal roster. But there's so much data that is housed within these organizations that quite honestly is underutilized. Honestly, and I'm going to be exaggerative criminally underutilized. I believe.
And this is from someone who's been around football a long, long time. And I consider some old school to me. But I also understand how important it is to take it to the next level. This league is going to be an evolving data league.
The more that you can jump on board as a football person and be able to work with the data that's out there, it's only going to make you that much better. We feel that we can revolutionize the NFL quite honestly, NCAA, eventually, mark by utilizing something like this that will help you pick better players and manage a roster better. OK, can you give me an example? Because there's some of that.
There's some of the analytics data that I always look at. Like, OK, that's bullshit. Like, hey, we got to run. We get a year per carry more to the left than we do to the right.
So let's run it to the left. The analytics guy said, and you got, hey, man, they got Aaron Donald over there. So you can pound saying we're not running over there. You know what I mean?
So tell me, give me an example of how data and analytics can help you pick a roster. Well, so I agree with you. Again, I came into this being really going home on it because, again, I've sat in the seat for as GM for 13 years, but in the NFL, as a scout for almost 30 years. And I realized we have to be more exact with our selection process.
So for instance, we have over probably 55 models within our algorithm. And what we would do is we literally would run the algorithm on, let's just say Atlanta Falcons. They would say, OK, what is our optimal roster? We might produce two or three optimal rosters for them.
Given all of our algorithm and all of our models could be age related. It could be finance related. It could be injury related, et cetera, et cetera. That is creating this.
There's probably a million to two million, not millions, but millions and millions of options that come out in front of a GM. Where, for perspective, when I used to go to Arthur Blank, I would say, I have 12 scenarios for you. And I was proud as a peacock. Man, I'm walking in there thinking, man, I got this figured out.
With a tool like this, it'll just give you myriad options that you would never be able to touch. Because there's just so much data out there with everything I was explaining to you. And what it ultimately will do, again, you could just say, for the Atlanta Falcons, give me the top five rosters that you suggest. And our company is called Sumer Sports.
And the product is called Marvel. And it would give us those five different opportunities to pick from that, whatever it's presenting us. And what's interesting, it also creates viability models for us. So when we're in the draft, we may say, OK, I'm at pick 20.
We were thinking about moving up to pick 10, we're back to pick 25. What's the viability of potentially getting that guy at 10? What's the viability of moving back five spots and getting the guy we need? Our algorithm will show what we believe is going to be the answer to that.
These are all elements that are going to be incredibly important for the growth of the league. The same thing with models that we're using right now with trade models, right? Everyone knows that they use the Jimmy Johnson trade chart, right? We feel that we have a really good setup with.
Miriam, probably five beyond that. Five different options to be picking from on the trade charts. Our own that we've developed as well. We'll run the algorithm as far as the potential of the trades and how the trades are going to come out.
And it will give the teams who are owning this data, the opportunity to decide on the trade they're going to make through what we're presenting through Sumer Sports. We just think it just provides vital information that is honestly overwhelming if you don't have something managing like this tool called Marvel for us. So Thomas and Stink hates analytics. He's kicking and screaming into the next generation here.
OK, but it is the way it's going. And I'm curious, because it's fascinating what you talk about. What about when it comes to quarterbacks? Because we see a lot of quarterbacks get drafted very high.
And to be kind, it's not a very high success rate. How do you think quarterbacks have been evaluated? Are they being misevaluated? And is this perhaps a way that will evaluate these quarterbacks coming out of college so that there isn't such a big failure rate with these guys?
There are a lot of mistakes with quarterbacks. There's no question about that. And I'm a big believer. And I want to go back to this.
I am not just flipping on the data bandwagon. I just believe the best way for us to continue to be football people is to tap into the intelligentsia out there. There's a lot of really intelligent people that can provide the next two, three, and four waves to something that I feel marked guys that I've been doing for 30 years. There has to be a better way.
The better way is utilizing it, augmenting, right? Make sure that you guys understand it. It's not the answer. It's not black box.
It is augmenting. It is giving a guy like George Payton the opportunity to look at all the data that's out there and sift through the data so that he doesn't have to sift through it with his three, four, five data people downstairs. This is much more advanced than that. So back to the quarterback question.
Yeah, a lot of mistakes are made. We believe that it will help, of course. Nothing is exact. Too many people out there in too many teams.
And you both would know this, having known football as you do. We make our mistakes because of excess need. I mean, look, I raised my hands and I think about the excess need moves we made in Atlanta. We needed DMs.
Dan Quinn and I thought made a great partnership. We went in there going after a guy, a defensive man thinking that he was going to be the end all be all like quarterbacks, by the way. It's another position that people make way too many mistakes because they are just pressing what they need. People are pressing on quarterbacks because there aren't that many out there that we think can take over.
We've seen guys will look what San Francisco's doing. Think in the end, this is something that's going to help us sift through. It's not going to be perfect. But as you guys both know, analytics, and this is tough for some of us, you hear analytics and you think it's got to be 99% real.
It could be 10% quite honestly, you know, and is 10% in your mind better than no percent, right? So that's what I think teams are going to have to be working through on this as they start to potentially embrace more of the data that's available. Okay, so as we talk about quarterbacks, let's go to the Lamar conversation because, you know, I heard people talking about well, Lamar has been injured last two years, but it's been in the pocket. And my argument to them is you have to understand leverage.
When a team has leverage, it doesn't matter that you got injured in the pocket. The point is you've been injured and we have some leverage now and we can say, hey, listen, you've missed, you know, you've missed what five games the last two seasons combined, 34% of the snaps, you've missed them. And it doesn't matter that it was in the pocket or that it was you running around. The point is that you missed time.
So we have some leverage now. And I look at the situation with Lamar and I think to myself, listen, as dynamic as an athlete as he is, a lot of his success is based on his ability to run, his ability to move around, his ability to stress a defense. And you having to at some point say, we got to pay eight, nine guys in the ball. We either got to go zero or one and we got to play man to man and we've got to shut this down.
So it opens up those passing lanes. So my question to you is, why do you think there's a limited market for him being that he is a free agent, but you'd have to give up two first round of draft choices and make that big contract? Like, what is the Lamar situation in your mind and why has he not either signed with Baltimore or why has not another team stepped up to grab him? I mean, those are great questions.
And I think it varies from team to team. I was on a pod recently talking about why I thought it landed him. I mean, they seem like an ideal team to jump in into this market. And without getting into a ton of detail there, I mean, their situation is, do they really want to pass up to fix?
They're trying to build back up from when Dan and I left there, right? They continue to build, coming off of salary cap situations, et cetera, et cetera. And do they really want to invest that much money? That is a big investment.
And the guarantees, of course, I don't even look at it as collusion as much as it is a pain in their ass to be dealing with something like that, right? So meaning, a lot of people out there say, well, why, though, this guy is such a good quarterback. Yes, he's a very good quarterback. But the teams are also going to have to adjust their system.
You guys know that. I mean, you're not coming in running the exact same system. So that is something that would be on teams minds as well. Look, I personally think you have a guy who does not have an agent.
This is a whole other issue that a lot of people that aren't in the office and aren't general managers say, well, that's nothing just deal with his mother, respectfully speaking. This is nothing against his mother or family. The reality is it becomes complicated. Not only to do this deal right now, but there's going to be a return to the return to the issue in the next two or three years.
And you're going to have to deal with this again. That's not a comfortable spot to be in as a general manager in my mind. That's my take on it. Yeah, it's good stuff.
Hey, let me ask you real quick about the Broncos in general and kind of what they've done this offseason. You got a chance you were the GM of the Atlanta Falcons for 13 seasons. All those seasons. I assume I think Sean Payton was the head coach of the New Orleans Saints.
So what are the Broncos getting from a game planning standpoint, from a competition standpoint, with Sean Payton as their coach? My god, I said this the other day guys. I was like, if they're towards the end of my time in Atlanta, I was thinking more of the idea like, would I ever truly trade picks away for a head coach? My point is I would for Sean Payton.
I think Sean Payton is a fantastic coach at so many levels. He's got, you know, he's got obviously a billy. One of the things, the ability to coach and the ability to game plan, all of that is top notch. I hate to play in them because they were always prepared with us, right?
And he always had an air and an element to him, which is, you know, he'll go toe to toe with anyone on looking someone in the eye and battling him on whatever, which is a great thing to have as a coach. You have a guy who's going to take control there. One of the things, and you know how important this is, he's not a guy that's going to sit in there and worry about what his assistant coaches are thinking. He's going to say, and he learned this from Bill Parcells, I'm sure, and Bill Belichick in any of his circle.
He holds those coaches accountable. I'm going to tell you right now, the best way to have control of your organization is make sure that your assistant coaches know where their line is and know to toe their line. And they are not general managers and personnel directors. They are coaching your team.
And I guarantee that he's going to have your coaches developing your football players. Russell Wilson, you saw how he played last season, obviously, a precipitous fall from where he has been, the system, maybe not fitting what he actually is good at and all those things. The likelihood of Russell Wilson kind of getting it back together under Sean Payton. A lot of people talked about what he's lost, athleticism.
I don't buy that. I think it was more about fundamentals. And I thought it was more about game planning wise and putting them in positions to have success, which I don't think they did last year here. So how do you assess Russell Wilson and what do you think about his just his ability now, coupling and pairing with Sean Payton as his head coach?
That's another good question. I look like everyone. I was taken aback by how far I saw it fall last year. I do believe and here I am continuing to pump, which is heresy, by the way, in Atlanta, that I'm pumping Sean Payton, by the way.
Yes. I say that respect, but everybody like, wow, I do believe that that's strongly and what he can do. And I think he comes in there. And I don't I think he's the one person in this league that's going to come in there and get the most out of Russell where he is.
I think get back to the situation where, you know, maybe at least my perception, you get to the fitness level of where Russell needs to be because I believe he came in a little bit bigger last year, right? He had other things going on. I don't know how you feel about this as a general manager. And again, I have great deal of respect for George Payton.
This is not a dart at George decision. I'm not a fan of quarterback having the final say over an organization. I think they're really, really important. You have to communicate them.
They are they are legit stakeholder, but the offices and the extra, you know, the extra parking lots. Those are things that I feel like that Sean would come in and say, OK, let's we're going to work this back here. We're going to clean this up. We're going to focus on what's important.
We're going to eliminate as many distractions as as possible. We're going to have the teammates, you know, Russell's teammates looking at him like, OK, we're back online here. We're all together. We are all treated somewhat similar.
I get the money situation in a quarterback. You know, I'm sure you battled that many, many years as an alignment. Like you kidding me? Come on, guys, although you were always stood there and everyone treated you so well.
So that's a big thing. But I think it's really important for that. I think if there's one guy who's going to do it, I think he comes back and I think he has a strong recovery. I'm feeling confident where you guys are with that.
Real quick. And this would be the last thing for me. Just where are you with the off season moves? They spent more money than any other team in the off season acquisition, address their offensive line, the right tackle with Mike Mclinchit's been a problem there.
Also got the powers kid from Baltimore. So just overall moves and what they've tried to establish here in the off season. Well, look, I mean, without going to detail on everyone, my overview on it was I thought it was a strong place to be in. I felt this, you know, look, you get a new head coach that's coming in.
I'm going to speak again from a perspective of a former general manager. There's a lot of pressure on a general manager in that situation, right? Given everything that has happened, George had to reach out, of course, and do what he needed to do to turn this around quickly, right? Get that offensive line situation set up.
Make sure that you're providing for Russell as well as you can. I'm not saying they didn't have that last year, but I think that is really important. I mean, I like Mike Mclinchit. I know there was talk out there that, you know, where was he?
Be interested to hear your assessment on him as well, because I always evaluate value that beyond. I like what they've done. I think they've been aggressive. Of course, there's a lot of money spent on it.
There's no other way to do it right now. They have to shoot for this in my mind, especially why they have Russell here and they have to make the most out of where he is surrounded with the right people. And I think they're making their efforts to do that. Yeah.
I'm a big Mclinchit. I think Mclinchit is really improved. I think he's a really solid athlete. He gets a little tall at 6-8 sometimes.
He gets pushing the pocket a little bit. But I'll tell you this, playing with Trent Williams over the last couple of years, you've watched him develop this attitude of if I'm going to get beat, I'm going to get beat trying to, you know, trying to murder you, trying to shorten your neck. And there's an aggressiveness there that I think has really increased in his game, which I really like. I know Mike's got one more.
I just want more for you. We've got a lot of, I'm sure Patriot fans that watch this podcast and you spend a lot of time on the way up with New England. Bill Belichick was asked this week. Why should Patriot fans be optimistic for this upcoming season?
And he said the last 25 years. It was a comment that rankled some people. Even Teddy Bruceke came out and said, hey, yo, coach, that's not what we're all about. You know, resting on laurels.
And Bill came out and clarified his comments by saying, of course, that's we're not resting on laurels. It's all about moving ahead. For the first time in a long while, for the first time ever, where you're in legitimate talk that Bill Belichick maybe has lost it. He's not the same coach anymore.
And then he might even be coaching for his job this year. Do you buy any of that? I don't necessarily buy that. I think Bill Belichick is the best coach out there, hands down.
I think he is. In no way. I mean, I speak with him here and there. He is incredibly sharp.
I remember last year, not last year, two years ago, when we were in the league meetings. He walks in there and everyone listens to every single word he says. There's a godfather element to it. And I'm not saying he rides off of that.
I'm just saying he is still incredibly sharp and incredibly driven towards what he needs to do. I personally think 25 years is important. There's a lot there, right? There are organizations out there that hang on one year.
And then they just fizzle. So there's been a lot of consistency. He has approached things a little different than he has in the past, of course, because he has. And I remember what was it two years ago, and even this year, making legit moves in free agency.
They have. They're trying to build the way that they need to build. They need to get the offense, obviously, operating the way it is. And again, I think Bill can do it.
I don't necessarily, I mean, who am I to say he'd be playing for his or coaching for his job? I just believe that he needs to continue to work with the people he has there and get the coaching situation there as the offensive coordinator with Billy back in there. And I am correct on that, right? I didn't miss any news along the way.
He's the coordinator, right? I mean, that's going to be important, that's going to be important, Adam, sure. So I still have faith in Bill Belichick in the way that the Patriots can operate. Need to pull out of it.
I get it. Yeah. Hey, Thomas, man. We appreciate we've taken up of your time.
But we appreciate you. We look forward to talking to you and continuing to talk about all the analytics stuff and the things that you're doing right now. So appreciate you, buddy. Thanks for the time.
And Hank, draft up on the way up. Give me a call anytime. OK, man. I appreciate it.
I'll talk to you soon. See you guys. See you, buddy. Bye.
All right, Thomas, to meet you off, we really appreciate him. Long time, general manager, 13 years in Atlanta, 30 years overall as a scout and working in the NFL. And I tell you what, it just a plethora of information. I always enjoyed calling games in Atlanta and discussing him.
And he's one of those guys, Mike. And I think these are the guys that I really like being around that have had success. But at the same time going, hey, what can you teach me about the game, right? Because that's how I always approach when I'm talking to coaches and talking to GMs like that.
I want to know what it is you see and how you operate. And he's just one of those dudes that's fascinating to me. All that talk of analytics. Was that like sucking on a lemon for you?
Because you are fighting it, man. No, because there's a lot of the analytics stuff that goes out there as gospel that's bullshit. Like that's the stuff I fight. And I'm all about using a tool if you have a tool that is legitimate.
But when you just start throwing out numbers for the sake of throwing out numbers and acting like that is NFL football, that's when I start to go, wait a minute. Like, wait a minute. Like, I don't care. A 40 yard pass or 40 yard gain is a 40 yard gain.
Whether you throw one in the flat that you design, you get a couple of guys to run cover job, you get a couple of guys to run slants or a deep post or a dig and you hit the flat. And it goes for 35 yards versus throwing a back shoulder fade or a fade for 35 yards. Well, that's a fade as much harder to throw. We add more weight.
It's a 35 yard freaking gain. I don't care. I want the 35 yard. And by the way, why would I not want it to make it easier on my players as opposed to harder?
Why do all of a sudden we put more weight or value on a harder throw that has more risk to it? I just don't, I will never, listen, I'm embracing it slowly, some of the things, but when it's bullshit, I'll call it bullshit. Like I said, folks, kicking and screaming. I thought his comments on as we get ready for the draft and the likelihood that we're going to have four or five quarterbacks go, maybe even the top 10.
I found his comments about how teams make mistakes in over valuing or over over playing their need. And so they feel a need at a particular position. And as a result, they probably take a risk that they shouldn't take. Now I've had this argument with people when it comes to quarterbacks a lot.
Do you think that shed a little bit of new light on the idea that maybe these teams are drafting quarterbacks based too much out of need, panic? Or is there something to the idea that the quarterback position is so important and we are so needy, it's worth it to roll the dice. Even if the odds aren't in our favor. Yeah, Mike, I think the latter of that is true, that it is, it's a favorable thing.
It's the roll the dice. I think the whole collective bargaining agreement and the whole rookie wage scale was based on the quarterback. I think 100% was based on the quarterback saying, listen, if we can get this wage scale done, then we can draft a guy that probably has a third round grade that plays quarterback in the top five picks because bottom line, it doesn't hamstring us for a decade. It doesn't jamark us, Russell us or Sam Bradford us.
It doesn't Ryan Leaf us. We just move on. And I think that's the biggest reason they've gone in that direction to say, hey, we really want this. The owners put their foot down and say, we want this and the players, right?
It doesn't affect me. You know, I mean, do do do do do do do do do. Lamps to the slaughter. What?
But that's why they wanted that. That's why they wanted that so bad. And so yeah, I think there are a lot of third and fourth round, second, third, fourth round talent guys that get drafted in the first round because why not? But there may be now after what Demetra talked about.
Maybe there is a way now to better evaluate these quarterbacks. It's not as risky, you know, because if I'm a fan watching this and I had to live through James Winston or Marcus Marioda or Carson Wentz or all these quarterbacks that were drafted really high who failed, hey, maybe if there is a better way of evaluating these guys moving forward, then bring it on. I'm all for it. And I think the big part of the analytics aspect or the analytics discussion is, okay, if we can get four or five, 10%, 12% more information, then then we have a little bit better chance of making the right call.
Now, you talked about that top five quarterback, the 25% of those guys win. 75% fail. So can we take that from 25% to 37% when you rather have a 37% chance of hitting a lot of than 25%? So I get that aspect of it.
There are certain intangible things that you'll never be able to put into a number. And that really, for me, is the difference between the guy making it and the guy not making it. And that's what we'll see. I think the other interesting thing for me, and I wanted to talk to you about this a little bit.
And we've talked a lot about the Lamar Jackson situation, but he did mention something that I've mentioned a bunch. So I talked about leverage. And I understand leverage probably better than anybody else. So let me tell you a quick story.
I'm playing with the Broncos in 1995. And we're playing Monday Night Football against the Raiders, our number one rival. And the Raiders had had their way with the Broncos before Mike Shanahan came here in 1995. And I had this injury history where I flunked the physical in Atlanta.
I flunked the physical in Indianapolis. I flunked the physical in Chicago. As a matter of fact, the doctor in Atlanta told me I had that he said, I don't believe you play in the NFL. You've got the knees of an 80-year-old woman, to which I said, fuck you.
I line up every Sunday and play. Needless to say, the meeting didn't go well between me and the doctor. But part of my French, what I was pissed. The bottom line is, is if they have leverage on you, I don't care if you got hurt in the pocket.
Everybody tells me, oh, well, he didn't get hurt running the football. It was in the pocket where he's gotten hurt twice. I don't care. The point is, is you've been hurt.
So here I roll into my NFL career with all these injuries. In 1995, my first year in Denver, it was really important for me to make sure that I played every game, regardless of how I felt. So I had a kidney stone, a Sunday night before Monday I game. I woke up in the middle and I'm dying.
I'm dying. Here's my parents were in town for the game, right? So everybody's asleep. I tell my wife, I need to go to the hospital.
I'm really, like, this is, I'm in bad shape. You know, and if you've ever had a kidney stone, I mean, you are like sweating, you're throwing up, or you're trying to throw up, you're like, it's just, it's so much pain. It's ridiculous. And my wife is gracious as she goes, go down the couch, try sleeping off, right?
So I go down. I go down the couch for another four hours. And finally, I'm like, you got to take me to the emergency room right now, like right now. So we go to the emergency room, we tell my parents, hey, I'm having a kidney stone.
We got to go. So we go in there. I'm in the hospital all day Sunday. Finally, I transfer hospitals.
You're on morphine. You're trying to pass it to pump and fluids. They can't pass it. So finally, you got to go down.
You got to go have surgery. Transfer hospitals go have surgery. It's literally 11 o'clock at night. They will me down into the operating area, right?
We'll me in the operating room. I am, this is no joke, I am on the slab. Like, it's like being at the gynecologist's office. I've never been there, but I would imagine.
Like my feet are in the stirrups. Like this, right? Both feet. You can't get that knee out.
So both feet are in the stirrups, right? And I'm butt naked. Have you ever had surgery? No, it's like snowing in there, right?
So like it is, there's a significant amount of shrinkage. So they get very, very cold. You're going to have to have a flashlight and a pair of tweezers to find the thing. And I'm not cold in there.
And every person in that operating room is a female. Oh, geez. My anesthesiologist, I get this gal who comes in there who she goes, hey, are you allergic to iodine or benedimics? I'm going to scrub down there.
So you're going to scrub my junk, my bits and my pieces, right? And I'm just like, you got to be kidding me. So it's more than the right. So I turn to the anesthesiologist.
I go, would you just knock me out? This is embarrassing. Would you just knock me out? It's knocking me out.
They go through your junk. They go through your junk. They go into your bladder, through your bladder, up to your yurter, which is the tube between your kidneys and your bladder. And they get the piece out, right?
So you wake up, it's one o'clock in the morning. And I'm like, I got to take a morphine shot to take a piss. And it's all blood. Like it's just as miserable.
I check myself out of the hospital the next morning and drive to the stadium, lace them up, and we beat the Raiders 27-nothing. And you know, you're talked about in that fashion during that time as a warrior, and the toughest guy in this that, the other. And until your contract comes up and you know what they say to you, dude, you've had so many surgeries. You've been in it.
I play every game. What do you mean? Yeah, but yeah, but we can't pay you. And the whole career was begging for more.
It wasn't negotiating. It was begging for more money. And for Lamar, it doesn't matter that you got hurt in the pocket. The point is that you've missed five games this season, the last two years, 34% of the starts you've missed.
And so the point is this is that you've been hurt. You've given us leverage opportunity, and we're going to use it as a football team. The other thing, and Thomas mentioned the Atlanta Falcons. The one team that I think Lamar fits on, other than the Baltimore Ravens, is the Atlanta Falcons, because I think there is less adjustment, more roster-wise in Atlanta than there would be with any other team.
So if you're a team that loves the three wides and a receiving tight end, like the Pittsburgh Steelers and Fairmouth and tight end, and wide receiver, like all of a sudden, you don't have the personnel to go, okay, let's go get a bunch of beasts that play tight end, block and tight ends. Let's go get ourselves a real live, real live, full back, and let's change what we do. Teams are like, if we take Lamar, we've got to change our whole offensive philosophy, our play calling, and our personnel. That's two, and give up two first rounders and sign him to a $150 million contract.
Like that's just too much for us to stomach in one-off season. The one team that actually makes sense to me, and I did a couple of Atlanta games, because they ran a similar style. Arthur Smith? Arthur Smith?
Tennessee? Yeah, from Tennessee, but they ran a bunch of stuff where Marcus Mario was there starting quarterback where they ran a bunch of quarterback run stuff, and they have a couple of legit big-time Pruitt and a couple other guys that are blocking tight ends, and they've got a real live Keith Smith, real live, full back. So they're the one team that is actually built in such a fashion that they could take Lamar and put him on there, and they wouldn't have to change a whole lot of what they do. They're the one team that makes sense, but then again, you're going, okay, well, we do make sense from a roster construction standpoint, but Mike, you know what?
We don't make sense. We don't want to give up two first-rounders, and we don't want to sign you to $100 million to whatever million deal. I think the only place that Lamar's going to have to figure it out with Baltimore or sit out this season. That's what it feels like to me.
We shall see. Yeah, we shall see. It's interesting. Anyhow, big thanks to Thomas Demetrov.
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