Lamar Jackson reports for voluntary workouts + How long will Baker Mayfield remain a Buc? (4/7 Hour 2)

If you want to say that you're going to win a championship, you want to say that you have championship standards and those are your goals and your expectations, certainly that's going to take work, that's going to take collaboration, that's going to take the beginning of building the relationship with their coaches, other players, you know, starting off this next regime on the right foot. So that would be those guys getting in here, us being able to work with them hands on and be able to kind of get this thing going in the direction that we want to. My, my first thought on seeing that video, and I say this with all due respect and difference, which means no, it looks like Declan Doyle. And right. Exactly. It looks like Declan Doyle and Jesse Minner came off the same assembly line at the robot. I hear you. You look exactly alike. Yeah. Right. Right. Yeah. I mean, you're right. There's definitely some resemblance there to where you go. Are they family members? Is there, is that a cousin that they didn't tell us about? There is something in the eyes and the smile that are similar there. It did grow through my mind as well. I thought you were going to go somewhere else with that. But yeah, that does, you're right. It does, it does look like they're like, I didn't know. I don't know with you at times. So I wasn't sure where you're going to go. I thought it might have been something more negative. That's what I was scared of. But, but yeah, I, I scared scared. I think I just said, yeah. Yes, you did. No, I, you don't, you don't have to think it. I know it. It's, it's on tape. It was kind of like a, ah, I was going to say, ah, and then I got the word scared. It wasn't like, you know, I said it all in one word there. I didn't mean to do it that way. Hey, hey, look, look, when, when it happens, it happens and it makes me the victor into the victor. Go to the Simsism. Spoil. So, so yesterday, right near the end of the show, the Ravens posted on their social media channels a picture of, a picture of video of Lamar Jackson showing up for the first day of the off season program. Oh man. Slow motion too. Look at this. Another video of him out doing the workout QB one setting the tone double exclamation point. for a guy who, who last year for $750,000 by not being present for at least 80% of the off season workouts the year before for $750,000 for not being present for at least 80% of the off season workouts. So here is the fair question. Hey, it's great that he's there. Declan Doyle made it clear. There's an expectation even though he was dancing on the line of a CBA violation. Jesse Menner told us that the scouting combine it's incumbent upon us as coaches to make it worth their while to be there to give them a reason to want to be there. He's there the first day and this is the question that has Raven fans up my butt. How long is he going to stay? How dare you? How dare you hate the Ravens? Yeah, never mind the fact that three weeks ago, I was the only one defending them when everyone was crapping on them for the failed Max Crosby trade. I was the only one trying to see their side of it. How dare you? You hate the Ravens. I mean, come on, folks, let's be realistic. We don't know how long he's going to stay there. We've seen star players show up and then disappear. OBJ used to do that show up for the first day talked to the media. See you in June. That's how it used to go. So it's a key question. How long will he stay? At what point will he decide possibly this isn't worth my time. I can work out on my own. They're not telling me anything I don't already know or will he stay there? I think that that like they think that him being there yesterday answers everything. It's just the starting point. How long he's there, how locked in he is. That's what's going to give us the answer of how committed he is to the new program. That's not hate. That's just hey, folks, this is how it goes and let's see which way it goes and we don't know. There's no guarantees. He goes, wow, it's voluntary, but you're missing the point. Is he going to volunteer to be there? Is he going to make it 750,000? Does he agree that it's worth his while to be there? Does he agree that he needs to be there in order to be properly prepared to get the most out of this first year of Jesse Menor and Declan Doyle? So it's a fair question and we don't know the answer to it and it has nothing to do. You hate the rate. No, I mean, I'm analyzing the situation because it's very compelling, especially when he doesn't have a new contract. Yeah, no, I mean, listen, it's a good start. That's what you say. It's a good start. I'm happy to see it. You know, obviously he felt like, Hey, there's a new regime here. It's important for me to be here for the first day of school and kind of do that and show the team that way. So that's what you love. And yes, as you know, for other things that are maybe more tangible, I would think there's great value in being there. Again, the system is going to be different. He's going to have to learn some different things with Declan Doyle and the Ben Johnson offense and how things operated there in Detroit. And there's going to be some moving parts. So from that standpoint to you want to go, Hey, yeah, it was a down year. The head coach got fired. It's new people in. It's time to usher in a new era of Ravens football and to usher it in. Yeah, we need the biggest star in the sport. Lamar Jackson, you know, we need you there. We need you. You're the biggest star in our football team. That helps everybody's energy when they see you there. It makes everybody want to work and be there. And that's why we know, you know, we in the past, we bang the table about, Hey, Lamar, you need to be there. And also I just say you need to be there because our roof for Lamar and go, you know, the first OTAs and the start of that, the other great quarterbacks and to be there too. And you know, you got to, you're competing with them right now. That that's where we are. I mean, listen, that's what got me up in the morning a lot of times. And I know it gets other quarterbacks up in the morning at times. I mean, yeah, did we think Tom Brady didn't wake up a lot of mornings going, man, Peyton Manning, let me, let me get to work. Let me get to work. And I know Patrick Mahomes had the same thoughts. We even with Tom Brady up to Tom Brady is awake. Let me get away. Let me get going here. That's part of the job. And hopefully Lamar understands that and can kind of usher in this new era in a way that, you know, it is awesome for the organization and Jesse Minner and awesome for himself. That's that to me is the number one thing. You have said usher in a new era a few times when you first said it, you almost said usher in a new era, which I was hoping, hoping you would, you would do in honor of MC Well, we don't have even EJ on the show anymore. So nobody even makes Sims isms anymore. It's a dead thing. It's gone recently. I had one recently. Yeah, we have them every now and then, but, you know, they cut our budget to $1 to negative four. So now we don't have anybody that does graphics or fun things like that for us anymore. And that's, you know, so it gets lost in translation. It's like, and it's, it's not nearly as publicized. There's been other ones too that people have told me, but we just we miss them slide. They slide through the cracks these days. Hey, the low budget is our friend. We would have been canceled a long time ago if this show didn't cost nothing to produce. Sure, we'll let those knuckleheads stay on the air. It costs us nothing to produce the show. So okay. So hey, at least we're profitable. I asked you who MC Esher is and you avoided the question. You know who MC Esher is? I do know that you're in a new era. I do feel like I do know I know and know the name, but no, I don't I can't say what I know it from. What is it? He's the guy that does those highly stylized drawings where you never like your look going up the steps and you never quite like they're the very like they move almost futuristic, but like you're like you you can't figure out where everything is like this is rising and this is falling and it never comes together. These stairs go here and these stairs go there. Okay. MC Esher not to be confused with MC Hammer. Anyway, back to back to Lamar Jackson. Yeah. The reality is the quarterback does need to be all in. It's part of what you pay for. And I know there are certain points in a career where you don't really need to be there. But when you have a new coach, when you have a new offense, yeah, when you're trying to get your new contract, he's been trying for a year and I don't know where the short circuit is. Look, I think 62 million a year new money APY gets it done three year extension on top of the 104 million he's due to make over the next two years. It's not all that complicated 62 times 3 186 plus 104 290 five years guarantee the first three years done. They haven't gotten it done. And I've heard different things about why it hasn't gotten done. And I don't know this to be true. And again, I'm not looking to have a long list of nasty phone. Well, I don't really give a damn about your emails or phone calls. So tell me all the things you know. Let me say this. Yeah, let me say no, no, I think there's a chance because Lamar Jackson was the problem the last time dragging his feet, broken microphone on the phone. They couldn't get in touch with him like the perception in the aftermath of the last deal was this didn't happen because he's not being responsive to their efforts. Yeah. What if the Ravens are the ones dragging their feet now? And no one will ever know because the Ravens got two years left on this contract in 104 million. Two years from now, how do you project what Lamar Jackson is going to be as a quarterback two years from now, when he's 30, I believe in two years, we need to check his birthday. I'm a little skittish about relying upon my memory of age after our Dexter Lawrence thing from earlier. But I think it'll be 30 in two years. And when you got a guy that's had plenty of wear and tear. And we saw it with Steve Young and Steve McNair, there's a point where the running just stops and you're a pocket passer. And at some point that transition is going to have to happen for Lamar Jackson is going to have them for Josh Allen at some point at some point, you're just going to be a passer. You can't be doing this stuff because everybody else is faster because you've gotten slower than Epiphany Lawrence Taylor had when he finally retired. All these other guys are fast. No Lawrence, you're slowing down. That's going to happen. So Lamar turns, finish it, Gary, finish the thought he's caught. We've got a 30 in January. So he's 29. So all the more reason possibly for the Ravens to find a way to see where things are, if we can delay it a year, we can make a more a more prudent decision. Because Lamar is looking for more than 60. He was the highest paid player in the NFL when he got to 52 five three years ago. He's now and it's kind of gotten scurry because to his contract got ripped up, but he was 10th with Dakot 60 and Lamar 52 five. And he's trying to fix that and he's been trying for a year. I just wonder who it is that's dragging their feet this time because Lamar, this is one of the benefits to the team. If Lamar is committed to never talking about it, he'll never even put his version out there. We don't know what's going on. We don't know why this hasn't gotten done. We know the Ravens said they wanted to get it done. We don't know why it hasn't gotten done. And the history between the two is the perfect cover. If the Ravens, if there is diabolical, does everyone thought they were three weeks ago, this is a perfect opportunity for them to prove it by being the ones to drag their feet on the Lamar contract and everyone will just think it's him. Well, yeah, that I mean, everybody's going to think it's him. That's the reputation Lamar Jackson has gotten. I mean, and I think it's deservingly so it doesn't matter who you talk to. People can't get in contact with Lamar Jackson. That's been something you've heard from the start of his career. And we know that now they can use it. Yeah, but that's what's beautiful about it. And also, and also ugly if they do it. But like, you don't mean the owners wrote a blank check. I mean, he literally that just doesn't have like the owner doesn't do like they want to get it done. I just, I don't, I would be shocked. The owner doesn't say stuff like that. We don't ever see owners do stuff like that where he's literally like same contract, 62 million place it in. Boom. I mean, he did the damn work right there. Highest paid guy will do it. Boom, right there. I mean, so that's where I, maybe, maybe you're right, but that's a risky game to play. And like, you know, Lamar Jackson with his play in, in as far as that 29, it's, yeah, he's lost a little of a step, but it doesn't really matter. He's one of the, he's one of the ones he's special. You got one of the special ones. He's already shown me just like Josh Allen. It doesn't matter when they can't run as much. They're still going to be damn good. They're still going to be phenomenal in the pocket. Lamar makes some of the damages throws and plays in the pocket every week when I watch him. So that's where like that squash, he's, he's already making the adjustment. It's not going to be as explosive to your point as he once was and be able to bring that to the table as they get older. He and Josh Allen a hundred percent. But I have no doubt that when he does lose another step is Lamar Jackson going to fall off planet earth. No, he's still going to be one of the best pocket passing quarterbacks in the league. And that's where I don't think he quite gets enough respect in that department at times there. The key though, I think for the Ravens is if he wants to be the highest paid player in the NFL, let's just see more data points. Let's, if they can find a way, and I'm telling you, I don't know what they're doing. I don't know what's going on because nobody ever talks about it. Lamar doesn't want anything to be discussed and the Ravens fully and completely respect that. And the only reason we know anything about the last time around is because of the collusion grievance that resulted in a hearing that generated the 61 page ruling the Pablo Torre track down last year. And part of the fascination in that document was the details we'd never before seen about the Lamar Jackson negotiations because nobody ever talked about it. I don't think Lamar was very happy that it came out, but I mean, he put his name on the collusion grievance. This is what happens when you pursue something like that. Maybe it wasn't explained to him because if you've never been involved in the legal process, you don't really understand what saying yes to something will ultimately mean. Yeah. Like, I don't think anyone said to Lamar, you know, Lamar, if you agree to this, at some point down the road, there's going to be a document that has all of the details of the, the negotiations that you had with the Ravens and all the struggles that they had tracking you down. But man, what, what a, hey, look, people assume the worst about the Ravens three weeks ago with Max Crosby. And I'm not saying they're doing it. All I'm saying is we won't know if they are. And it's the perfect cover. People are just going to assume it's Lamar and we're going to take our time and we're going to play this out. And yeah, he's going to be an unrestricted free agent two years he can go anywhere he wants. I mean, I don't know, like in two years, when he's 31, and he's going to be 32 in January, that's usually how, you know, age works. But I don't know. Why, why, why are we talking about it? We don't talk about anybody at 31 or 32 a quarterback of day. We're going to talk about Baker Mayfield next. We're not going to bat an eye about his contract at 31 or whatever. We are going to bat about it. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, we are going to bat an eye about it. We are going to bat an eye about it because look at all the injuries he had last year. And at some point, it's fair to say, you know, what are we paying for here? The guy's got to be able to stay healthy. And I mean, that we're going to talk about. I mean, look, I'm a Baker Mayfield fan and we are going to talk about that. But my point is what is really going on and we don't know and we won't know. And that's the background against all of this. And he's there. The good news is he's there. Whatever it is that's going on and not going off the contract, he's there. So he understands the importance of being there. The question is, how long will he be all in? And I'm trying to take up, look, I'm looking at this from Lamar's perspective, like, I hope the Ravens aren't taking advantage of the fact that he was the problem the last time, at least that's the perception. So they're going to manipulate the situation and they're going to be the problem this time and they're going to force him to keep waiting for the contract he already deserves. But like you said, Bishadi laid it out. He didn't use the numbers, but he basically said, we did the, we did this, you take the last thing and you plug in new numbers. And I did it myself. It took five minutes. You used 62 times three, add it up. Okay, we guarantee the first three years, you can do a rolling guarantee where the first two are guaranteed it's signing. The third year becomes fully guaranteed in March of the second year. Boom, you're done. It's not hard to do. So why hasn't it happened? They wanted it done by March. Why hasn't it happened? And unfortunately, we're never going to know the answer to the question or maybe we will if there's another collusion, Ravens and there's a ruling that comes out years from now and we can find out what the hell caused this to not happen because he should be getting, this is all the people out there say, you hate Lamar Jackson. We've always advocated for the guy to get paid. We advocated for him to get paid when the window first opened. And in part because he didn't have an agent, he didn't get a deal. And Josh Allen did. And Josh Allen made money those two years that Lamar Jackson is never going to see. It's gone forever. And look where Josh Allen is now. He's got a contract with a new money average of frankly 85 million per year, but we're not allowed to talk about that because it short circuits the whole new money average analysis and logic. But we've always been fully supportive of Lamar Jackson getting every penny he deserves. And he should have gotten to 60 last year. And he should be at 60 now or 62. And I'm just curious how that backdrop factors into what we're going to see because look, if he wants to put pressure on him, don't show up. Don't be there. So I'm just curious. And again, it's curiosity is never going to be satiated because we're never going to know what's going on behind the scenes with this one. No, we're not. But I mean, again, we can draw inklings. I mean, it's the strongest comments there's ever been. And Ravens are an organization that usually wants to have their ducks in a row for the future and other contracts and all that. And I think that's what you were. They were telling us at that end of the year press conference, they want it done. And yeah, we've had, I've never heard the other way around so far when it comes to Lamar Jackson. It's just been the one thing. I mean, we, you know, whether it goes back to the Jordan brand and they couldn't get in contact with them either. I mean, it's, it's, it's famous players that played there. Everybody. So I, you know, until I hear otherwise, yes, it seems like in this department, it falls more on Lamar and a hundred percent with you. I mean, yeah, I back them being paid. It's a guarantee. It's a no brainer. That's why I think the owner comes out and says it. He's just like, yeah, well, extend now, now sign it. Let's do it. And I don't know why that hasn't happened, but it's hard for me to sit here and blame the Ravens, just knowing the history of all the other stuff. Exactly. Exactly. And Chris, I'm not just throwing some games. You think the Ravens are next level. They need to run the CIA between their next level Max Crosby and now next level mind tricks here. Damn, we need to fire the CIA and get the Ravens in charge. I got reason to wonder whether or not the Ravens have deliberately decided to slow play this, knowing that, knowing that the perception is going to be that Lamar is the one who's slow playing it. I have reason to think and we're never going to know, but I have reason to think that it's possible that that's what's going on. Regardless, it's easy to do the contract. They already blew the window to do it and get the maximum cap savings this year. They've restructured the contract for this year. Who knows when this is going to get done, but the good news for the Ravens and Ravens fans, Lamar is there. How long he stays is a fair question. Don't get upset with me for asking a fair question. How long will he stay? Maybe it's a show of good faith by him in the hopes of getting this deal done. Regardless, he deserves it. He should get it. And if it's from his perspective, it's a shame because we've already seen this movie once and you'd like to learn from it. If it's the Ravens, then man, they really are evil geniuses. And I guess I mean that in a good way. To the extent that evil geniuses are ever good because they played it just perfectly to their benefit with Max Crosby. And if this kind of screwball hunch I'm throwing out there that may have something to it is true, they really are next level. And like you said, they should be running the CIA. And frankly, I've just given the keys to the entire federal government at this point. And I would sleep better at night. Okay, let's take a break. As mentioned by Chris, we're going to talk about Baker Mayfield as he tries to get a new contract and some interesting information that we shared by Levante David about all the many injuries that Baker Mayfield had last year. That's next on PFT Live. There's MCS. So that's one of the classics, the two hands drawing each other. Gotcha. That's actually kind of creepy. It's amazing how realistic it is. It's amazing. Yeah, it is amazing. It actually makes me think of it. And now like you've told me and I totally know who this person is, even though I didn't really know who it is. You know, it's also funny. You see these kind of paintings with like the people on Instagram where they put it on the sidewalk and it's like a hole. And you know, of course, the all of mankind right now walks like this, right? This is the new picture of mankind and no matter where you are, but then they roll and like they fall down or they're like, Oh no, I'm falling. Like that's pretty funny, right? But it's in lieu of that kind of painting right there actually. There's a great video of a cat. Yeah, falling off the couch and she's it's so good. I know exactly the one that I saw. I mean, I hate to find humor in the raw terror of an animal, but it's all right. No cats. No cats were harmed physically. Right. They were harmed psychologically, but not physically in the filming of that video. And then there's the one and I was I was laughing my ass off the other night, showing it to my son and I I don't know whether or not it was AI. I don't think it was. They have these videos where they put a mask on a little shit dog. Yeah, I've seen it. Walks up to a big dog and he flips out. Yeah. That's a real thing. Putting the mask on and the dog's getting scared. Yeah, that's pretty good. I know that's where I do love social media. It can bring a bright spot to your life during the day. But but I mean, yeah, the dog, the dog like the dog experienced three seconds of terror for our amusement. That's the only problem with that if people are going to lose their minds because of an April Fool's gag at a basketball game where they acted like a guy who was blindfolded made a half court shot when the guy was in on it and the Washington Wizards has to apologize. I mean, you know, I feel bad taking pleasure in the psychological harm to any animal. I love animals, but it is funny. It is. I can't help it. It's funny to see a dog lose its shit. It's tiny little dog with this creepy mask. Hell, I would have been in there asleep. Yeah. And this little dog walks up with his chihuahua mask on. Yes, I would freak out. Although, you know what? Frankly, to scare the shit out of somebody, Chihuahua doesn't need a mask. No, you're right. I'm with you there. It's one of the uglier dogs out on the planet. I'm sorry. All those Chihuahuas out there. I'm just going to put myself out there on that one. All right. Well, speaking of Chihuahua, Baker Mayfield. No, he's not that small, but I'm sorry. We love Baker Mayfield. And he had this career journey where he's the first overall pick in 2018. It doesn't work out in Cleveland, obviously, thanks to the Browns who openly flirt with Deshaun Watson and destroyed the relationship. So he got traded to the Panthers. It didn't work out there. He was cut late in the year. He had that awesome Thursday night game against the Raiders with the Rams where he showed up 48 hours earlier, becomes a free agent, lands with Tampa Bay, and they got something. And they currently have him. It started with a one year deal, I think, and then it's a three year deal, three year, $100 million contract. And man, he was like MVP early last year. And now they're in a spot where he's got a high cap number and they haven't worked out a contract yet. We asked Jason Light about it at the scouting combine. More recently, Light said Baker's our quarterback. He's one of the toughest guys on the team. He's a great leader. Everything kind of revolves around the quarterback spot. At some point, I'm sure we'll figure something out. There's no timetable on that. They're already dealing with the bigger cap number. And I think it's like low 50 million when you look at this three year deal and how they structured it. You know, you kick money around, you end up having a bigger cap number in year three. But they got to get it figured out. And the question is, where does he land on that pecking order? You know, tears have kind of broken out. You have the top of the top. Yeah, I feel like the middle figure in this out. So he's kind of in the low middle right now. Like where should he be? He should be higher than he is. But how high should he be? Well, yeah, that's the breakdown. I mean, when you get into average, right per year, all right. So you start to look at some names, but you know, significantly down the list. And I know it's been finagled. There's like Mahomes is at 45 million, but that's not real like you've explained before. There's been a lot of finagling there. So I don't know if I can, you can follow that. But like, I think regardless as a base, like base number here, Baker may feel more than 50 million a year. That's for sure. Let's just start there. We know it's north of that. Now, where is it north of that? That you're right is going to be the, the, the, the juggle, the juggling of the situation here. Herbert's making 52 million a year. Brock Purdy, you know, as we get in here, it's 53 million a year. Goff is around 53 million a year. So that to me is maybe right around the spot where Baker may feel this. Then you get up there to Tua, which is one of the dumbest deals in the history of football. So we'll wipe that off. And then you have Josh Allen, Burrow, Trevor Lawrence, Jordan Love, Dak Prescott. Now, are they going to go up to that, to those kind of numbers? The high fifties and there I don't know. And again, you know, my stance on this all, all together is just that there should be a pecking order. It kind of should be like, no, here's, here's my homes, and here's Lamar, and here's Josh Allen, and here's Joe Burrow, and you know, should be those four at first. And then Justin Herbert, and then we'll see where we go from there from everybody else. That's how I feel about it. But yeah, he definitely is north of 50 million. I think you agree with that, right, Mike? Right. And I misspoke on the cap number for this year. It's 39.975. And obviously a new contract, even if the new money APY is north of 50, you would get a smaller cap number this year. He's due to make $27 million in cash this year, with a million dollars in likely to be earned incentives. That's just a cap accounting tool. I don't know how likely it is or isn't without looking at the actual triggers. But he's under $30 million for this year. And there's something wrong with that picture, 27 base rate. Sam Darnold's at 27 or 25. That's another issue in this whole thing. That's, yeah. Yeah. Right? But Matthew Stafford, the MVP took 42 because he's later in his career. So that, you know, those are things that the Buccaneers are going to go, well, you know, you're really, you're very similar to Sam Darnold. Sam took 33 and he won the Super Bowl. And I like Matt Stafford's the MVP. And I mean, he's been playing at a really high level. He only had 42. So there's the Buc side of it where they can use that a little bit. And that's kind of what's weird. Quarterback markets a little all over the place right now when you kind of look at it and digest it a little, right? It is. It is. And it's kind of stretched out. It really is. And there's kind of a big middle where there aren't a lot of guys, but it's really stretched out. And I think we're going to see these teams begin to pivot away from this presumption. We drafted you. You've given us three or four good years. You're not going to be the highest paid player in NFL history. They've gotten away from that. That's the way it was eight, 10 years ago. We went through that stretch where it went from Jimmy Garoppolo to Kirk Cousins to, I think Matt Ryan was in there at some point. Matthew Stafford, like everybody's getting a little bit more, a little bit more, a little bit more, just because that was the, that was the way that it worked. And now they're trying to work out a different way. But with Mayfield, there's another issue. And we were touching on this earlier. Lavante David is a guy that we played some, some quotes from yesterday when he was on the arena podcast. Here's Lavante David talking about Baker Mayfield's 2025 experience. And here's hoping that Skip Bayless doesn't interrupt Lavante David while he's trying to tell us something. Here it is. Baker was going through a lot, bro. Baker had a lot of injuries that you didn't expect a quarterback to play through. You know what I'm saying? He had the oblique injury. He had the shoulder injury. He had a lot of things like, you know, anchor injury, knee injury. He had a lot of stuff that's, you know, that he was going through. I mean, the season over now, we could talk and talk about it, but he had a lot of stuff that he was going through. And he was really trying to push through and really trying to, you know, be the player that we needed to be, that we needed him to be. I don't think Baker should have got to blame it all because years prior, he playing lights out early in the season. He's playing lights out. You know, he put up 38 points on a, you know, eventual Super Bowl defense, you know what I'm saying? At their place. I would never be in Blake for that. Thanks, Skip. He's listening to you. Here's the balance. Here's the balance. And I'm a big advocate of a quarterback's obligation to keep himself healthy. Baker Mayfield does not keep himself healthy. He doesn't miss games, though. He started every game last year. Who's only listed as questionable twice. I went through the week by week injury report after I saw those quotes from Levante David, like he had a bunch of injuries. A bunch of different body parts showed up on that weekly list. He was questionable twice and never missed a start. He refuses to. That's, it's like, I think it became a problem his last year in Cleveland because there's a point where it's impairing your performance because you're playing hurt. Yeah, that's part of what screwed him over. It's better to just be healthy. It's better to just be healthy. You've got to find a way to avoid taking those hits and his toughness becomes a potential liability if it affects his performance. And I think that's what the Buccaneers are struggling with because healthy early in the year lights out like Levante said later in the year. When he's struggling to get to the finish line and parts have fallen off and and he refuses to take a game off and let the backup play, you know, at some point the starter is sufficiently impaired by injury that it's better to go with somebody who's 100% and let him play. But I think that's part of the overall Baker Mayfield experience is part of what makes him great. It's greatness to a fault. It's stubbornness to a fault. It's commitment to his craft to a fault because he keeps playing when he shouldn't be playing because of all the different injuries that he has. And those are just the ones that we know about. Yeah. And I mean, he's tough. He's rugged. He does. He plays a physical brand of football for a quarterback. We see him lower the shoulder. He hangs in the pocket. He's not real, real fast. So he's not going to always be able to avoid things and he takes hits and he's a football player. He is and you're right. He's played through a lot of injuries being banged up there. But I kind of look at it to go like, man, there's not too many of them out there and you got one in Tampa Bay. You got one. You got a guy that's a leader. He can make big plays. He's got a great arm and there's just very few of them that you can say, Hey, we got it. Now, yeah, they got to find the magic touch. You're right. All right. And also within that too, okay, you got a smaller quarterback. You got to make sure you protect them too. It's got to be a part of it. And last year they were a little banged up on the offensive line. So that hurt them. And then Mike Evans, Miss Time and Chris Godwin wasn't quite as stale. And damn, I mean, Baker Mayfield early in the year was doing things where you're just like, man, are him and the Mecca of Bucca just going to tear the league up here all year long? And of course that settled down, but yeah, I mean, I would think they're going to find the sweet spot here. It's just about what is that number? What makes sense for where Baker Mayfield is in his career? You know, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, but you got a guy, he's a damn good player. He gives your team an edge. He gives your team a, ooh, the bucks are on. It's Baker. Let me watch him. You don't know it's going to, because Baker's going to go for it. He doesn't play the politics of the sport. He doesn't do anything. He goes for it. He is trying to win. He's trying to throw lasers. And he's one of the more explosive quarterbacks in football in the pocket because of his, because of his frame of mind and his big right arm. So yeah, you know me, I like the bucks and I'm, I'm hoping the, the glazers and Jason light reward him. Hey, in 2024, when the Vikings and Kirk cousins didn't continue and Sam Darnold arrived, I was, I was saying, I was saying, hey, get Baker. He was one year in Tampa Bay. He's hitting the free agent market. They didn't apply the franchise tag. They kept him on that three year hundred million dollar contract, but he's fun to watch. He's a great leader. I'd love to know in the aftermath of the Thursday night game that you attended when a kaka cousins and the Falcons managed to beat the Buccaneers after the Buccaneers had like a 13, 14, 15 point lead. It was two score lead in the fourth quarter. Yeah. I think it was 10. Maybe it was 13, but yeah, it was, it was, it was two scores. It was two scores. And I think it was more than 10. It was like, it was 13 to 15. It was something around there. So anyway, Todd Bowles had that rant F bomb rant, look in the F and mirror F this, F that and MF and I don't know that there was an MF in there. There may have been. There's an MF sitting right here. It's always great. MF is it's great, great initials to carry around. Yeah, they're fitting our life. Especially once the kids figure out, yeah, MF you. Yeah. So the, the, I want to know what the reaction was in the aftermath of that game because I suspect that and publicly Baker Mayfield didn't point fingers. The man, he had to have been pissed. Whatever was going on, there was something going on with that team last year. Something was happening with that team and it wasn't just Baker Mayfield's got too many injuries. They, I don't know whether it was practice habits, whether they weren't locked. I don't know what it was, but that team was too talented to not make the playoffs and they just fell apart down the stretch and they didn't respond to the bull's rant the way that I thought they would. And when you got a guy like Baker Mayfield in the locker room, you just wondered like, where are the flaws here that this team isn't able to finish the job? They had so many chances to finish the job and they ultimately couldn't. I, I, you know, I think it's, it was unfortunate. They fizzled out, kind of got to a hot, hot start. I do think the injuries caught up to them a little bit. And then the other thing that we saw, and this is where we weren't sure where it was going to go with Todd Bowles and all that, it's just the Buccaneers defense was just pitiful the second half of the year. They couldn't do anything. So it just was like, it was always having to play that type of football game. And that's hopefully where that can get fixed. Yeah. I don't think Todd Bowles and the defensive staff had their best year coach on the back end. I also think that they had some, you know, lack of pass rushers. Uh, uh, Coligia, Cancie got hurt, uh, corners. That was a big negative for the Buccaneers last year. So I think they got to kind of retool that side of the ball a little bit, but yeah, nothing worked. And I can tell you, listen, I was, you know, I was there. I was in the game. I was in the owner's box that day. I, all I could tell you is that the Glacier family was intent on, wait, let's go watch the big screen TV in our box here and let's watch the post game press conferences. And I didn't sit there and watch them with them because I was kind of like, that seems like it's a family business meeting over there. I'm going to say goodbye and blah, blah, blah, but they were, yeah, obviously extremely tuned in at the time and worried about kind of where the organization was going at that point in the season, why the play wasn't as good. So they kept Todd Bowles. Hopefully he can get some of these defenses things straight and they can get the offense to be better too. I think he also got to remember they lost to awesome offensive minds two years in a row too. And I think they hit a few stale points on the offensive side of the ball as well. So let's see if Zach Robinson can help out the offense and let's see if the Bucs can be a better team. We'll see. There was some talk about maybe a coaching change. I don't know how close it came. I know that there were plenty of Buccaneers fans that wanted to make that change. When you see Liam Cohen and Dave Canales both go out the door, it's kind of like what happened with Lovey Smith and Dark Cutter, my good friend Dark Cutter who is still angry at me for daring to ask the question of whether or not it was a palace coup. Well, you are an MF-er. I didn't ask it that way. I didn't ask it that way. It was like, what do you say to those? Many are saying that it was an inside job. Many are saying, there's another guy to keep an eye on. Yeah. And I heard about this during the season. David Walker. Are you familiar with David Walker? David. Fourth round pick. Yeah. They drafted last year out of, I got to look up the school because it's not like one of the mainstream big schools. Where did they get David Walker from? I'm looking it up here. David Walker was a fourth round pick who tore his ACL early in training camp. They love David Walker. They have high hopes for David Walker. He wasn't able to play last year. He went to central Arkansas, but they think like he's going to be a potential superstar. And so help is on the way if David Walker lives up to what they saw from him in the off-season program in early in training camp before he suffered the torn ACL. And obviously, it's going to take him some time to get back to 100%. But that's a name to watch. It's a name to watch. Okay, look at you. De facto GM of the Bucks. All right. All right. Hey, David Walker. I'm just telling you what I hear. I'm not grinding. I'm not grinding. He's like, I'm grinding central Arkansas tape. That's for you to do, Jaworski. Thank you. I just pass along the shit that I hear. All right. Let's take a break. Will the Chiefs have a special package for Justin Fields when Patrick Mahomes returns from his torn ACL? That's next on PFT Live. Appreciate you not making fun of me right out of the gates for the senior moment that I had earlier. So for everybody out there, all right, Florida is pretty sharp as we know. But here we are a few minutes ago. Miles Simmons is here. Mike goes to me as we're sitting here. He goes, we got it though. We got the real we got it now. Yes. We wear the hot Mike senior moment. I don't know what the hell. You know what I was thinking that morning? I was thinking that morning and I won't say the F word. I'm freaking hot and it's only going to get worse. And when you're in that setting, and I think I have a touch of social anxiety when I'm around a lot of people. Okay. Like when I'm around a lot of people, I get a little like, you know, I'm I'm aware of it. Like we've seen it before people around. We've seen it before. There's too many people around. Yeah, what are you talking about? I've seen it before. I've seen it. I've seen it before. You know. Yeah. So so like and then it's like, Hey, here's this person. Here's this person is this person like and and I'm always sensitive to making sure that I'm not having a conversation with someone and another person's there. And I know the two people, but they don't know each other. So I'm always sensitive to that. Apparently, my filter was a little too thick. Yeah, apparently, as you guys know each other and have known each other. And I knew that. But it's in that setting where and I'm just it's just I'm trying to be courteous and make sure people know each other. You know, because I know how overwhelming it is when you're spot where I don't know these people. So so you handle those situations much better. Because you just like show up and start grabbing everyone. Yeah, the right solution. Yeah, just break the ice right away. Start grabbing. Hey, what's up? You jerk? You idiot? Hey, good to see you. Slap them on the back and move on with life. So you're not going to be moving to Arizona as you get older and retire or anything like that. Too hot for you. God, no, God, sorry, Arizona, but I'm never going back there. I heard they're doing there again next year. Have fun without me. LA off the list. Oh, wait, you're going next year for the Super Bowl. Arizona. Oh, you're off the list until the Super Bowl is there again. I just think that like I can go west of the Mississippi can go to hell. Wow, damn. I know that I think Minneapolis is probably west of the Mississippi. I think so. I don't know if it snakes up that way in Missouri. I don't know. But New Orleans right on the middle. I love New Orleans. I go to New Orleans. I know it gets hot in New Orleans, but it's not hot in March. Like let's do the league meetings in New Orleans. It always pings pongs, ping pongs back and forth between Florida and Arizona. But I heard out there that next year, there's back in AZ. Yeah, yeah, I heard that too. Yeah. Interesting. All right. I'll see you there. I haven't told you I'm never traveling again. I tell you I'm never you have you have you said comments like that before though, but they've they've turned out to be not true when then we get later on down one of these times. One of these times I'm going to mean it. Okay. One of these times are going to mean that I'm never going to travel again. Sure. That time maybe now we'll see. Okay. Andy Reed talked to the media last week when he was at the league meetings in Arizona and one of the topics obviously is what they plan to do with Justin Fields. Patrick Mahomes suffered the ACL injury week 15, I believe last year or it was December. Yeah, it was week 15, I think. Right around the middle of December. I believe so. It was at the end. Same day, Michael Parsons suffered his same day. Same day. Michael Parsons had his bad day. And yeah. And so the question is will Mahomes be ready for week one and the attraction to Justin Fields who they got for a pretty good deal financially, he's a guy that can play quarterback for them. And that's what Reed said. He's more than a gadget guy if Pat can't play for whatever reason, you've got a legitimate guy in there that can play and win games for you. And yeah, as backup quarterbacks go, look, Justin Fields has played a lot of football. No doubt a lot of games. That's right. This narrative has emerged that that he's just horrible. Well, he played for the Jets last year. Yeah. So the Jets will put a stain on you that is impossible to wash off. He was doing well in Pittsburgh so well that I thought they shouldn't put Russell Wilson on the field. Yeah. When he recovered from that hamstring injury. Remember, Wilson got injured in training camp and Fields took over and they were winning games. And I thought they should stick with Justin Fields. And and they wanted to bring Justin Fields back last year. The Jets overpaid him. But that Jets experience has caused everyone to just assume Justin Fields sucks. He doesn't know and the Chief saw that and they got a steal here and it's great insurance policy in a year where you've got your starting quarterback coming back from a torn ACL and nobody knows how that's going to play out. Yeah, totally. You said it right. There's experience there. He is tough. And then there are a place there in Kansas City who knows how to organize a team or an offensive attack around their quarterback strengths and weaknesses and kind of manage the game through that lens. So they're good there. And you're right. It's gotten probably a little too harsh on Justin Fields. And honestly, I've probably been a part of that a little bit because at times, yeah, you know, hey, your first round pick, you look at through the lens of a starting quarterback. And I know I had lots of weeks last year where, you know, I echoed some of the things that Woody Johnson said to go, you know, hey, I mean, yeah, it's hard to win or be a good offense when the quarterback won't throw the ball into some tight windows and make some of the throws that need to be made. So there's that. But still, he gets dragged, I think, a little bit more than he should. And at the very least, he is a really damn good backup that like you said, battle tested. And he's played a lot of football. He understands taking care of the football. And then of course, he's still a really damn good athlete off of that. So, you know, with the Kansas City Chiefs and the situation they're in, I certainly can understand them looking at Justin Fields and all that. But I will say, and I'll say again, and I'll say it one more time after this, number 15, Patrick Mahomes will be ready for week one. I would bet my house on it, you know? Yeah, I mean, absolutely. But the question is, but the question is, is he going to be running around laterally and changing direction and putting stress on that knee? No, not to the same capacity. It'll take some time for that. You're right about that. But if something happens, they have the insurance policy in Justin Fields and you mentioned Woody Johnson's comments, this doesn't get said enough. We live in an age where like the rich and powerful get a pass. They can say outlandish stuff and nobody ever says boo about it or the reaction is minimal to what it should be. The stuff that Woody Johnson said about Justin Fields last year was beyond unacceptable. And then they have the audacity to fight the players and their ability to create report cards because God forbid we might be offending the delicate sensibilities of the oligarchs. I just don't think that that got the appropriate attention it should have gotten. And I know that some folks with the Jets are sensitive anytime I criticize Woody. Well, you bought the team, you've run the team into the ground for the past 25 years, and somebody's got to say it. Well, it was just a stool of the time of a lot of stuff. So I feel like that's where it got like, you know, kind of to a degree, maybe swept under the rug because, yeah, Aaron Glenn wasn't handling things the right way. You know, the defense not being able to create a turnover with a new defense ahead coach became a thing. And it just felt like, oh my gosh, it's just a stew of craziness with the Jets. And that I feel like maybe got a little lost with, yeah, with what Woody said there. I want Justin Fields to do well as you're just to kind of stick it to Woody a little bit. So not that I don't want Patrick Holmes to be able to play all 17 games, but Justin Fields does get an opportunity. If he does get an opportunity, I hope he does well, because that stain, that mark on his career where people think he stinks now, that has a lot to do with the team that he played for last year. And look, nobody forced him to sign with the Jets. They gave him 30 million guaranteed, but it didn't work well for him. No, and it's like what we always talk about. Andrew Luck. Yeah, I was just saying, it's like we always talk about, we just, we talk about this all the time. In the quarterback, yeah, we, for some reason, we've just anointed them all Superman. They need help. They need help. And you look like crap when you're around crap, like I always say. And that's kind of what happened to Justin Fields there. Yep. Hello. Well, they're giving Geno Smith another shot. Isn't that beautiful? It's amazing. Maybe one of these days they'll bring back Sam Darnold. Maybe they'll bring back Justin Fields. Maybe they'll bring back Joe Namath. Who knows? All right. Andrew Luck is not coming back to the NFL. His retirement occurred in 2019. A former teammate has given a version about what happened behind the scenes and Luck disagrees with it, but it's still worth discussing. It's a little juicy. That's next on PFT Live. Tuesday edition of PFT Live, April 7th, 16 days away from the draft. It was in August of 2019. I remember exactly where I was when it happened because I thought somebody's Twitter account had been hacked. Andrew Luck abruptly retires just days before the start of the 2019 season. It became an issue again because his former Colts teammate, Eric Ebron, a first round pick of the Lions in 2014 when they could have had Aaron Donald, by the way. Ebron had ended up with the Colts by 2019. And here is his version of how Andrew Luck's retirement came about. Andrew then decides that he's so tired of, he don't tell nobody this, this is the back story. He's so tired of injury and he just doesn't want to do surgery. You know who the man is around there that gets on everybody's nerves. Big draws over there behind that disc. He tells Andrew, this is word bro. He tells Andrew, you're either playing this year or we're moving on. Who the f*** would tell Andrew Luck that? Right? That's great. That's great. Andrew Luck now says, I'm not going to be ready. I'm tired of playing with pain. I retire. We all find that out what week three and we play in the Chicago Bears. Mid game. Mid game. We find out we're not going to have our starting quarterback for that year. Now, I will say this. It was bullcrap that someone leaked to Schefter during the game, during the preseason game that Andrew Luck was retiring because that created some ugliness as he was walking off the field. I've never heard any suggestion that Chris Ballard, and we know Chris. Does Chris seem like the kind of guy that's going to say to Andrew Luck either play this year or we're moving on? Is he really going to say that to Andrew Luck? Well, yeah, I think there's two things here. I mean, two things. The first thing is we're in this business and the fact that we've never heard that story before, yeah, makes me want to throw the challenge flag. I mean, I just do those. There's not even a whisper. Those are the kind of stories. Again, like, you know, time would tell me that I find the story, that story out of 100 out of 100 times, 100. I'm batting 1000 on stuff like that. Not that I'm breaking the story or anything like that, but shortly after it happens, I talked to somebody who's talked to somebody or I've talked to the somebody and when I went down like so that I've never heard that. So that's why it's hard for me to believe that the second part is what you said. Exactly right. Forget Chris Ballard. I don't think it's in his way of doing it. I don't think any GM would say that to Andrew Luck, one of the five best quarterbacks in football at the time. Hey, we're going to give you an ultimatum. One of the five best players in football. Like I just have a hard time buying that one right there. So maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'll find out something different. But yeah, that doesn't seem like it adds up to me all the way there. And by the way, I failed to mention Big Drawers is Chris Ballard. I did not know that was his nickname, but from now on, I will refer to him as Big Draws. But this is the kind of thing where it's been seven years now. It'll be seven as of August. We've never heard this. There have been enough people who have come and gone from the cults that it would be out there at some point. Somebody would have reported it. It would have been a Sunday splash report for some cults home game. Something would have happened. Someone would have leaked it. Someone would have talked about it. It's too big of a deal for something like that to stay quiet for that long. So it's entirely possible that Eric E. Braun is misinformed about what actually happened. And that happens too. I'm misinformed all the time. I mean, we've already just have you met Miles, so people can make mistakes. Well, the biggest thing we know is I've been misinformed is that, I mean, Andrew Luck kind of debunked it right away. So that to me is like, I forgot to mention that. Ding, ding, ding, like Andrew Luck saw that and sent an email in and was like, no, that's wrong. So, and I'm paraphrasing, of course, but yeah, I mean, that's, yeah, go ahead. He told Mike Chapel of Fox 59. Chris and I had a wonderful relationship, especially through my decision to retire and we remain close. Any notion of internal pressures that influenced my decision are without merit. That's Andrew Luck. Yeah. So, there's the answer. Dearest mother, Chris and I had a wonderful partnership, especially through my decision to retire. All right, break time. He sent me, he sent me squirrel oil. More PFT Live right after this. Tuesday edition of PFT Live. So the Vikings do not have a general manager. Oceano-Pomensi was abruptly fired five weeks after the season ended. They have decided to get through this free agency and draft period with Rob Brzezinski, long time employee of the front office, tap and contracts expert. He's in charge of stabilizing everything. It's going to be more juice for Kevin O'Connell. They're not going to even start their search for a new GM until after the draft. And that makes sense. Yeah, totally. The draft is coming. Right. I saw that and it's like certain things, certain things and I'm sensitive to this because anytime I post something that someone doesn't like, the response is slow news day. And I used to respond to that on social media by saying slow life day because if you're taking the time to point out that you think it's a slow news day, maybe you should find something else to do. But this is an example of a slow news day. I mean, I didn't like, did we really think that they're going to start interviewing candidates who are getting ready for the draft in their own cities before the draft? So yeah. Yeah. Come in here and disrupt our whole process right now and then we'll just send everything into a spiral. Right? Yeah. That's right. They're doing the right thing here. Waited out. They got a Brazinski there like you talked about. You got Kevin O'Connell who's been around the block that's going to be watching film and be able to help. You got a Brian Flores who's a defensive genius. So you can lean on some coaches there too who have backgrounds and evaluating and know how to like and know how to do that a little bit too. So yeah, I don't think this is a situation where you look at it and go, oh no, the Vikings don't have a GM. They might really mess up the draft here. No, they'll be absolutely fine with whatever they do here. And I'm curious to see how this front office is going to be structured. Is it going to be that O'Connell is basically in charge and the GM is the table setter? I don't know. I don't know. And I know Vikings fans freak out when I go there, but and it sure feels like Kevin O'Connell got got steamrolled last year on the quarterback situation and history proved him right. Yeah. And I think that to the victor go the spoils and that's just the way that it works. Yeah. All right, let's take a break. We'll wrap up this Tuesday edition of PFT Library after this. Tuesday edition of PFT live. There was a comment yesterday, I think, for me in Rapaport of NFL Network or ESPNFL. I think they should just go by ESPNFL. Then we'll all understand that NFL Network now owned and operated by ESPN. He said that Miles Garrett's not expected to be at the offseason program this year in Cleveland, but basically nothing to see here. I still think that there are people out there who are kind of like, yeah, or the Browns just trying to set something up. I kind of feel like that. To get maximum. Yeah. Right. We have no intention to trade Miles Garrett. It feels like that a little bit, just getting the best offer realizing this guy's got finite years left in his prime. We aren't going to be any better anytime soon. Let's get the picks that we pissed away. Sorry, London. On to Sean Watson. Let's get some infrastructure young picks to provide the nucleus of a team that we're going to take into a new stadium. Yeah. I mean, I've kind of been part of that. That just, it seems a little, I don't know. I don't want to say fishy, but yeah, it just feels like it's being set up in some degree to maybe be able at least have the possibility to trade a Miles Garrett. I have echoed the thing you just said, you know, he's their greatest bargaining chip. They're not going anywhere right now. They're kind of retooling their team. They could kind of set the table for themselves going into the future and get more now than ever before. So that, that's where you look at it. But yeah, there's parts of me that feels like it's like Davante Adams with the Raiders ish type of feel Mike there at the very end. And maybe that is the case. Maybe they'll, they'll like get this year started. And we had talked about that recently. If things go sideways, maybe they will accommodate him, but it just feels kind of off and nothing to see here. Maybe there is something to see there. Nothing more to see here. We're done until tomorrow morning. See you. See you. You crazy bastards.