Stephen Jones on George Pickens Contract + Ravens President on Max Crosby Trade (3/31 Hour 2)

and we're just not going to comment as we move forward on negotiations on on where that stands or anything like that. Do you have any idea whether he will show up or answered your question? Cowboys. Cowboys executives usually like to talk. Certain subjects they know they know last year they completely bungled the Mike Aparson situation to the point where they ruined the relationship and the only way out of checkmate was to trade him. They thought I believe they were going to keep him for the fifth year of his contract. They were going to deal with the franchise tag this year, kick the can sign him then get him for 25 million last year. I truly believe that's what they were trying to do. They acted like they wanted the sign and they didn't want to. They wanted to get through 2025. He called their bluff. He wasn't going to play and they realized they were screwed. And now they're in another mess with George Pickens. The facts are different because he's franchise tagged. They only have until July 15 to do a multi-year deal, but they've at least learned to shut the hell up. And it's not good for us if they shut the hell up, but they've at least learned nothing good comes from running your mouth about any of this stuff. And I think they're scared that they're going to screw it up again. Well, I mean, it's a dicey situation. I think they know what they're dealing with and George Pickens that he sees about his business. I think they know that he's extremely talented. They know where the wide receiver market is. They know what that number is probably going to have to be to pay a guy like George Pickens. He is a big time difference maker. And yeah, they're in a little spot. You trade it for the guy hoping you would be in this spot. But sometimes it's crazy with Dallas or you're just like, wait, it all happened. So what's the plan now? And I think you're exactly right. I wouldn't be shocked if we hear from Stephen Jones on this subject, the majority of the time from here on out. I think so. I wouldn't be shocked if they look at last year and are like, hey, Jerry, you know, hey, you know, dad, you're awesome. We like you. But you said some things that kind of made the situation harder on us last year. And I think we all know that. And I think people in the league know that. So maybe that's where it's going to be the new approach. And maybe they let Stephen kind of handle these situations. That's about as, I don't know, straightforward as Kurt. Stephen Jones is one of the more polite guys, no matter what. I mean, we're guys here sometimes and we bash the Cowboys and we question some of the things that Jones family does. They don't bat an eye when they see us. They're always polite. They're nice as hell. They handle the criticism the right way. And he's always that way. But I think the way he handled that right there just tells you how serious the situation is. Well, they typically don't bristle at the things we say because they don't care as long as we're saying things. That's true too. And I go back to, I was talking to Clarence Hill about this yesterday. I did a little video with him. He's with Aldalis.com. And the Sunday ticket trial from two years ago that is still pending on appeal and the NFL could still end up owing $14 billion by the time it's all said and done to a nationwide class of residents and bar owners who have been paying way too much for Sunday ticket traditionally than they should have to. Jerry testified in that case and the testimony was riveting. He wants to be interesting. That's it. Yeah. He knows there's value in being interesting and he doesn't care if people don't like him. He knows that people will tune in and watch if it's interesting. And when the cowboys get themselves into these contract tug of wars, it's interesting. Yeah. And I think they learned last year, there's a point where it's no longer interesting. There's a point where it's problematic. Yes. Better off, even though it's in our best interests as carnival barkers and ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, children of all ages, step right up for the greatest show on earth. No, not with this. We got nothing to say because they know they are in a problem. And it's their fault. They let it go too long. The moment that Jerry did his whole thing about it was poetry. It was an opera. It was a ballet. The day after the Monday night game against the Raiders. That's the day they should have sent down and said, Let's do it. Let's get it done now. Right. We'll give you 36 right now. Let's do it. 36 a year. When you take it, you don't have any money. 40 would have been good. Probably. Because now it's gone up to 42. Yes. It's going to go up. And then of course there's the Pukka Nakuwa dynamic. We talked about that with Lesnead yesterday. I mean, he's definitely worthy to where this could go up even more. Puka certainly could be 43. So that's where this is all going to be interesting. But I think to your point and what we're both saying here is, I think the Jones family is smart enough. They've done a they got an eye for talent. That's the one thing I'll say about the Jones family. They really do. And I do think with all the things you said, yeah, they like the attention. But at the same time, I think attention at some point goes overboard. Like we talked about last year where I kept going, the circus doesn't win Super Bowls. It doesn't happen. And that's what happened last year. And I think as much as they like attention and want to make money and do all that, I'm still going to be one. And I think you've turned a little bit to where Jerry wants to get that trophy and go screw all you screw. I mean, that's what he wants to do. Right. I was going to really go after it there. And he'll be like, Hey, for you, shove it. Like he wants to do that. So that's where I think they are trying to find that balance. And so he could say, Jimmy Johnson, look what I got. I do believe that. And father time, as we know, is knocking on the door and they want these results. He's knocking the grid. Yeah, he's rocking on your door. I mean, damn, you forgot who I was yesterday and miles. So that was a rough day for you. I mean, senile old man moment for you yesterday. Those of you who, you know, the crew found that very entertaining. They loved it. They're all laughing. You just made the list. The book written by Mark Lipovich some seven or eight years ago called big game. Took a look at the NFL. There is a very memorable comment in there from Jerry Jones about how he viewed shoes when he was trying to sell the shoes. And I think of that comment now as it relates to that trophy. And I'll just leave it there. Anybody that knows what I'm talking about is enjoying that. I'll tell you, I'll tell you, I'll tell you during the break. I'll show you the PFT post during the break with the quote from Mark Lipovich's book with an extent that was when he went on the bus and they were drinking tumblers full of Johnny Walker blue. And he like passed out on the bus and Jerry drank him, you know, under the bus. So anyway, here's why we react and recover from that. Here's Brian Schottenheimer, the Cowboys head coach on his star receiver who is currently not under contract. Hey, look, GP loves it here. We love GP. We have plans for GP to be here for a long time. So we'll let the business side of this thing play out and see where it goes. Regarding him being available though for the offseason program, mini camp OTAs, any experiences that he'll be around. No, and I haven't pushed that on him. I mean, again, we're all going through the process. It's almost April. We're still a couple of weeks away. It's going to play out the way it plays out. Again, it's all voluntary. So you'll see where it goes. Well, it's not voluntary if you're not under contract. If not a contract, not employee. It's only voluntary for the people who are employed. He doesn't have to show up at all. George Pickens is no more employed by the Cowboys than Chris or me. Now the difference is will never be. George ideally will be again, but that's the mess they have. And this goes back to that weird issue with the calculation of the franchise tag. And it's not true for every position. I did a breakdown at some point before the start of free agency looking at every position. For some of them, like center, which is why the Ravens didn't tag Tyler Linderbaum. It is a tag that was not is now, but was dramatically ahead of the market for centers because it's the the full offensive line, highest paid players average together. Right. So the tackles make it much higher than it should be. But for receiver, it's the most dramatic gap between where the market is and what the tag is. 27.2 versus 42.2, a $15 million gap. And the Cowboys are taking advantage of it and they have every right to do it under the CBA. But this is the point I always try to make for the fans. The franchise tag number one, it's horrible. It's awful. It restricts players who deserve more money from getting what they should. But it's a card that the owners are allowed to play. And once the owners play that card, the player has cards like I'm not going to show up for anything. And the water Jones situation from 20 years ago, he did three straight tags where he didn't show up for anything until right before the start of the season. And he still got his full salary and then they did it again the next year and they did it again the third year and the third year they finally signed a long term deal. But the player has every right to not show up for anything until right before the start of the season and you get your full money. And the only risk you're taking is they'll they'll yank the franchise tag out from under you. I doubt that George Pickens is concerned about anyone yanking the franchise tag because I think teams will find. I know the budgets have been busted. The Cowboys vowed to bust their budgets. I'm still waiting to see evidence of a busted budget. But any other team out there that has any interest in George Pickens would find a way to pay him if he became available. Would agree. The players don't have any avenues to negotiate like we've talked about. So yeah, they have to play hardball. Something that had to be the unpopular guy. That's the big thing. This is one where we always talk about, yeah, the franchise tag is a tool for the owners and the team. And it helps them. But this is one where it honestly feels like it works against them with with how they're you know if this was a franchise tag that was more close to what at the market was going to be. Maybe you could get somebody like George Pickens to go. Oh wait, it's one year 40 million. OK, I'll wait the year and go next year. But the fact that it's 27 and he's going. Wait, what? I'm the man. I'm one of the three or four best receivers in football. You guys saw it. Jerry, you said all those damn things about me. I mean, turn on the film. Teams are doubling me. They're not doubling CD lamb. I'm the man. And that's where the price tag and the franchise tag for the wide receiver positions really going to hurt Dallas in this one where if it was closer to the market price, I feel like you might have a better chance of maybe being able to sway a guy like George Pickens to do it one year. And you can understand that. But when you're that below market price, the hell with that. Here's where it also becomes problematic. The last time they had to receive under the franchise tag, it was Des Bryant some 10, 11 years ago. And at the time, the franchise tag was close enough to the market to allow the usual formula for turning the franchise tag into a long term deal to apply. And that means taking this year's franchise tag number and next year's at a 20 percent increase by rule, slapping it together and making it fully guaranteed at signing. And then you fill out the rest of the contract from there. For Pickens, that would mean 60 million over two years. That's not good enough. Exactly. It's not good enough. That's not nearly good enough. It's messed up. Yeah. I don't know. Again, if there's, we know the long term deals done at the very least, I look at it and just go, there is no F and way George Pickens is playing for $27 million a year. So Cowboys, maybe you're going to have to, you know, as we always talk about here, sprinkle the pot. Ketete, KGB style. Is there something like that? I don't know. Hey, here's the franchise tag. We'll add 10 million on top of it for the year and give you 38 and maybe then we'll work on a deal as the season goes. We'll see. But again, there's no way George Pickens is playing for that price tag and he shouldn't. He shouldn't step on a field. And yeah, this is one where the franchise tag does hurt the team a little bit. On the issue of franchise tag versus long term deal, another quote from Stephen Jones where he actually said a little something as it relates to the philosophical question of playing under the tag versus getting that long term deal. Here he is. I respect that everybody would like to have a long term deal. Obviously teams around the league use it. Teams around the league, players around the league have played under a tag. As you said, it's a lot of money. Certainly. But at the same time, I also understand why players won a long term deal. We've had a lot of players here in Dallas that have, you know, including our quarterback, the most valuable guy to the franchise has played under a tag. So we certainly understand it and respect it. But we also know it's part of, you know, part of the salary cap and part of putting the team together. You know, I say this with all due discretion and respect for whoever asked the question that acknowledged the franchise tag is a lot of money. I'd really like to find that person and punch him in the nuts. Because it's part of what Frank and it may be my friend Clarence Hill. I don't know. But I don't like feeding into the narrative that so many fans swallow that. Why are you complaining? You're making a lot of money. Yeah. Well, George Pickens ship has come in. And if he were able to become an unrestricted free agent this year, he would have gotten 43, 44. I don't know. Tyler Linderbaum, a player who would have been franchise tagged, but wasn't because that's the one position where it's better to not be from a team standpoint. He busted the market by 50%. I don't think George Pickens is getting 60 million a year, but he's getting at least 40. And this was his chance to get it. But now he's going to have to play out the year under the tag and carry the risk of injury and maybe next year get tagged again at 32 million. Yeah. And maybe his ship is never going to come in. That's why you got a strike now. So that's it. And you got one shot. Yes. Other than a quarterback, he got one shot and his shot has been delayed by a year. And I still, even the fans that understand it, they still say, yeah, but they're still making more than we are. Screw them. They're still getting paid to play a kid's game. So screw them. And for some of those people, I'm never going to reach them. No. But we need to understand at some level, half the money goes to the owners, half goes to the players. And I know it's a cap system, but the market is the market is to a set. And he was at and market and he got paid 53 million. Shouldn't have, but he did the market is the market. That's what it is. Period. I mean, I don't want to hear about it. And that's where it does stink that there is the public narrative sometimes with the fans because he go fans. You live by that credo of the market. You don't sell your house and go, well, I bought it for this. And, you know, I don't want to sell it, you know, too much because, you know, I sold it for a low. I bought it for a low number. And I mean, if I sell it and try to sell it for way more, I mean, that's just not that's not nice to do the people like what? No, you're going to go with a no, I bought it for this. The market's this now. And that's what we're selling it for. And you want to buy it? That's what the market is tough shit that it cost this 10 years ago or eight years ago. And that's where I think people just sometimes you go, yeah, they don't realize it until it hits home in their own life. But this is their only chance, like you say, this is a short span of your life. And this is the greatest talent some of these people have and these guys in the NFL have. And this is their only chance to make their money off their great talent they have. This is not a doctoral lawyer or somebody else and go, I'm 60 and I'm still working and going and making money. And, and yeah, so it's a different aspect here. And you got to have a little love for the players and these situations. I revert to the days when I was just a fan and I didn't understand the business and I just wanted any and all contract issues to be over. I didn't want anybody holding out. Yeah, I didn't want. I remember there was a year when Anthony Carter wasn't happy with this contract with the Vikings and you just want it to be over whatever it takes just to end it. And I see how that can easily be skewed into against the player pro the team rooting for the laundry. Full strength. I want to say you're going to ruin our year. And I understand that. But there's a personal element that everybody got. And that's the thing we try to get people to understand that the players, they're the ones that we tune into watch. We don't tune in for cutaways to the owners. We tune in to watch the games. The players deserve to get what they can get while they can get it. If we've learned nothing else over the last 16 years as we become more sensitive to player health and safety, it should be that we need to understand they need to get paid when they can, what they can. And George Pickens is simply trying to do that, not with a not with a one year franchise tag with a long term deal that gives him multiple years of security that gives him something close to what he would get if he would have gone to the open market. That's the problem with the franchise tag. It artificially keeps players from getting to the open market to get like what Tyler Linderbaum got 27 million a year when the market was 18. That really is. That's the dream. Yeah, and it may have been stupid by the raiders, but that's what happens when a great player is available. There's a chance that one of the 32 teams is going to do something stupid. Yeah, that's right. And at times when there's a the stars align the right way, and there's a guy that's an awesome football player, and he's a part of a team that's pretty good and towards the top of the league almost every year. Yeah, the team that's at the bottom of the league and kind of has a bad reputation might have to overpay to sway that guy over there. And that's what happened in this instance. And yeah, now it breaks the market. It changes the game. And I thought that's what we're about free enterprise capitalism. I thought that's what we're all about in this country. Let's take a break. One return. The NFL did something yesterday. It has never ever, ever done before. And it doesn't involve Jerry Jones and his shoes. That's next on PFT Live. Tuesday edition of PFT Live the last day of March. Let me be the first to wish our Greek friends, Kalomina. You know that is the traditional greeting for the first day of the month. Did you know that? Kalomina. That's what the Greeks tell each other on the first day of the month. It's like good luck. Have a good month. I did not know that. Yeah, you're full of mishmash today. Yes, I am full of something today. The NFL made an announcement yesterday around dinner time that it's kind of surprising. They have announced not just one, but two years of preseason hard knocks. They've never ever announced a year in advance. And they rarely don't announce it this early for the year that they're doing it. There's been speculation like into June, who's the team going to be? And they used to have rules that would exempt certain teams. And then like the Jets who did it three years ago, they had no desire to do it. I think everybody understands now if we're going to do this thing, you're going to get tapped on the shoulder. Yeah, once every three decades, you're getting tapped on the shoulder to do this. Just shut up and do it. So the Seahawks who have never done it ever, they're doing it this year. And the Patriots who have never done it and would never do it as long as Bill Belichick was there, although he wanted to do the offseason hard knocks because it would have been a great way to sell his team as long as he can control everything. And his girlfriend owns the rights and that caused it all to fall apart. But he never would have done it as coach of the New England Patriots, a Patriots who are doing it in 27. So the two Super Bowl teams from this year are the next two subjects of hard knocks, which I don't even know who watches it anymore. I still do. I kind of watch. I watched the first episode or two. Like if there's a newsy issue with the Bills last year, James Cook, hold in. What are they going to do? Right? Once they got that deal done, they're like, how do they handle it? Do they even talk about it? Do they look the other way? Once they got it signed, I forgot about it. We're into the preseason and off we go. And in season last year, I didn't watch any of it. You know, in season, I will say I don't think I did either. I kind of meant to. But yeah, I don't think I did. I still do enjoy it. And I probably will watch in season at some point. I mean, it's a good thing, especially in the middle of the week, no football on. That's kind of what I take it as. And yeah, there's little inklings. And it's not maybe the same show it once was because, you know, the coaches and everybody a little more paranoid about what's being shown out there. But when I first read this yesterday, I was I didn't even realize I was like, wait, are two teams doing hard knocks this year? I didn't realize we were talking about two years in advance. So I was like, oh, that's kind of cool. And then when we got here today and I was kind of looking through the rundown, I was like, oh, what? It's two separate years. So yeah, the NFL, the Grim Reaper finally came calling. They're like, you guys have avoided this show long enough. We're putting you down. You have no choice. And, you know, oddly enough, it's the two teams that were in the Super Bowl. There aren't many teams that haven't done it. Some teams have done it twice. Remember the Rams and Chargers did together in the pandemic year of 2020. And now they do in season for a full division. They realized it was too much of a distraction to impose that on one team. And again, like I know in season didn't do well last year because the first time ever I got a PR email from somebody trying to spin me to cover it. It's like I didn't even respond. It's like it's football season. Like I there's football and and unless it's going to be as compelling as the Giants off season hard knock. Misadventure was which they've never done again because it was too good. It was so good. It was bad for the Giants. That's the thing. And that's that's that's the reality. It's never a documentary. It's an infomercial, a true documentary where the subject of it has no control over the final product. That is what I'd want to watch. That is never going to happen for the NFL. It is controlled by the teams. I remember when people surprised like when Brian Billick, the coach of the Ravens, who was the first hard knocks team in 2001. When he said years later, oh, we had final say over everything. People are like, oh, really? Yeah. Yeah, really? That's why the Jets got dragged because they allowed that scene to be included in 2010 where Antonio Cremardi couldn't remember the names of his kids. All the Jets had to say is don't show that. Take that out. Take out Mike Tannenbaum trying to catch a punt and doing a backward flip. Although that's actually pretty good. Kudos to the Jets for letting that in. All the Jets turn was great. They won all the Emmys that year because Rex Ryan was the perfect figure for that environment. Yeah, you didn't give it down. And they're also going to do quarterback again this year. Now, if they're doing it this year, that means they already know who the quarterback is. So I haven't heard. No, I know. That's one right. I'm amazed by that. I mean, we've seen some high profile quarterbacks do it. That'd be something I can tell you just from my own personal life. I would want no part of that if I was playing in an NFL season. I was amazed that my homes did the first one and then to win the Super Bowl with the cameras following you around the whole year. That was incredible. We've seen Joe Burrow do it. But as a whole, yeah, I still think there's a lot of quarterbacks that are reluctant to be put in that situation. I mean, I think last year we had to have a right like Peyton Manning had a call Joe Burrow be like, Hey, you know, and kind of and kind of work it a little bit. But do I think Peyton Manning or Tom Brady back in their prime would want to do something like quarterback? Absolutely not. Tom Brady would not have done it. Tom Brady would have stopped. If somebody would have called Tom Brady and said, Hey, there's a flight football tournament in Saudi Arabia, Tom Brady would have said, No, I'm not doing that. Oh, we moved to LA. I'm still not doing it. I got to focus on my prep for the season. Yeah. And yeah, Peyton Manning wouldn't have been distracted by any of that. You just don't want that. You don't want those prying eyes. And Brady wouldn't have done it because he knew that that or he knew that Bill Belichick would have missed down upon him. Right. And it'd be an issue. That's a tough thing to do. But he did do that Tom versus time thing. But that was that was full control, full control and complete control. And I think that's the end of his career a little bit to where I think he finally felt like, OK, I've worked enough cash here to do this and not have my coach rag on me all the time. I think I passed that point. It is a different era, though. We'll see. Some of these, you know, some of these young kids and the younger players in the NFL. I mean, you know, I got a daughter in college and a son in high school where just the camera and that stuff just does not bother them anymore. Things that I would have been embarrassed about at that age growing up because they're always on a camera or friends taking a video or whatever. I do think that the younger generation of football players a little bit more numb to that maybe than, you know, older guys like me. Well, it's another example of how this damn thing has changed the world. Yeah. When I was a kid, we used to envision a future with flying cars. I don't know. We're going to get there. Maybe we are futuristic cities. All the old buildings torn down the Jetsons. And the one thing that we didn't really envision now they had the Dick Tracy wristwatch, which was a TV. Yeah. And so we're kind of there. But carrying around this device that does freaking everything. And it's now just part of your life and you're going to take a picture of this and you're going to take a video of that every time you get a nice looking plate of food. What's it? What do you do? You take a picture of me? I don't. But sure. Yeah. I do. I don't. I don't put on social media. I send it to like my wife or my son. Like yesterday I got the text from my wife. Hey, look, I'm eating. Here's my food. Have you seen this before? This is food. But it looks sometimes like a nice presentation. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's where I don't think I'm ever going to break fully into that. You know what I should have done yesterday? I should have taken a picture of my bag. You're very impressed with that. They got me ready to go. They got me ready to go. I did have breakfast today. You know what? Not feel good and sitting in your damn hotel room last night? Yesterday was bad. Yesterday was bad. I failed to eat. I should have eaten. We had a good breakfast today at the hotel. I should have taken a picture. If I would have known how much you enjoyed pictures of food, I would have taken a picture of you. It was a really good breakfast. Save yourself. Screw off with your pictures. All right. Thank you. All right. You have just unlocked the new universe of nonstop pictures. They are going to launch a pro flag football league for men and women. It's going to start in 2028 as a run up to the Olympics. The new fantasy or new. I keep saying, you do that too. I want to say fantasy football. The new flag football league has a $32 million. You messed this up too. You got it in my head. It's your fault. You said it too. We both said it. The new flag football league got a $32 million commitment from NFL and former players including Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Eli Manning, Learford, Gerald, Steve Young and others. It starts again in 2028. Some people believe, and I don't know whether I buy this. They think that eventually the NFL is going to be flag football. I think it's the fallback in the event that they ever discover a way to diagnose CTE in a living patient because to this day you can't detect it in anything but someone who has died so nobody who's alive knows that they have it. If there would be some horrible finding about the perils of head trauma, concussions, the subconcussive hits, thousands of those happened during the course of the game. Could there be some hybrid of tackle and flag? I don't know. Could flag be the emergency option in the event that, hey, they made a run at football. Teddy Roosevelt saved football in the early 1900s. They were going to outlaw football and they came up with a way to make it safer. Guys were dying all the time playing football. Flag becomes the, hey, if all else fails, we can still do this. I think the more likely reality is this is the way to infiltrate other countries. You don't need all the helmets. You don't need all the pads. You don't need 22 people. You only need 10. And you need minimal equipment. You need a ball that looks like a kid's ball and you need the flags. That's it. You don't need to play it because like we've talked about with the flag football anyways and you talk to any of the coaches, it's like, well, yeah, it's not real football. You need a whole team of slot receivers and corners. That's all it should be. Linebackers, defensive tackles, big tight ends. You don't really need it. So that's where it's not real football. But regardless what this does on the world stage and again, part of growing it everywhere internationally, I love that. That's great too. I'm just interested. Yeah, we're going to launch the pro flag league and it's going to be in the run up to the Olympics and wait. I mean, again, just who's going to play in the Olympics is one of these teams going to be that good that they can challenge the USA team. Where does it go? I'm kind of I am, even though it's not real football, interested to see the NFL's approach to how we tackle the Olympics and launch this and its first ever Olympic appearance. And do we do it and go wait? We actually want the best flag people or do we want the, oh, yeah, we want them to be pretty good at flag, but we want them to be a big name and a star to blow up the sport a little bit and make it a thing. And that's to me the, the fine balance are going to have to find here. Sean Payton was asked today about his experience coaching a flag football team. I haven't read this yet. One of my writers heard some funny stories. He had some comments about it. Let me just paraphrase this. It was humbling. He said, remember the Home Alone series? Macaulay Culkin was inside the house. Macaulay Culkin was the international team. And I felt like you guys really, I felt like we were the two guys outside getting hit in the head with the iron and tripping over the garden hose. It's an entirely different game. They were the wet bandits. It's an entirely different game. It was kind of cool to be around those guys. That was a big deal. When this was announced, there was a feeling it would be 10 NFL players on the roster. I'd be surprised if there's one. I think we have plenty of players that can acclimate, but it's going to take a month or two. If you're one of those players, do you have that month or two? If you're trained for that, you're not training for the other. I think it's in that avenue where they can play football. And that's the bottom line. Yeah. And I was told by Scott Hallenbeck, the executive director and CEO of USA Football last week, they're going to send out forms to current NFL players to see who's truly interested and willing to make the commitment. Yeah, that's going to be the big thing. The commitments are the thing. You've got to make the commitment. You've got to learn the game. You've got to get the reps. And are you willing to take your own personal time? Exactly. Before you get into a time where football starts. And on top of it, take the risk. We saw the videos of Joe Burrow, the jump stop, the pressure on his knee falling down, diving into the end zone. Who's going to want to take the risk that they may get an injury that will screw up their ability to get the most out of their football career? Here's the other aspect. I don't think anybody's talked about this yet. One of the Olympics. I mean, I know they're 2028. I got that. But one of the Olympics, right? Are they late July? Yes, they're late July. They are right before. You're telling me right around the time of training camp. You're telling me, God, just again, poor hamstring or just, you know, you're going to miss the first few days of training camp or we get to training camp and the coach has to go, hey, you know, you rest up a little bit. I know you've been, you know, doing flag football. I'm going to be interested to see who signs up and who goes at it to now. Only thing I'll dispute with what Sean Payton said there is that I do think for a DB or a slot receiver, if you're practicing flag football, it does kind of correlate to what you still have to do on the NFL football field. So that to me where it's not a stretch to go, Oh, wait, you have to do something totally different here. No, it's still going to be receivers running routes and corners, shifting their hips and flipping and trying to cover people. And that does correlate to what they have to do on a real football field. But everybody else, it's not exactly that, especially not the quarterbacks. The quarterback plays different, very different plays different quarterback play would scare me. It's not realistic. Most people will tell you and coaches even right now when they run seven on seven, they go, I don't like seven on seven because it gets my quarterbacks in bad habits because there's nobody to hit you. So you're like, Oh, I'll, I'll pat the ball one extra time or who I he's about to come open. And that's just not realistic football. And that's where I would be, you know, a little concerned to if I was a quarterback thinking about it. And if you spend all that time learning how to grab a flag, does that screw up your muscle memory when it's time to put someone on their ass? Yeah, I don't know. Yeah. I remember when I was a kid and look, I had a very limited and glorious athlete career, you were an inglorious bastard. That's right. Yeah. And a glorious one. I can remember when baseball season started and basketball season had ended. Yeah, I can remember like being in the outfield and having like my glove and thinking I run. Yeah, like your brain is completely miswired. Like something's wrong here. I'm supposed to be doing this while I'm running. And I think at some level when you unlearn the way that you've always approached an opponent, and you're doing the O. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. But it's just something that we've never considered before. And look, we've talked about this. Strategic reverses star referee. Our bosses are going to want the star players there. Yeah, they're going to want to market Patrick Mahomes, and they're going to want to market the star players. They're going to want to market the star players. They're going to want to market the star players. They're going to want to market the star players. They're going to want to market the star players. They're going to want to market the star players. Yeah, that's the other part of it. They got a chance to be embarrassed. You know, you just to me the most important thing is if we're going to start this sport and make it a part of the Olympics and do it on American soil, the number one thing is we should start at the right way and win. That's the number one thing when it's we will the USA football and the NFL players will become kind of a meme if they go into this don't win and everybody's going to look at the Americans, the NFL, they started a little football. Their guys can't even beat the, you know, these guys from this country or whatever else. So they got to be careful of that as well. Well, and you're right. And look, the current team is good enough to just show up and run circles around them because they showed up and ran circles around the NFL players. Although by the final game, yeah, it got a little game. It, it, it was closer. Yes, that was Shanahan's team. The final game, they started to figure it out. We need to remember if he shows up today, we need to remember to ask him about that. He's showing up. They figured it out. They figured it out by the time they got to the last game and the final score was 24 14. And I think if they had a little more time, they might have figured out a way how to win that game. All right, let's take a break. Are the Ravens concerned about the fallout from the failed Max Crosby trade? We'll discuss that next on this Tuesday edition of PFT Live. One, I think is a slow, slow news cycle. I don't want to at all downplay the experience that that Max had come that we all had. Raiders, Ravens, Max, our locker room. As Eric said, we were just incredible excited and just as equally, if not more disappointed that we weren't able to pull off that transaction and bring Max to Baltimore. I understand if Sasha Brown, the Ravens president was saying it was a slow news cycle when it happened or it's a slow news cycle now. It's hardly a slow news cycle now because everybody's here and news is being created with every comment that coaches and GMs and owners make. It was a start of free agency. It was a start of free agency. Now, I've told you this and I know it was frenetic and it was hectic and there were a lot of moves. It was a lackluster free agency as it relates to names. When Malik Willis and Tyler Linderbaum are the two big names, it is not your usual free agency. Max Crosby was the thing that made everybody say, oh crap, when I got the text from a friend of mine of a screenshot of the Raiders tweet that the Ravens have backed out of the trade. I said that's funny. I mean, will you leave me alone? I got stuff going on here. No, what are you talking about? This is real. This is real. So it took over the news cycle. It became the news cycle. It was the biggest story in the NFL really for the rest of the week because there were so many different layers and levels and takes and ways to understand it. And we argued about different things and there's just strong feelings and people throughout the league were chiming in by, you know, making their comments to people in the media who were able to pass that along without outing their sources. So you could say whatever you want. It's the prime opportunity for negative opinions about the Ravens to be spread and there were plenty. A lot of people were mad at the Ravens and they thought the Ravens pulled a fast one by ultimately saying we're not comfortable proceeding with this trade. Oh, and by the way, we can get Trey Hedrickson for 28 million a year on a four year deal. Yeah, no, it's it was a weird situation. I don't think it was a slow news cycle. And even if it was a slow news cycle, this is it's Max Crosby. It's Max Crosby. It's one of the four or five best defensive players in football. It's the Baltimore Ravens. It's one of the best organizations in football this century. They're always towards the top. And it's wait new coach and Jesse Minner, who's a defensive coach and he's going to get Max Crosby and they have Lamar Jackson at quarterback and we know they've been knocking out the door or the playoffs and the Super Bowl. So yeah, this is a big deal. I mean, of course it is not only the player, the organization, the organizations never traded away a first round pick ever. So for all of that to kind of happen and then trade two first round picks and the hype to start and everybody going, Ooh, Baltimore, what are they going to be and then have the rug pulled out from underneath you? Yeah, yeah, I'll you know, that's where I this is going to be a big story, no matter what what's going on. This is this was a big deal in the world of sports, not just football. Have you got any impression that there's any lingering bad feelings, you know, it's been a few weeks, I think back to 2022, the Haslams supposedly getting the cold shoulder if they did. Yeah, the five year fully guaranteed $230 million contract with the Sean Watson, which is a big deal. Which prompted commentary during these meetings that created the finding that the league had tried to get the teams to collude. The arbitrator, in my opinion, aired by not finding the collusion occurred. I think collusion occurred because these teams typically do what the league tells them to do. But that was all part of it then that the Haslams had a hard time here because people were pissed. Yeah, you heard anything to suggest there's still any any rank or toward the rate. I think it's a different situation that just because this is specifically to those two teams. I did talk with some Raiders people yesterday. You know, you know how NFL people are. It happened. We're scarred by it a little bit, but we're moving forward. That's just the way it is. And there's no time to think about it. I'm sure there's going to be a little bit of some thoughts in the back of their mind of like, oh gosh, we're doing dealing with the Ravens. Yeah, but but no being around some of the Raider personnel and people that are here. I did not get the sense that they were bashing the Ravens behind the scenes or anything like that. And as I've said before, the next level genius move here would be if the Raiders knew there was a chance the Ravens were going to do this and the Max Krosby's reaction was going to be, I want to be a Raider again. They didn't want to trade him. Supposedly. That's the problem. The more upset they are about the trade not going through, the more they acknowledge they want to trade Max Krosby. If you want him, you should be happy that he's there. The way this was all presented was he wants out. They don't want to trade him. They're doing it reluctantly for two first round picks. They'd rather have the player. So hey, thanks Ravens. Yeah. Thanks for sending the player back. Now we get to keep him. That's the thing about it was weird. And that's what makes their reaction so strange. The initial very curt perfunctory. The Ravens have backed out of our trade. We have no further comment at this time. Thank you for your attention to this matter. It felt like they were pissed. I think you should be happy. Well, yeah, I think they are happy. I also think you know how it is. You've moved on to your next thought. You know, your next way. Okay, we're trading him. We're down that road. We've been on phones for a month now, six weeks. So you've already come up with the next plan and the next phase of how you're going to run your organization. I think that's what gets a team frustrated is like, wait, we're trading him. This is going to be off the books. We're going to make this money, this money and oh, the draft, we're going to start to formulate a plan here. We're going to get the Ravens picks and we got some things here that okay, yeah, we're going to lose Max Crosby. We want them. But here's our new vision. And so now you kind of get set, I think, on that and the new vision and what it could be. And then all of a sudden it's like, what, what, hold on, I have to rearrange things and we got to recalculate here and okay, yeah, it's awesome. We have Max Crosby back. We got it. But at the same time, I was, I was thinking of all the possibilities around Fernando Mendoza and how we could build a young nucleus. I'd kind of move to that. Now I have to retract those thoughts. And I think that's where a team would get frustrated in this situation. Well, they can still trade him again. And the item last week from Ryan McFadden and ESPN suggested that it's not dead, that it still could happen. Teams are going to continue to call and check it out. Whether it's before the draft, whether it's after the draft, whether it's once he gets a clean bill of health, if and when that happens after the torn meniscus, then, then there we go. Here's a little more from Sashi Brown, the Ravens president, on the reputation of the organization after they backed out of the Crosby trade. We've got strong, long relationships across the league. We have emphasized the importance of doing things the right way. We'll continue to do that. And we understand that it is a headmind story because of its profile and significance. We believe, you know, our relationships to the extent that you need time to repair them. People understand who we are and what we're about. A locker room understands that as well. But when you have high profile transactions like this and opportunities like this, it's unfortunate, but sometimes these things do happen. Yeah, and look, it happened. And the circumstances allowed it to happen. And the circumstances allowed the Ravens to realize that Trey Hendrickson had overshot his market and was still available on Tuesday when they did the physical, when he otherwise should have been long gone. That's this part. The planets lined up and as the Ravens came to the conclusion as to whether or not they were comfortable with going forward and giving up two first round picks and paying Max Crosby 29 million per year and he possibly would have wanted more. How much are we going to get out of him? This was the gist of the story last week from Ryan McFadden of ESPN. They didn't feel sufficiently comfortable that the knee was going to make it more than a couple of years. So we can get Trey Hendrickson and hey, these deals aren't done until they're done and they exercise their prerogative to back out. The Browns recently pulled the rug out from under AJ Eponesa. Yeah, that's right. Failed the physical. They weren't comfortable with the physical. Failed the physical. Didn't sign him. He was off the market for 11 days. He could have signed somewhere else. It's the way it works. The Raiders have done it twice. They reconfigured Jimmy Garoppolo's deal. They yanked an offer from Roger Saffol. This is what teams do. But it always looks a little weird, but you got to consider the magnitude of what they were going to give up and they weren't comfortable and I think they became more comfortable with Trey Hendrickson. That's where I think, yeah. That's what you look at. I think that's where people still in the league look at it and go, oh, it still seems a little fishy to me. I'm not sure I totally buy the story of their selling. I don't think it's going to hurt them long term. The Ravens are a top notch organization. You know, Dacosta, Sashi Brown, Jesse Minner, top notch football guys, ownership's top notch. This was a tough situation. Yeah, some people might look out of the corner of the Rye a little bit and go, did you pull a fast one? I think other ones are also going, man, they're kind of gangster. Good for them to have the guts to make that type of move. But I do think overall, yeah, there's a little thought of, yeah, they didn't love the physical, but the other things surrounding the circumstances with Trey Hendrickson and all that maybe could have pushed them to not love the physical a little bit more, right? Well, and this gets back to what I said, and this is one of the things we argued about, but I still believe this. If you're going to do this deal, you have to be aware of the fact that the market opens on Monday. You have to insist on the physical being done before the negotiating window opens. So you don't have the opportunity to be tempted by somebody who may be still out there as you do the physical on Tuesday because they made the deadline Wednesday. Deadlines should have been. Well, I think your idea of talking about maybe there's a like all three agents or everybody does a physical. So you don't have situations like you just talked about with AJ Eponessa. He's thinking he signed to a new team. He moved missing opportunities. It hurts him. It hurts the team. It's not good for the league. And these are little things that, you know, maybe they can figure out. This is a prime example of what could have happened. He could have gone to Indianapolis when all the doctors are there, could have been scanned and poked and prodded and all teams would have had everything that they would have needed to come to a conclusion as to whether they're comfortable with AJ Eponessa. And it never would have gotten to the point where the Browns make him an offer and he's off the market and he ends up failing his physical. All right, we need to break because we can tell that the end of the meetings is approaching. Not because the limos are lined up. They're not lined up yet, but the rules. The rules are coming through. The proposals are becoming final. We'll give you the latest when PFT Live continues right after this. Yeah. Yeah. PFT Live Tuesday edition. The rules. The rules. The rules are there ain't no rules. There are rules and there are rule changes and as expected, the fail Mary to foundation has been laid. The owners have voted to allow for one year only the officiating department to clear an obvious Mrs. Byonfield officials that impact the game in the event there is a work stop involving the game officials represented by the NFL referees Association. Yeah. I firmly believe they are hell bent on locking them out. I think they're thinking about breaking the union. I think they're thinking about coming up with some different way. I think they're thinking about robots, AI. I think they want to tell the current officials to get lost for good. I'm starting to feel like they got something up their sleeve. I don't know what's going on. Again, with this, it's a little disheartening because you don't want to hear about the refs not being there. But at the same time, if we are going to have replacement refs, yeah, I would like the NFL officiating department to help them out and they're going to need that. So, you know, we'll see what happens here. We're going to continue to monitor it. But but yeah, overall, it doesn't feel like it's going in the right direction. That's scary. But if this is what it's going to be, yeah, I do want people to know. Yeah, I do want people in the league office to help these guys out who are not going to be up to speed with the NFL and, you know, clicking on all cylinders there. When the NFL adopted the so called dynamic kickoff a couple of years ago, initially the onside kick, which must be declared in advance. There's no way to do an onside kick out of this new formation. You had to be trailing in the fourth quarter to use it. Last year they expanded it. If you're trailing at any point, you can do it now. You can do it at any time. If the game's tied, you can do it in the opening drive of the game first kick. You can do it whenever you want trailing, leading, tied, whenever you can do an onside kick. But it's not going to be a surprise. You still have to tell the other team you're going to do it. So it doesn't bring back the days of Super Bowl 44 and the great Sean Payton surprise onside kick to start the second half, which is sad. That's like the only time in 50 years of following the NFL that something that was part of the game is gone and it's never coming back. Yeah, you know, those are some exciting moments for sure. In fact, it's funny. We're sitting around the pool there yesterday. I actually was talking about this with Sean Payton a little bit. I mean, he's story with just the onside kick, of course, one of the greatest moments in Super Bowl history to start the second half and kick an onside kick in the Super Bowl. And of course, just the guts to do that, the magnitude of the moment, it was incredible. And of course, it was a game and we were kind of joking because he was kind of joking about how he would tell certain things in production meetings just for a quick story. And I think I've told you this before, but he met with my dad was doing that Super Bowl. He met with my dad and Jim Nance, you know, two days before the game. And he told my dad in the production meeting, we're going to kick an onside kick in the halftime. My dad called me the night before the Super Bowl. And so I was telling Sean this last night and he's just like, you know, can I can you believe I would never say those type of things now to people. Yeah, he's like, but I knew your dad and your dad was a parcels guy and I'm a parcels guy. Hey, trust me. He trusted him. Exactly. We were talking about to start the show. That's where the you know, that's where the league is built that way. But so he tells him I my dad called me the night before the Super Bowl when he's like Christopher, Christopher, the saints are going to kick an onside kick to start the third quarter. And I was like, what are you kidding me? Like what? And then you know, so the Super Bowl happens and you kind of forget a little bit. And now it's like, wait, halftime's ending. And I'm like, holy crap, hold on. Dad said they're going to like, is this they're not going to really do it. You know what I mean? And just to watch it all happen in real time was incredible. But it was a funny story about the onside kick by the way, friend of the show, Jeff Darlington. What was he doing over there? He gave us a finger. Did he? All right. Good. He gave us a finger and ran away. Hey, Jeff. Jeff's awesome. He's Jeff was one of the stars of the pool party yesterday. He one thing I heard from people all over coaches, DMs, they were like, man, Jeff Darlington's awesome. He's hilarious. Yeah. Yeah. So he was making some moves there. And I'll give him the finger doing when I see you next time. All right. So the onside kick can happen at any time, but it must be announced ahead of time. The incentive to kick the ball out of bounds on purpose from the 50 yard line, that is now gone. And what's going to happen is if you kick off from the 50, which usually means there's been a 15 yard penalty on the try. If you kick it into the end zone is not returned or if you kick it through the end zone, it goes to the 25. I believe. So now we're going to be all over the place. We got the 20, we got the 25, not the 35. Not the 35. It'll be the 25. If you kick it, or maybe the 20. It might be the 20. Because that was the whole purpose. You're right. The whole purpose of doing it was you kick it out of the end zone and or you kick it out of bounds and they get the ball at the 25. Yeah. Because it was a it was possession 25 yards from the spot of the kick by rules. Right. Now what it will be, it will be the 20, which makes sense. It simulates the 15 yard penalty. Because if you kick it into the end zone or through the end zone from the normal 35, they get it 35. Yeah. Now they get it at the 20. Yeah. That makes sense. Yeah. It's fair application. 15 yards. You kick it out of the end zone. They get the ball at the 20. So it no longer not that it wasn't that they wanted to take away the strategic edge. If anything, you got better. Now you can pin him at the 20. Totally. It just was weird. It was a bad look. It was too complicated. Why are they kicking it out of bounds on purpose? Why are they deliberately taking this penalty? It's still weird. I think it confuses people. It is. So I mean, look, we're getting confused here. I'm confused all the time. This is it's a one. I still don't have my head wrapped around all this. Sometimes I have people tell me stuff and I'm like, wait, so wait, where do they get the ball? And I try to explain it to people sometimes and you realize it's something again, Sean Payton brought up last year. It's a little all over the place. Let's have it. It just used to be. Yeah. You get the ball at the 20 or you return it. Now it's the 20 here. It's the 40 here. It's a 35. Yeah. It's a lot. It is. It goes in. It's a 20. If the ball goes in, it goes out at the 20. If the ball goes in, it goes out at the 35 and and they have made it way too complicated. This makes it a little more streamlined on those rare occasions. Somebody kicks off from the 50 because they finally figured it out last year. I'm kicking off from the 50. I kick it out of bounds on purpose. They're going to get it at the 25. Yeah. And some teams figured it out and some teams didn't. Now hopefully they'll all know when you kick off from the 50, just bang it through the end zone and you get it at the 20. Unless for some reason you want to dare them to return it. If you're desperate to try to cause a fumble, I don't know, but there's no reason. No, there's no reason. No. And the other thing too, you could do an onside kick from the 50, which would give you better field position if you recover. Yeah. Now you can do that. Yeah. That's a good point. They've also modified the kickoff alignment requirements for the receiving teams, players in the setup zone. And that's all we're going to say about that because I don't care. I don't care where they are, wherever they think they should be. That's fine. It's electric football until they get the ball and then it goes from there. All right, let's take a break. The NFL taking a step to better address the mental health of players that's next on this Tuesday edition of PFT Live. You need to address your mental health. I know. The NFL has announced or will be announcing soon an expansion of behavioral mental health services. Teams must now have a full time mental health clinician at the facility. The original program mandated a part time clinician that started in 2019. That was one of the things that I heard after the passing of Marshawn Neal and the Cowboys defensive linemen. A team reached out to me and he said, Hey, every team needs to have a full time mental health clinician. And then the push back to that was some players don't trust the team doctor because they never know where that information is going to go. And that led to a fairly robust discussion in the viewing room the following Sunday about whether or not teams can be trusted to not misuse that information. Some teams can, some teams can't. And if you're the player, you don't want your career to be impacted by the fact that you went and opened up to this clinician full time or part time and somehow some way. Now they tell the coaches. The people who all things equal. All things equal. Which guy are we keeping? We keeping the one who's used our mental health services or the one who has no issues of any kind. Which one are we keeping? And you don't want that held against you. And that's fair. That's exactly it. You're right. It's a real concern. There is because usually when you're in the building and the facility, it doesn't matter who it is, what room it is, the rest of the facility finds out. That's just the way it is. So yeah, players are going to be scared there. I think this is a positive thing though overall and hopefully they can find the right balance. Players need this and the current, you know, it's a pressure job. It's social media. So the pressure is on more than that before than ever before. And then so many of these guys as we talk about a lot have come from situations in their life where they've had nothing and you'd be shocked to hear their backgrounds and how they grew up and everything about it. So yeah, there's going to be some issues of what they've had to deal with mentally their whole life. And I think that's where this is a good thing for the NFL overall. And the key too for guys who are separated from the team due to injury, suspension, whatever, to have someone they can go to if they're having issues. Because for some guys, it's the first time they've ever been injured. For some guys, I think of Friday night lights when Booby Miles, I mean, it's a heartbreaking scene when he's at the doctor and you're explaining to him that your injury wants to fight the doctor. Like the first time that they feel that something other than everything working out their way has happened, it's a tough pill to swallow. And if you're at the NFL level and you're facing the loss of that career can be a problem. Alright, we gotta take a break. We'll wrap up this Tuesday edition of PFT Live right after this. There's Drake May's head shape. Just be careful. It may not grow back, Drake. There's no guarantee it's going to grow back. So I mean, curly. It's cool. I like so you know, you know this. My son loves Drake May's obsessed with them. Okay. And my son sent me this video earlier today. So great cause. Cool. He's doing. So your son's going to shave his head. I hope so. That stupid-ass haircut that every kid in the world has right now. Does he got the mushroom? What do you mean? Yeah, exactly right. It looks like he's got a bale of hay on top of his head with like no hair on the sides. It's the dumbest looking haircut. You go pick them up from school and it's like if you see 100 boys, 99 of them have the same haircut. And you're like, are you freaking kidding me? First of all, y'all look like crap. You look like crap. And I'm hoping that this Drake May haircut thing will get my son to cut his freaking ugly-ass hair he's got on top of his head. Hopefully this happens. Well, there it is. I'll leave it at that. We will not be on live tomorrow. We're going to have a bunch of interviews taped. Interviews from yesterday and interviews today, including the guy standing right over here. They're playing in the Masters apparently. They're going to play in the golf team next week. Kyle Shannon and Matt LaFleur will join us tomorrow as will Kevin O'Connell. There's a shot of them. Busted! Yep, we got you.