Well hope. The NFL Daily on Greg Rosenthal Beyond Lucky Today, to be joined by Jordan Rodrigg of The Athletic with Me in the studio, the Chris Westling Podcast Studio and somewhere in the Sonny environs of Las Vegas. Nate Tice of Yahoo Sports. I'm really excited about this show. You know, we've we've been doing it a little bit here and as you hopefully have learned if you're a listener, we're going to have a bunch of different flavors of this show.
Different shows, we'll have different flavors. And this show's flavor, Nate is dork that That's that's our flavor.
Let's let's get.
Let's get.
It's good to see about it.
You look, you look very rested, and you look you look handsome, and I haven't seen you since since the Super Bowl in a little bit.
Getting the wife hasn't killed me yet. Like that, That's what's going on. That's why I I think I have a lot of takes pent up, and maybe that's what I'm going with. I'm bursting at the scenes with takes. That was that was a very fun Is that from like the NFL films are ive there.
We're gonna leaning hard into NFL films.
Yeah, yeah, that's not the autumn wind. That was like the gramble to it like beforehand, it was a summer wind. I can't do that either. That's not true, but it's but no, I'm happy to be here. I I usually get like nerd or anything, but one time I got described as like it was. Actually it was an old co host with Dane and I din brug Or. He was like, oh, our draft geeks, and I felt like I almost got insulted there. It was like, yeah, yeah, geek, you know, you know that's a step below nerd.
Uh.
You're none of those things.
You're you're a tall, strapping uh former D one athlete and you know, back up to Russell Wilson. So that's more at least athletically as far as I know, Jordan than me, or you have accomplished.
As far as you know, I don't know, I don't know, you don't know, you don't know all about that.
It's great to have you back in the studio. To Jordan, you're here obviously for our first show, and I wanted to get you back for this show because I just felt like you and Nate are the two perfect people to talk about, like what's coming next, what we're interested in terms of NFL schemes. That's why today is the flavor of dork. And I mean that in the best way possible, Like I love this stuff and it's a
good time of year. I think to talk about what trends we've seen maybe on the field, and what we're looking forward to. And I left it pretty open ended.
Nate.
I know you have a piece coming up on Yahoo's Sports about this, so you are very well prepped. You also have a podcast coming up on Yahoo's Sports in a couple of weeks, so I'm really looking forward to listening to that. But it can be league wide, it can be a specific team, it can be coach, it can be anything.
In Jordan, I want you to get this going well.
I'm excited to start because I'm going to steal Nate's answer from him immediately. You know what I'm going to say, I think, so okay. At the same time, ready one three pistol.
The rams, Oh your rams pistol. I was gonna say, rams pistol. Okay, So okay, I know you're gonna point. I knew you're gonna bring someone's gonna bring this up. So I have a bullet point on this. So I'm ready. I'm ready for the pistol.
Well, okay, so I'm not gonna be the person who comes on here and talks about the Rams all the time. I do want the listeners to know that we're talking about a lot of different things. But this was extremely fascinating to watch and cover. Last year, the Rams started deploying a significant amount significant amounts of the pistol formation, especially in the latter half of the season. They ended up with like about one hundred snaps by all said and done.
They didn't just start it after the bye.
You saw a little like test of concept earlier in the season, but they really sort of spammed it later
in the season. It basically allowed Matthew Stafford to do what he likes, which is be a shotgun quarterback and a drop back quarterback, while also having the entire run menu at his disposal, because the under center run menu was you can keep that in the play sheet and in the call sheet if you're in the pistol, even though you're in sort of what looks a little bit like the gun with the running back immediately behind the quarterback. What was really good about this was it kind of
helped them get back to some of their zone runs. Nate, I know you wrote really well about this over Yahoo. I love that piece that you wrote. It was super helpful and like parsing some of this that we were watching last year. I think it's next because it works. I think you're going to see a lot of teams using it because it works. The Dolphins used it a lot,
the Falcons used it a lot. But when you see those teams that you know, Dolphins and Rams specifically that other teams are studying their cutups and their their run packages and their sequencing and all of that, you're gonna see teams copy. And I think this is a really good example of being able to blend this concept, specifically to not only keep your entire menu open to you, to not give tells to aggressive defenses, but also to kind of just keep adding things back in.
Once they shifted to.
Like the duo team for the first time in the last several years, they were able to get.
Back into some of their even just explain to the listers what pistol is in general.
Yeah, So pistol is when I mean it literally looks like a pistol. It's when the running back is lined up directly behind the quarterback, and the quarterback is in this case, you know what, four steps or so behind
the center. So instead of purely under center, where you also see the running back lined up behind the quarterback, the quarterback has some space between the center and himself, and instead of the shotgun where the running back is off to one side of the quarterback, this sort of blends the two together, and by doing so, the defenders can't really tell which direction the running back is going to go, and it's a little bit closer to formation, so the play can develop quicker than if it were
just a pure shotgun.
And if the back was offset, then.
The defender has a tell not only for some of the blitz and the pickups and things like that, but also which direction and maybe the gaps are gonna unfold because the running back is literally to one side, and then you know, you can keep running things like play action. A lot of coaches don't like to run Nate, you can elaborate on this. A lot of coaches don't like to run a full play action menu out of shotgun.
It just it limits them, but pistol you have a full menu open to yourself and then you can also get to some zone stuff a little bit easier that way, because again, you're not just on one side of the quarterback as the running back.
And I love that the Rams and we've seen this with the entire Sean McVay career in Los Angeles, but even with Matthew Stafford, who's such an established quarterback and as things that he does well, like, they change what they do a lot, and they don't stay static. You can't stay static, and it's pretty cool, nay. I know Stafford's one of your favorite quarterbacks to see him evolving and doing stuff that you haven't seen before. It's not
like they're the first team to ever run pistol. But the league is just different now than it used to. I mean the pistol uh, of course, fame created by Tyler Thinkpan in Kansas City. Now, I'm just saying, I know that was kind of a fun one and obviously Kaepernick with the forty nine ers.
Yeah, people have done it like this isn't new. I don't say it's next because it's new. It's not new, but it's all you see it a lot in the college.
Everything, everything in the NFL has been done some way before. But the way you're talking about marrying the running game, Like, what what gets you going about this?
Watching Stafford in this evolution, Nate.
Yeah, it's yeah, it's merging two worlds like Jordan was kind of alluding to. And I thought the most important part is that defenses are really smart now, like they I mean, they've been smart before, but like I think they're just the level of defensive plays higher than ever. And when teams, i mean, shoot, when Payton Manning was with the Colts, like they were like the first team to be fifty percent.
Shotgun and that was insane at the time.
That was like crazy, they were fifty percent, and now most of the teams are over easily over fifty. Some teams are over ninety percent of the shotgun. And okay, when we have standard runs, Okay, if the running back is too away from the tight end, it's all based on where the tight end is and where the running back is. So if he's away from the tight end, they only could run this run, this run, this run. Okay, if we can limit it to rock paper scissors, and
they only run rock and paper. Okay, we can really make it easier on our defenders. So when you get to the pistol, it just opens up the menu like Jordan was loosed to. And you saw that with the Colin Kaepernick stuff when he was at Nevada, and then the forty Niners kind of copied it because they wanted
to get the QB run game involved. So now instead of just everything being zone read, now you can kind of get same side looks so because the running back is downhill and where the quarterback is reading is to a different side than would be on zone. And then you got to the next time we really saw a lot of pistol was Peyton Mannings last year with the Broncos because Gary Kuback wanted to run zone and Peyton was too old to be under center, so they went to so they went to the pistol, so they.
Moved them back to make it easier. That's our real thing.
That sounds a bit familiar, Yeah, exactly.
So it's flexible. If if like.
Colin Kaepernick kind of out of them as an NFL play and Peyton Manning.
Kind of that's it.
You don't have to be able to move as a quarterback for this to work is what Nate's getting at.
Here you're cheating four yards.
But I when you get and this is where I think it's what's cool with the Rams version is I always think of pistol. It's like, oh, it's to open up the QB run game a little bit. That's why you can just open up some more of the stuff. But when you watch it with Stafford, and like Jordan was saying, the drop back passing game, it's now creating under centered looks out of pistol. So it's easier on Stafford.
But it doesn't have to be under center. But now you're taking away the taels for the defense because now if he's in what they call a home position, which is like an I formation position, but now it's shotgun, you know, pistol.
Now the defense can't. I can't.
This linebacker doesn't know if I blitz or not because I don't know if the running back's releasing to my side on his route. We don't know if the run game is this So it's really the first and second down looks that this is where I thought the Rams really cranked it.
Up the Ravens game. I'm sure Jordan can speak to like that game.
You saw it a lot because they're trying to mess with defenses there blitz happy and simulated pressure appy because they're trying to those guys now can't key in on some like Okay, the back's away from the tight end. I'm Patrick Queen. I know I'm blitzing now. Okay, well now he's behind the quarterback. All right, we gotta wait till the snap of the ball to see what side he goes. So you're just creating half seconds and then those add up over.
Time, and just from a layman's point of view, for me, it's like the pistol accomplishes both things. It's like it's in between in a way that you can really do everything, and it's exciting and I love that you have just like an absolute fireballer behind center still and seeing the best of Matthew Stafford. I just hope he stays healthy and I just hope he is like he was last year, because when that was all happening and my daughter's a ramstand,
I just had this feeling. I was like, oh, I actually think they have like a non insignificant chance to win the Super Bowl this year, Like things have to go right but if you played the NFC playoffs out, I think they make the Super Bowl like a couple times at least, and it just didn't happen for them.
They lost a close game.
It's like, I just hope they can have Stafford at this age that healthy and playing that well all season again. And I'm hopeful and we look forward to that. In the meantime, I want you guys all to listen to these just beautiful commercials. We will be back off to the back and we're finally going to get to all of Nate's points. He has so many points back on NFL daily, and we've reached the portion of the program where it's just time to let Nate cook.
We just we got to hear it. We got to hear what you got.
What's your best scheme?
Know that you want to.
Start with This was gonna be my two strike pitch. Yeah, but I'll start the bat the bat with it. This is I see your two safety looks. I see the top down defenses, and I raise you three safety looks.
Not just I'm not talking just big Nickel. I'm talking three safety shells.
And I know there is a large British fan base of this show, but they would love to know that this is very much like the three center back looks that you're seeing in soccer, you know, they've seen the last five ten years kind of proliferate a little bit. But the two defenses that I think are either going to be the best examples of this. There might be others that maybe I'm just not focusing on, maybe like
the Raiders or something. But the Cardinals defense with defensive coordinator Nick Ralis, who's thirty years old, and actually I went to high school with his two brothers, which is the small world and his brother's former we wrestler uh name.
So this like marries your world very well. Basically, it's so weird.
It's so weird, like a little Nick is a defensive coordinator in the NFL, Like great for him, and he's doing a lot of fun stuff, so it's ky.
Yeah.
But and then also Shane bon and defense coordinat for the Giants. So I think these two are the best examples of what I'm going to be talking about here. But Jordan, you guys, you already hinted at this point, so it's perfect. We're talking about micro reactions before the snap.
So the Shanahan offenses especially, so the teams that do the best the Packers Rams forty nine Ers, the Falcons last year, which maybe the Steelers this year, the Dolphins, these teams that have really weaponized motion, the Cardinals offense that they're trying to get you hot at the snap of the ball, gets you out, leverage, gets you out of position, you being the defense, getting all eleven defenders
off of the same page. And how defenses kind of counteracted that is quarters cover four two safety looks.
We've talked a lot about it, you.
Know, talked a lot that there's been rise and fall of another head coach already who ran actually a couple of them that were the leaders of this type of coverage.
But the ones that I think kind of took this and kind.
Of are you talking about here someone that worked right.
Maybe the other Los Angeles team.
Yeah, I mean, you can put Brandon Staley's name out there, the.
Salification that came and went.
But so what they were trying to do with the quarters looks was is top down, keep everything in front of us. We can adjust their two safeties and if you want a motion, you want to shift, our safeties will kind of be a safety, you know.
Fill in from the back, fill in from top down.
We're not going from the line of scrimmage backwards now, we're going from the safety spots downwards. And when we watched this Cardinals defense and the Titans defense last year, who boned was defense Cordinaio of NOL Giants. They were taking guys like Buddha Baker and he was a true what I would call monster back, which is fine ball, the sea ball, get ball kind of player, like a true rover, a guy that could just move around Bob Sandy.
You know.
Yeah, what they did was they really though.
What they did was rather than have the slot player or the other linebacker by the mic, you know, linebacker, and rather than have him as a safety all the way back, they kind of put them in between the linebacker and the safety. This is kind of in between spot.
And what that allows them to do is now, rather than having a guy from the line scrimmage work backwards or now we have to bump everybody because of a motion at the snap of the ball, Budda Baker, whoever this roving player is, he can fill in where they're away from the motion towards the motion. He can move be a slot player, he could be a Tampa tuo player like Brian Urlacker, he could be the deep safety,
he could be a blitzer. So they created this kind of motion piece, this move piece, and the Titans were doing this a little bit last year. Roger McCreary was an interesting player. He's doing a little bit of this and the safeties they had in Tennessee last year. So it's it's really interesting. I'm curious and more defenses copy it. The Cardinals had one of the worst defenses last year.
I gotta say, I want I want to kind of bring that up that like these two defenses, you know, not that effective, but they weren't.
The process was clear. We've covered this. I were terrible. The process was clear.
Yeah, I see what they're trying to do.
And I think more defenses are going to copy that because we have seen more weaponized slot players. Brian Branch, Devn Weatherspoon, Kyle Hamilton. You know, you saw a little bit this with the Ravens last year. But I think this kind of like true move that guy into the middle of the field and into that in between area that I think is going to get copied a little bit more might might be the whole major of the defense outside of these two or maybe a couple of others.
But I think more teams are going to go, hey, this gets our best guys out there. And I think it's a great answer to all that motion stuff, all the other things, and it doesn't make you predictable. And this is the last thing. I watching the Cardinals defense against the forty nine ers. It was in Arizona. That was kind of a game that was kind of like, Okay, I see what you're doing here. It takes It changes the pre snap and post snapbook for the quarterback. He
can't just go Okay, it's cover two. Oh, it's single high. Oh, it's man coverage. Now he has to go all right, where's Buddha Baker going? Wait, where's the other safety going?
Again?
We just talked about micro reactions. Those little quarter a half seconds add up. It helps the defensive pass rush get there and maybe make the quarterback gouts at a wrong spot, or maybe it hold on to the ball for a half second. So I just see this kind of freedom of the defense and these funky move looks. This is the motion for the defense. The motion is shifting of offense. This is their version on defense, and I think everyone you can see more and more of it.
Yeah, I call that because it's kind of it's evolving, right because you've seen a lot of teams put their hybrid safety or their hybrid corner in a bigger nickel. You see, the Star was really popular. I mean it's again, the Star has been around forever. I'm not saying it's new, but it was repopularized a couple of years ago. But I kind of call this the shooting Star because they can float like they can float across like they can they're not confined necessarily to the rest.
Of the who are good examples of that.
I mean, we're going to see We're probably going to see it, you know, like we're yeah, I mean, we're probably going to see more.
I would think, like.
Yeah, we'll see, we'll see more of these guys, like I mean, the slot because it's just happening what's in college and we just get these guys propping up into the NFL.
So I mean, shoot, just last year the rookie and second year players.
Last year, there was just all these slot guys and like so they're all dynamic blitzers, they're all good in coverage. They're all good tacklers. So it's become like not it's called the star and certain defenses, but the sloth and nickel whatever. But it's literally becoming a star position, like where you put your most dynamic player because they can they could just do so much.
We love a double meeting. We love a double rather.
Than so what they said was, rather than have our star just only be in the slot and kind of be predictable that he only could do three things, all right, let's move them like a helicopter. Let's move them to the middle so where he can rove any any spot that we need him. Our reagon's gonna call them a sweeper like in soccer.
I like it.
It doesn't work perfect, but it works close enough for kind of what they're doing.
And we've seen more three safety looks just in general, certainly that the Cowboys with Dan Quinn and the Patriots last year, and it just makes sense. And this is a show about big league wide trends and adjusting and how the game is always evolving. And part of the issues with with modern defense is just these linebackers get getting attacked and in coverage, and so one solution is
just have another safety be that linebacker essentially. I mean, like I don't understand it as well as you guys do, but that's essentially it's a lighter, faster league, but you still need to have the physicality to hold up in the running game, and this is one possibility for that. I want to ask you about, like, do you think the and I know you were well really quick thinking about this.
Yeah, help mine.
I'm sorry, Nate, you got me thinking about Like I remember when the idea for non coverage confined nickel players is to make them an unavoidable player, so the quarterback sees them and automatically looks elsewhere, which, to Nate's point, forces a little bit of hesitation. So I think that is also one part of it that you've seen in defense is already in the way that they move and manipulate you know, whoever.
The slot player is.
But with this, it's really interesting because they literally can like orbit the front seven essentially, and these teams that really capitalize on the middle of the field, while they can also like sort of float shooting star like they can float sort of pre snap. When I was mentioning the walk around defense, I mean you mentioned the Cardinals. When you know, the walk around, it kind of just like, oh, we're shuffling around, and all of a sudden they're in
their snap look versus necessarily rotating post snap. They kind of were moving and sort of like, oh, is there a game here today? And then all of a sudden, boom, they're in this look. And then the quarterback's like, oh, the player in the void where I was looking is in.
That void, So I got to look elsewhere.
And it's all about the quarterback always says, make the defense hesitate just a little bit longer.
Well, this is Tonate's point.
Making the offense, allegedly and in their hopes, hesitate just a little bit longer. Look deeper in the progression, look somewhere else, look for the layup, look for something that is not targeting that player. As long as that proof of concept is there, they can make the play on the ball there, you know, And like to that point, I do think we're going to see more of that.
I think we're going to see more of that because everything in this league is built around stopping the pass and now adjusting to the pre snap eye candy and the pre snap movement in ways that aren't just you know, playing landmarks as a defense because you can't necessarily always play the motion itself, but you can still understand the tendencies of the offense of where that ball is going
to end up on the field. But teams are even messing with that now too, so you have to you have to have these players.
I feel like if you want good pr as a defensive coordinator, you just do like the walk around defense, you know, because you.
Always get you always get popped for that.
That's like every couple of years, someone gets super into it for four games just because they're desperate and Belichick actually everyone's taking their little turn with it. But if you do the walk around defense where everything looks crazy before the snap, you get a lot of pop I want to ask you, guys, how you think the then they get on that's you know, the Patriots are gonna because they had big players, they wouldn't do it too much.
It just it just sprinkle it in every once in a while to mess with.
You, but you don't use it all the top.
Yeah, how do you think?
Uh?
I guess?
And this could you know, lead to just another thing to talk about because we know it's a trend because all you have to do is look at the coaching
staffs around the league. How do you think the Mike McDonald defensive tree plays into this but also just is going to play into this season, because I think for most fans out there, it's flown a little under the radar that Mike McDonald, who did about it as good a job as any defensive coordinator over the last two years in the NFL, coming from Michigan and going to
the Ravens. Everyone knows he got hired in Seattle, but then okay, so there's one style of his defense there, and then in Baltimore he gets replaced by Zachary Orr and so there's one there. And then we go to the Titans and we got a Ravens assistant Dinard Wilson there, and then we go to the Dolphins and they hired Anthony Weaver another one of those. So literally four coordinators from the exact same staff, who you know was very effective, and we're doing things a little bit differently than a
lot of the league are suddenly running teams. So that's you know, an eighth of the league is now this Mike McDonald defense. How do you think that's going to affect things like what are they going to look like? And related to everything we're talking about too with all the safeties.
Yeah, and I think i'd love to hear Nate's breakdown of why this defense has popularized so suddenly and so as these things do, if it works against high powered offenses, if it stops high powered offenses, you're gonna hire.
I basically having because Mike McDonald like beat the Shannonhan Tree a couple times in prime time, so like owners and stuff, but.
Also all right, let's do that.
His defense looks smart and it looks sick.
Right, No it doesn't. I'm not saying he didn't deserve it.
I just mean, like in big spots when people were watching, he slowed down the most unstoppable offenses in football, and so own exactly. It's got that complicated. Owners and coaches are just like, let's get that, but four seems.
Like a lot.
I think what's what's super interesting is you've you've seen some of these coaches and Mike McDaniel being one of these coaches literally walk out of the Fangio system era it's still ongoing whatever, but like walk out of that and into right very quickly.
He was a little late on the trend, and now we'll see if he's early one.
Yeah, it's interesting.
Yeah, and then and the Chargers of Jesse Mintera. So do the Ravens Ravens Michigan double resume builder, the harbor harboralization of your resume. No, I think with this and it's hard to just go like, it's not like this defense is the Tampa two or the Seahawks Cover three or the dick Lebau you know zone blitzing scheme, you know, blitzberg stuff. It's everything that that is the gift of this defense. And I think, what Mike McDonald, mcdianel McDonald, this is gonna be it.
God, too many Mikes, too many Irishmen and Scotch.
But no, it's I think with that kind of that defense, it's a kaleidoscope scheme. That's kind of what I always get to why it's so hard on modern offense. This is just what I was getting to with the three safety stuff, is that you're trying to just cause those hesitations.
So you're just is this Cover two? Is this man?
Is this Cover three? Is this a blitz? Is this is simulated? So all the things, everything looks the same. You know in baseball they call pitch tunneling. You know, it's the same thing. To the quarterback, it's like that is the same safety.
Look.
I've seen all five snaps and then, but it's been five different coverages. All that is you wish everybody could do that. What that takes is a lot of good coaching and a lot of detail orientation. So I want to say that this defense can work when you have the guy that can write it, when you have the author and you have the guy that's coaching it like the Seahawks do. When that kind of thinking spreads, that's
where I get a little worried. Where it's kind of going, All right, do you guys all have you know Roquan Smith. Do you guys all have Kyle Hamilton? Do you all have Justin Mattabike? Do you have Jadavian Clowney on his best year? Do you have Marlin Humphrey tackling? All right, Well, you have different personnel. How are you going to use it? Because this defense is supposed to be adaptable to its personnel.
If you're going to point at one thing that maybe they major in, it's the simulated pressures, which you know, just is the they only blitzed for or rush for, but it's the non traditional four you know, makes it look like a blitz. That's maybe what their fastball is. But I think what this defense is and what they kind of what the scheme, the theory, the whatever you want philosophy of this defense is is that they run everything well. They are sure with five six pitches that
they can throw on any ADDI pitch count. That's what they are. But again, when the brain drain happens a little bit, that gets.
Me a little worried.
When people are like, I'm going to copy that defense, it's like, are you okay, We'll see how you do with that personnel and without the mastermind maybe behind it. So guys like Jesse Minter I have a little trust in because what I saw, he did, what he did in college at Michigan. He has some proof of concept. Other guys that haven't called play we'll see, we'll see.
But also they might have their own thing.
And that's the thing is it's very hard to predict who has their own ideas that have contributed to what happened before. But they're different people, they're different coaches. It's like you know, Flores's Belichick's had successful people leave and unsuccessful people believe. And Floris is his own, Like you can see the Belichick influence on Flores, but he is
very much his own guy. And I tend to think Zachary or is the best bet because he's the one the Ravens chose, and the Ravens are smart, so they could have chosen smart team Bernard Wilson or Anthony Weaver. They had a year's long job interviews for all of them, right, and so I just tend to trust that they made a good choice of those three. But the other two might also be great everyone, and they might be great
at different things. Anthony Weaver was a guy I know, a team seriously considered for head coaching jobs and as a leader.
Yeah, I think, well I've heard about war is great then yeah, so I will say that.
So yeah, I mean, I think all of these guys, as you said, as you guys both said, have the potential to be outstanding. The main thing that we see over and over again when systems are borrowed offense defense, now special teams, because now we'll have you know, little schematic twists on the different special teams things, but the teachability of it, how you can communicate and build progression and evolution in that defense while simultaneously game planning while
you're in the heat of a season. It's a teaching progression, progression that is usually very specific to the teacher. You know, we heard reporting last year of some of the things with Brandon Staley was the teachability in terms of the progression of concepts wasn't necessarily there the way that it was in that one year in Los Angeles. And so that's always the kind of red flag that you look for, is like it's not just does it work, Yes, it
works generally speaking, this this works, that worked. How can you apply it to a wide variety of people in a way that builds a natural progression over time to where you're you're trimming fat Chris Vassar, who is a good defense great defensive analyst, and I read and listened.
To a lot of his stuff. He had a really great quote about.
Mike McDonald, who he knows, he knows really well and has worked with, and he said, this defense's best pieces aren't the front structure or the coverages, but the structure that encapsulates it.
It's not the calls.
It's the ability to have a lot of tools with
less teaching, so you're never surprised you're stuck. So it's like a no waste defense or defensive philosophy of teaching specifically less so talking about scheme specific stuff, but it is it is no waste in the sense that the things that click with your players, you keep those things, and you remove the things that don't, and you evolve and adjust your own structure underneath your general philosophy to be malleable to what your players can do and are
actually and you're not yourself sticking to what works just because you think it works and because it has worked before. So I think that's where Mike McDonald has the potentially be special. But people who have worked under him for a while, I think for multiple years that's going to be the key thing is watching how he's done that, watching how he's organized and bucketed information and disseminated that
information in pieces that build progression. To me, that makes or breaks a scheme like this, And that's the same for offense. But with something like this, where we think it might be new, it could I mean knew it's bought, you know, everything again, Everything cycles around, But when we think it could be the next wave, it's actually just going to be how it's taught less.
So what it is.
Yeah, teaching could be like the new money bough you know.
Seriously, it just seems like that's honestly a huge area for NFL teams to take advantage of that they don't that they just don't. They say they don't have time to do it, but to figure out how to quickly and concisely teach NFL players things they need to learn, starting with like fundamentals and just very specifically what they need to do. And I think that's probably lacking, and you're right, it's very easy to imagine. That's harder when
you're a head coach rather than a defensive coordinator. I think that might have tripped up Brandon Stalely or maybe he just wasn't always connecting on that teaching level or having the right players that he needed to be able to teach. But that's on them. Breaking football is complicated. That's what this show has been all about. It really is, and I love it. Like it's the middle of July and to me, this is the perfect time to get
into this stuff and hopefully make you guys smarter. We're going to take one quick break and we're going to do a speed round and have a.
Little after dinner man.
Back on NFL Daily and we're gonna try these are complicated things, they're big concepts. Well, we're gonna try to hit a few quickly and then we'll wrap things up. It's been great to spend this Monday morning with you. I mean, let's be real, it's not Monday morning. It went out in the feed like overnight. We obviously taped it before. Let's talk about twelve first and now, just because this is obviously not like a new thing, but it did pop up a little more in fun places
last year. You know, it is the second most common you know, personnel usage. It was relatively at a high, not that it had a huge spike last year, but it was one of the highest years of the last ten years. But the team that used it the most was the Packers and it was just very effective with Luke Musgrave and Tuck our Craft and it was just like awesome. And I think they're going to expand on that.
And you know, we've seen it. We've seen too as the NFL evolves and we've seen different times when it's more popular than others. Obviously, you know the Gronk, Aaron Hernandez when they really came out like that offense was had a lot of new elements, but really the way they use those two tight ends was a specific part of it. And I think about, again, we're talking about lighter defenses, how can you take advantage of them?
This is one way.
And I think of the Packers and Lafleur, who had the Laflorissance last year just cooking, and I think of the Bills.
With Kaid and Dawson Knox.
I think of the Raiders this year with Michael Mayer and Brock Brock of course.
And your favorite name I know already.
I know, and Mark Andrews and Isaiah likely in Baltimore and so those are also those are all really compelling teams. And I'm curious just how how they're going to be used. And I think I think they're at least it's going to be ticking up, and especially the Packers are going to be funny one.
Yeah, they love that, I think. And Nate I think can speak on this too.
It's like teams don't like to sub especially if they want to go fast, and so I think you might be onto something with an increase in a specific personnel usage increasing in that way, because if it's working, they're going to want to move the ball down the field. They don't want to sub back and get another receiver on the field float those guys in and out.
They're going to want to just go right.
And I think that's another step in this that will buy proxy increase the percentage of snaps that you do see with those teams, and with more teams who are running twelve personnels, they're not going to want to sub and you see it with like you know, I remember Matt Lafore was talking last year about how he always was fascinated with the way that you know, some of his cohorts used the larger receivers to kind of be hybrid full back tight end guys who are doing some
of the same type of disguises and blocking looks and basically making everything go all these different personnels go out of eleven personnel. And I know Nate's classic joke that I'll always take with me everywhere was you call it eleven and a half personnel between eleven and twelve and so but I think that with some of these coaches who do like that because you don't have to sub, you can go fast and you don't have to bring guys on and off the field. What what coaches like now
is that you can capitalize against smaller, lighter defenders. You can again find find the similar voids in the field the way that we've talked about this entire show, and you don't have to sub if you have multiple tight ends who are capable of maybe you don't have three receivers you want to keep on the field and your and your twelve works.
Yeah, I mean, look at these teams, Ravens, Raiders like those second tight ends. I mean it's why I think, Nate not to cut you off, but I know you're getting I know, we care to uh like uh, I know, I know, I think you were. You know when they drafted Bowers like you thought it makes sense because those two tight ends work together and they don't have a third receiver.
Now now they I want them on the Rams. That's where rams, I know. And I was I couldn't believe. I almost manifested that. I was like, yeah, I was giddy about that for a minute.
Well are the Rams gonna run more twelve because they signed Kobe Parkinson, so.
I've believe they're gonna run more twelve.
I think so too.
Tyler off a serious injury that might take a while.
Nobody sleeps David fantasy for people, don't sleep on David Allen.
Yeah, he had a good moments last year and again against the Ravens.
Let's wrap up this show, uh with you, Jordan, and you're going to give us our after dinner mint today.
Yeah.
So I like the concept of the after dinner mint that you introduced on the in the debut of the show. And I was a little nervous when you asked me to do it because mine are I gravitate toward earnestness and bittersweetness, Right, those are the Those are the spaces I like to be in. And I think about training camps opening like you think about what the bubble of camp really means. It is a space where the players and the coaches are all It's all very raw and real,
and you're there's no hiding from anybody. You are who you are in that space for two three weeks. You learn a lot about each other and you work really hard and there's a lot of pain, and I remember, I think about some of the things that we pass to each other and some of the experiences that we
passed to each other as humans. And I remember a young man named Austin O'Connor who would went out to Carolina Panther's training camp in Spartanburg every single year with his dad, and sadly his dad passed away so several years ago, and he decided that he was going to take his father's ashes and spread them all over the
world where they'd taken trips. And one of those places was he traveled to Spartanburg and he made the same drive that they did, and he went out to the field very very early in the morning.
And I want to paint the.
Picture of Spartanburg there, because it is unlike any other place to have a football practice.
There's like this.
Humidity that rises from the ground down there, and it's so it's this mist that swirls all around you. And so he walked to the edge of the field and to the end zone and he, you know, placed some of his father's ashes there, and I remember thinking, like that's happening. And then all of this, like players were having babies in camp their wives are having babies. You know,
another player's brother passed away during camp. I mean, there was so much of existence in life happening in that very confined space, and all of those things are part of the human experience and what we passed to each other. And this is not the mint that you expected. I know, No, I love it, but that's what I every year when
training camp's open, I think of Austin O'Connor. I think of his father, and I think of walking through the mists that morning and him having that quiet moment and passing that into the field, the very field on which these players were about to have these very real, very honest, very vulnerable, raw hard experiences with each other and build a team and camaraderie that they would then pass to each other through the rest of that season and beyond.
And no, I think it's beautiful, and I think you know, as people that we've been working in football for a while, it's like it's it's the start of the year, it's rebirth, it's it's everything. And yeah, rookies are reporting this week at a few places. The Texans will be the first team to report fully later in the week because they're in the Hall of Fame game, like it is happening, and it's not just like the feeling of like, okay,
school starting, like we're back. I know, Nate, you feel that like that the NFL calendar is just sort of your body clock at this point and it's a certain
sort of fun, innocent excitement. But I love that you pointed out the family aspect to it, because like the NFL is expensive and training camps affordable, and it's easy to go to and for anyone that hasn't gone a training camp, and if you have kids or if you don't, like it's a great experience because you just see these players up close in a way that you would have to pay. You couldn't see them up close, like no matter how much you paid, if it was during the
regular season. And the players are cool, they're they're in a better mood. You can kind of scout and see which days you know that they're maybe doing a little extra versus days where uh, they're not going through that much. You can find that out if you kind of like look look at the beat writers and what the schedule is.
But you know, my son, like he he can't wait, like he's begging to go because I think he has more as much or more fun going to watch a training camp practice than he does going to a regular season game. There there is just kind of a beauty, uh and an innocent about it.
It was my first job. I was doing well training camp, ball boy. It was my first job now originally yeah, training, yeah. I I always like the equipment guys, man, Like my first boss was Dennis Ryan, longtime equipment guy for missing the vikings. But uh, it was so for me growing up. Camp was At first it was work, and I was kind of like, I'm missing all of August, could be hanging out my friend and Simon man Cato, Minnesota, staying
at a college dorm with no air conditioning. And then as I got older, like really, once I kind of realized, you know the path that I was going down.
Yeah, that's never happening for you. At some point you just give it up and you're just like, I'm not going to be that friend here.
Well yeah right and then yeah, and then camp started, and then I started looking forward to camp once I hit high school, Like once I like ninth grade or so, I hit I was like, oh this is cool. I'm reading the script behind these players. So like my memories of camp, and I've gone this as I got older, maybe away from like the day to day of the game, but in my own now media career and being around the draft a few times now and seeing what the
draft's like, is that it's hope. And I think that's what's so cool about training camp and the draft is that you're selling hope to the fans. And I think that's awesome. Not just the fans, I should say to the entire organization and to teams and to coaches. Everything's a clean slate. Oh they caught us last year, but now we got Carl on our team. You know, we didn't have Carl last year, but now we do. But like you don't know who the secret key is going
to be. It could be Carl, it could be some six round rookie, or could be the number one freaking pick, you know.
And I think that's what's so cool.
NFL is not for long in a negative way, but it's also the opposite of that is how much you can get built up. And I think that's why so many quickly too. And I think that Puka Nakua a great example. But I think that's what's so cool is that you can start seeing those flashes in the draft, and then you start seeing him camp, and then you start seeing it week one, and if you're a kid at twelve years old with your dad watching practice, you go, I remember Pooka caught that touchdown and we said he
was going to be good, you know. And I think that's why camp I think has so many special memories for people. And I think Greg brought up the best point. It's usually very affordable and it's a very fan I mean for a lot of people. I mean, yeah, right, yeah,
but the fans and fan events around him. I'm getting to see this from a media perspective because again, I was always involved with the game, so I never stepped out into the parking lot, you know, And so it's kind of gone pretty cool for me to see that from a different perspective as I've gotten older, and I think it's great.
Well, it was a great way to take a look at a big picture around the league. A lot we're looking forward to, and yeah, training camp is coming. I hope to have you back on sometime Nate, and obviously Jordan loved having you again. That's it for NFL Daily Today for Nate Tice In, Jordan Rodriege.
We will be back on Tuesday.
Excited for this show with Colleen Wolfe back in the Chris Westling Podcast studio and Patrick Claybon.
We will see you then