Well here we are back here live a UFL college draft recap Wednesday. Here.
Thanks everyone for joining, Please like and subscribe by trying to get up
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One. We will showcase big guest list standy by. See Anthony just
lugged in this. Well, that was my bat. I'm like, where
the heck is Anthony Miller? And then well I had never actually sent over
the link, so that's it's usually always my fault, which it is now,
but this is excited. Let me bring in everyone and then we'll do
all the preface. We have Evan here, Greg Parks, Anthony Miller,
everyone standing by. You know, fool me once, shame on me,
fool me twice. Like I'm always so used to these drafts. Hey,
it's happening at seven am. And then we get a press release sometime in
the afternoon. I go, there's no way today they're going to post this
like, we'll go live at five. Everyone could have notes and everything,
which we have, and then of course this all went out in a really
timely manner. Here, Greg, like, I feel like we've lived through
this many times, I, Evan and Anthy have as well, but this
seemed to go pretty smooth today. Greg will introduce yourself and like, what
do you think? Like, because I said, normally this is something that
comes in a pressure really so there, I felt like they tried to make
this beast today and yet it wasn't all that people wanted it to be either,
Like people say, why don't you televise this and things like that.
It's like no, no, no, so they you know, they released
the picks on social media. Each team's social media account tweeted the picks out.
So, you know, I think for what this draft is, and
you know, we can get into the weeds a little bit and talk about
what this draft is and what this draft is not, I think having it
play out the way it did today, certainly it's better than dumping them all
in a press release, which we've seen before. This is kind of the
norm I'm expecting now. I think, you know, read you. And
I were on We Run with Pat for the Super Dispersal Draft back in January,
and that's how they did it. We were on live and they were
doing the picks in a very similar way on social media. Each team's account
was releasing who they were picking, and that's how they did it today.
So I think if there is a draft after in the fall, I'm not
sure there will be, but if there is, I think we can probably
expect the announcements done the same way. Yeah, this felt, and we'll
get Evan in here because I've thought we pre show. I think Evan did
a fantastic job of kind of explaining because there's still a lot of questions where
we're going to have Anthony here as well, and Anthony has this article I'm
ready to pull up and Greg as well, and Evan said he has no
which is great because again, normally I always try to go live like oh,
the draft's going to be at you know, ten am Easter, and
like let's get on at seven, let's do it, and then we kind
of sit around and pontificate for an hour, kind of waiting for the results
to come in. This time, they came in on time, of course,
we're late now, but now we're here. It's five o'clock. I
was doing line work all day. I fell off a ladder. I put
on a shirt, but I think I might have elbow there. Entered my
elbow very poorly here and trying to trying to shave one of my one of
the hedges outside. But we're here, and we have lots of things to
talk about, Evan. For people in the chat Phillips checking in a bill
here, we'll pull up the comments. But Evan, can you explain the
draft today? Because this very much is the USFL's college draft now with the
UFL right merge kind of like, can you, Evan, what is going
on here? Do they have for people checking in, like whether we and
how does this work? Right? Well, a lot of the players that
you saw today, it's not a guarantee that they play in the UFL.
This is essentially a rights draft. The USFL, back when they were a
separate entity, had one back in twenty twenty three, and they actually did
theirs prior to the NFL Draft, which was an interesting strategy because a lot
of the players that were selected in that draft ended up signing NFL contracts or
NFL draft picks, and they never appeared in the USFL. I would expect
similar things here. A lot of the players that you saw that were drafted
today are currently under contract in the NFL. A majority of them are undrafted
free agents. I thought Houston's draft class in particular was interesting because I believe
they only drafted two players that had signed into the NFL and the rest of
their class was current free agents. It's an interesting strategy and one that might
work out better for them considering the position they were in last year. But
the idea is that you know, the chances of all eighty players that you
saw taken today in the draft playing in the UFL and twenty twenty five are
slim to none. Hopefully there's some. My guests would be I don't know,
maybe a quarter, so twenty out of the eighty. And I have
notes on I think twenty or twenty one guys today that I really want to
touch on, not saying that those are going to be the guys that actually
come, but just to give you know, a better idea or understanding to
people out there who are new to this process. Because like I said,
the USFL had a college draft. It was just like this at the beginning
of twenty twenty three, and then last summer the XFL had a ton of
drafts, you know, rookie drafts, supplemental drafts, things of that nature,
and those were a similar process where they were all just acquiring rights and
not all those guys ended up actually playing in the league. Because it is
weird because obviously we have in Mike Mitchell reported and we have you know,
coaches laid off here at the end in the June. We're in the middle
of July. A lot of the team kind of DPPs are involved in a
lot of this stuff. You know, the coaches want to come out to
do any of the showcases. They'll get paid for kind of that. But
coming it's just like this weird time where we're acquiring you talent, we don't
necessarily have like league scouts. We have a lot of DPPs taking care of
that. Like, Anthony, what do you make of all this? Because
I'm sitting there, like I you know, I'm a Commander's fan Sam Hartman,
right, like our third string quarterback, Like he's draft in the league,
Like what do you make of all this? Because I do think I
don't think the league and I know, you know, Poor went out to
Jeff like we lot, you know, Jeff with the VP of Comms for
the UFL, like he's gone. It just feels a little like they don't
do a great job of explaining kind of what's going on here, Anthony,
what do you make of this? Yeah, I mean it's hard to get
excited about these drafts sometimes because like Evan said, like a lot of these
guys are probably not gonna end up in the UFL. A lot of them
are in the NFL right now, and they're probably gonna either get on the
practice squad or be a thirst ring on an NFL team. So I mean
it does build some excitement because it has been pretty quiet, Like I think
there's only been fourteen players that have signed to the NFL, so, which
is, you know, lower than what we're usually you know seeing. And
then usually like around this time last offseason, there were teams that were signing
players like they were signing free agents and stuff. We have not seen that
at all. This is really the first time when we've talked about you know,
like teams like I guess acquiring the rights of a player, but they're
not really getting them unless they like commit to it. So it's been a
fairly quiet offseason and you know, hopefully a lot of these guys will be
able to join the UFL. I think would be a great thing. There's
a lot of good talent that's coming out of this draft. But yeah,
it's just you know, these drafts sometimes can be kind of anticomatic, and
I think that's why they don't put it on television and stuff like that,
because it's like you're only getting the rights of these players. It's why I
like the CFL never does anything with their like negotiation lists and stuff like that,
because I mean, we don't even know if these parts a play or
not. Yeah no, And I think that's a great way to kind of
look at it because you get a lot of this. I've seen players like
they've been selected, they tweet like, Okay, what's going on? This
is fake? Like it's not fake. It really is. Like the negotiations
list. I think Anthony is correct. The best way to kind of phrase
this where if you know your opportunity in the NFL doesn't work out, if
you choose to play in the NFL, this is the team that kind of
has your rights. I think that's a good way to look at it.
I would never like to see this televised because I just don't think that,
you know, Evan, like everyone here has a wealth of knowledge of these
players, Like I don't think the casual person coming on would know like a
deep dive into a lot of the names that are involved in this. I
think it's good that we had some time to kind of work through that I
wanted to read, and then we'll get to kind of Greg's initial thoughts into
kind of the players that were drafted. So just I'm covering myself here to
kind of read my press release here. So this came out on July eleven,
talking about the draft the UFL. You know, we'll hold the Callers
Draft today. They'll select from over twelve thousand draft eligible players. Players must
be eligible to have been selected in the twenty twenty four NFL Draft and were
not selected. UFL teams will hold exclusive rights to those players they select until
players reports to the team or the team gives up their rights. All players
eligible for the draft much it must have been out of high school for at
least three years and exhausted or way with their college to eligibility. All players
who signed the UFL contract including players who remain under contract from the twenty twenty
four season love an NFL out until December thirty. First, So, now
that we've gotten all that, greg like initial thoughts today like how did the
teams do? And I have your article here we can pull up if there's
anything specific, but what was your general takeaways? It really is hard to
analyze a draft of this type because so many of these players are never going
to step foot on a UFL field. So it's you can't apply the usual
analyzation techniques that you would to an NFL draft or to an NBA draft.
So I mean, if you want to look at the draft as far as
pure talent, I mean you can do that and you can say what team
drafted the most talent, But it's very hard to look at it and say,
oh, you know, so and so filled their need they drafted two
or three offensive linemen, because those offensive linemen probably are under NFL contract,
probably will either make the team or make the practice squad. So I really
struggle with how to analyze and assess a draft of this nature. It is
kind of an amalgam of the USFL college draft from last year, the XFL
rookie draft in terms of the timing, and then the CFL rights Draft or
the negotiation list, which you guys mentioned, And it makes sense because there
are representatives from all three leagues. You know, Jim Pop who's been in
the CFL front offices, Doug Whaley who is with the XFL, and of
course Johnston with the USFL. They're all a part of the UFL. So
it does kind of feel like they've taken a little bit from each league's draft
and put it into this. So it is hard, and I think the
other thing that's hard about it too is if you get to the end of
the NFL season. Let's take a player Keton Slovas quarterback out of byu for
example, he was drafted by DC. Let's say he spends the NFL season
on a practice squad. End of the year, he gets offered a futures
contract by an NFL team. If you're the UFL, naturally you want him
to choose playing in your league over signing that futures contract. But really,
what can you offer because what we've learned about the UFL is that, at
least publicly, they're not paying players over and above other players. Their salaries
are the same. Whether or not that's true, we don't know. But
this is not a league based on what we've seen and how it spends money
that's going to spend a lot of money and compete and say, yeah,
you can make this much an NFL futures deal, but we'll pay you x
plus to be in our league. Right, and you can't even offer opportunity.
You know, in years past you could say, well, you can
sign a futures deal, but you can also come and play in our league,
show out and sign with an NFL team in the summer, and maybe
better positioned with that NFL team going into training camp. I mean, you
look at the numbers. Fourteen players at this point have signed into the NFL.
That's not a lot, and no quarterbacks. So you can't even offer
You can offer the opportunity to play in risk injury in the spring, but
you can't even say, look at the past, look at our numbers,
look at the number of players we've put in the NFL. If you just
take advantage of this opportunity, the league MVP, we're on the eve of
training camp. Some training camps have already started, and the league MVP,
Adrian Martinez best quarterback in the league hasn't signed with an NFL team now I
expect him to. But you can take a futures deal and you can be
with that team's playbook during the offseason, and you can go through mini camps
and OTAs and give yourself a chance to compete there and then go into training
camp with a leg up. Or you can play in the UFL get signed
by a team. Best case scenario, get signed by a team who's playbook
you're not familiar with, going into camp behind other players who've been in many
camps and who have been through OTAs and who have studied the playbook, even
rookies and udfa's at that point. So I don't really even see a selling
point for the UFL for these guys, these fringe guys who might be considering
signing futures contracts next January versus playing in the UFL. Well, I know
that last year when it was the exit fel did there, it was the
it was the rookie draft, right, it wasn't the college draft. It
with your rookie draft, and they felt and they had said, like,
well, this is for players that may be missed out and don't have an
opportunity, Anthony, I saw you nodding your head thoughts on that, and
then we'll toss to Evan and that I do. We'll actually talk some players
here in teams to kind of stand outs. But do you think it's important
to just like contextualize what's going on here, Anthony, thoughts on anything Greg
said than just kind of the purpose of this draft, if that makes sense?
Yeah, I mean I get why they do these drafts like one.
I think it brings some news to the league. Like I mean, if
you look these players on on Google, like the first article is gonna pop
up is, Hey, they were drafted by the UFL. Like that's good.
I mean it may be. I don't want to say it's fake publicity,
but you know it's good. Any publicity is good publicity, right,
Like the UFL is going to be on people's radars today, Like I think
Greg just had it on the article was a sixty My players are under NFL
contract, so who knows that they most of them are probably gonna end up
being in the NFL. But at least that's good exposure for the UFL to
you know, they have their names next to the players. Now, I
mean again, they're gonna sign them. Probably not, but you know,
again good, you know, any kind of publicity the league can get is
important, especially with it being a very quiet off season where I'm not gonna
lie, it's been you know, Mike and I have really struggled to write
articles for Sports Illustrated because we're trying to figure out what to right because there's
just not a lot of news going on right now, not a lot of
players getting signed, even though two have signed this week, which has been
at least good for the league. At least they're making progress there. But
it's been very quiet, like no players have been signed. It's just been
a very dead off season. So at least this gives us something to talk
about. It gets you know, there have been good players that have come
out of these rookie college drafts that have ended up, you know, either
doing well in the UFL this year or I've done well in the NFL or
the CFL. So at least there's been talent that's come out of it,
and there's been some good stories from it. There's not gonna be many,
but there's you know, hopefully there's gonna be some players out of this that
end up being stars in the league uh next year. And the one thing
I was really interested in with Greg's article is talking about only eight players that
were now that were not not FBS related, which is really interesting because I
think we, I think the league should try to push for more like of
those smaller school guys because there's a lot of talent in you know, you
know FCS and Division two and Division three that are being overlooked and not really
getting those opportunities. They may get more opportunities and I don't know the European
League of Football or the you know, the indoor football leagues or and something
like that, but they really should try to get some of these guys that
are from these smaller schools because I think that, you know, I think
the league should try to get players that are going to stay in the league
for a long time, and I think those guys are more likely to you
know, maybe become stars and being household names within the league in the next
few years, other than these guys that are from like these big Division on
schools like Georgia and Alabama, because they're more likely going to go to the
NFL or if they don't see a future in the NFL Tholl just retire.
Yeah, I don't really know what spurned this week of any week to kind
of do this. I know there's been a lot of talk about that.
I was talking with producer Max, like, I don't know if the week
that the college football game came out. I don't play a lot of video
games and college video games, but I know that there's a lot of like
communication with a lot of that stuff going on, Like I know that is
the week to kind of try to draw some football attention. I will just
say in Anthony in regards to just kind of it really has been a quiet
offseason, and I would just say, like, and I know that we're
moving through you know, comm directors here with the UFL, but like you
know, I know the CFL reached out to Anthony and said, hey,
we have a lot of rookies coming in trying out running combines. Would you
like to interview them. Anthony did a series of articles about that, Like,
shoot, I would pay if anyone like, hey, we we're doing
Saint Louis, come out, We'll give you some interviews. I paid to
go out there, like or do it on zoom for free. Like it
has been very quiet. I mean we're doing the money recaps that Jason Hussein
and I are for the CFL. But yeah, has been quiet, it
has been quiet. Not a lot of that. Evan any other thoughts on
this and the place the stands, and then we'll get into kind of teams
here and we can I got an Antey's article we can pull up as well.
Yeah, I mean, I think everything Greg and Anthony have already said
is right. I would add that, you know, in terms of timing
right, I mean, you talked about the NCAA game coming out, But
I also think with the UFL, you know, starting to do some of
these showcases. I think they've done Saint Louis and DC already, you know,
with them kind of ramping those up, it's kind of time to get
more into a player focused mindset. That's what they're trying to focus on.
They are really trying to get the ball rolling on what has been a very
quiet offseason in the past. I guess it's already been a month since we
had the championship game. And then yeah, I really like what Anthony said
about, you know, drafting more small school players which are FCS and below.
I'm gonna make sure to touch on a lot of those guys today because
that's what I have, That's who I have a lot of in my notes,
That's who I focus on. That's what I know. And Anthony's totally
right. You know, those are the guys who are gonna, you know,
more than likely play in your league because those guys aren't getting the same
number of you know, NFL opportunities, especially like HBCU players. I don't
think there was any of those guys drafted this year, and they you know
fall into the FCS and Division two categories. So maybe, you know,
keep pushing that. Like I remember the the XFL. I guess it was
in twenty twenty two, had the HBCU showcase in Jackson State when Deion Sanders
was the head coach there. So just keep doing you know, things like
that. And you know, I mean, it's good to see that we're
getting you know, more players involved. At least again, there's probably only
a quarter these guys are a little more that are going to end up in
this league next year, but it's better than nothing in my opinion. So
yeah, and again we're doing this and we're still doing the showcases. We're
going to have a draft Leather. I have dul hat of questions about that
here talking about you know, is there's still going to be more drafts,
Greg said, we presume there's going to be. Anthony, Let's start with
you. I have your article here, a big takeaways, and you know,
we a little team, and we're not gonna do every player here,
and again some of these is you know what results like the ministre results of
kind of going through every single one of these, some of the guys lesser
known, Anthony, we are standards for you, and then we can kind
of start going team my team here. Well, I want to start with
everyone's been complaining about lebron James and Bronnie James in that situation how he got
drafted, and no one's talking about how Drake Stoops got drafted by Bob Stoops
in here. But no, in all seriousness, I think the big takeaway
is at the big takeaway from this draft is offensive line. I mean,
that was obviously a very big position. I think the tackle position had the
most from any position. I think twelve total got picked, so it's very
apparent. And I know, like and I know I've talked to this before,
like the number one positions that's always a struggle for these first spring football
leagues to find is good offensive lineman. And I think that that's what's good
about these college and rookie drafts is that you can get young offensive linemen that
maybe still needs some development and probably won't play in the NFL. They can
develop in the UFL and be able to get better and then maybe move on
to the NFL. So it was very clear offensive line was a big factor
for a lot of teams today. I will say, like looking at the
quarterback positions, a lot of mobile quarterbacks, which I think is always a
really smart way to go just because again, offensivelignemen are not the strongest they
see, they need a lot of development. So you need a quarterback who
could be mobile and roll out of the pocket and be able to throw on
the run. So I would say just my biggest takeaways was, you know,
big emphasis on offensive linement drafting it is I think twelve tackles. And
then yeah, I love how the quarterbacks it's all mobile quarterbacks, which I
think is a really important thing for the spring football leagues to have is have
those young quarterbacks who you know, they have strong arms, they give them
the run, but maybe there's some development they need there. So those were
my takeaways from the draft. Greg, I'll put your article, like Anthey
said, a lot of quarterbacks take in right, the number first one off
the board. Draft kind of major ways for you here in terms of the
actual players selected. Absolutely quarterbacks. Three quarterbacks going in the first round,
and not necessarily to teams that you would expect. Memphis, we talked about
a lot of holes on that Memphis team. Right, they take a quarterback
number one overall, and they don't take an offensive lineman, which was their
Achilles heel on offense until the sixth round. So I thought that was interesting.
You look at Arlington, they take a quarterback in the first round.
Of all the teams, you would think that Arlington was the most set.
If Luis Perez comes back the numbers he put up, the performance he put
up in twenty twenty four, and even if he doesn't come back, you've
got two really strong young players behind him in Lindsay Scott and Holton Naylors.
And yet they take a quarterback. You look at Houston, probably one of
the most quarterback needy teams, and they don't take a quarterback. A DC
takes two quarterbacks, So it makes you wonder what's going on there. Saint
Louis. I had them in my mock draft taking a quarterback in the first
round, just kind of you know, AJ mcair and getting older. Don't
know if he's going to come back. I don't think they have the backups
behind him that Arlington does that you could plug in if mccaren doesn't come back
as starter. So they take Schavon Cordero there. San Antonio doesn't take a
quarterback. You would think somebody like AJ Smith would always be wanting to take
a quarterback every year just to have somebody to develop in that offense. But
they don't. And you know, Michigan takes a quarterback. Birmingham takes a
flyer on Sam Hartman lay to you know, your commanders. He may end
up making the fifty three man roster of the Washington Commanders, let alone the
practice squad. So explains why he went in the ninth round here perhaps,
but a quarterback, quarterback, quarterback? Very interesting to see as Anthony talked
about what quarterbacks went, what their skill sets were, and where they went.
Evan, I know this is a tough question for you, and I
apologize obviously you're involved in player scouting and everything getting signed on. Here.
We've just spent here in the first you know, twenty minutes talking about how
this draft like kind of doesn't matter. It kind of matters as like,
how would you approach if you're someone if you're one of these teams, because
it's not like, well, this guy's guaranteed, right, we can draft
eighty you know, across the board, but you know, eighty players,
like it doesn't hurt us, right, and we're just having the riots that
they want to come, Like, how would you approach this if you were
someone involved in one of these teams? And I guess we'll go from there.
Yeah, well, you're picking from a pool of undrafted players, right,
So you want NFL caliber guys, you know, guys that are signed
the NFL teams, because I mean that's not it's not written in the rules,
right, Like you're gonna take guys that are signed the NFL contracts because
those are typically the best players, even if they're not also technically available,
which I understand that's all complicated. But if I was, you know,
in a position, you know, doing a draft like this that was for
rights and you had to kind of pick from a pool of NFL guys.
I would, you know, use my existing connections in the NFL with NFL
teams to figure out, you know, which guys of your undrafted pool.
I'm not talking about your draft class, but your undrafted pool that you brought
in after the draft. What you know, what guys are going to be
on the fringe is essentially what I'm trying to say. You know, what
guys do you think are you know, they don't have the greatest chances of
making the fifty three. Maybe they're cut in the preseason as opposed to you
know, being a part of the final round of cuts or whatever, just
kind of making those you know, very small I guess changes of note,
you know, just to determine what kind of you know pool you have.
So let's go here. Let's go team by team I thought I thought I
had Here, we go Anthony first, since you're the Arlington Renegades fan here
in that fan you're the reporter, right sorry, standouts here, and then
we talked that you made the jug Bob Soups down all that like thoughts here
Arlington Renegades that any players have know, we'll kind of go around the horn
here for each of these teams. Kind of as we go through, I
make the joke about Drake Stews, but I actually do think that's a pretty
solid pick. Like I think he's somebody who can actually come in and be
that slot receiver for the Renegade, and you know, he has that chemistry
having been you know, obviously he's very close to his dad, so he
knows, you know, the type of offense he wants to run, he
knows how he works as a coach. So I actually think that's a really
solid pick to get him in the in the tenth round. And I think
Soups is somebody, you know, if if Drake doesn't, you know,
if the NFL doesn't work out, he would definitely go to the UFL and
join him. Obviously, Plumbley is the big name here going in the first
round. I actually don't mind the pick. I think, you know,
there's a lot of uncertainty with Louis Perez if he is gonna come back.
But I think, you know, if Plumbley comes in, I think he's
gonna end up being the third quarterback on this team. I still think Lindsay
Scott just has better, better trades and better skill sets, and then Plumbley
has Plumbley it has a tendency of turning the ball over a lot, and
I think that's something that he, you know, really need to clean up
when he was in college and what he'll need to work on when he goes
into the pros. So I still think Lindsay Scott Junior. I don't think
he'll be a threat to him. I think Lindsay still ends up being on
top of him in terms of the depth charts, So I think it will
be really can Plumbly beat out Houlton for that third string quarterback job. But
I like Plumbley. I mean, he's got all the skill sets that you
want. He's got a good arm, he's obviously very mobiles He's fast when
he's out in the open field. He can put on the burners. So
I really liked seeing that offensive line. I think the offense lie was kind
of shaky for Arlington at the beginning of the year. It got better throughout
the season, but I think adding three guys in the offensive line is really
important there. So I like that they kind of focus on the offensive line,
you know, defensively. I would have liked him to actually done something
in the secondary. I you know, I think you know, they got
a good group of linebackers. You know, they get they got some defensive
lignment. But I think the corner in safety was where well, I wouldn't
say safety, I would say corner was their weakest spot on the throughout the
team. And I wish they would have drafted some more corners. I wish
they would have kind of built that up a little bit more because I think
it was really lacking. This was a team that allowed a lot of big
plays in that second and deary, so I would like to see more corners
pick. But I think overall it was a a It was a solid draft
for the team. Coach Craig here checking in, coach signing. A lot
of what you're saying about plum Lee talking about played baseball, So we should
coach Craig. Coach Craig like we did. This was kind of like,
hey, we're doing this and I would like we all wear carrd here,
but kind of like what effort can we do to put it? So we
need to get coach Craig on to getting here to talk through all that stuff.
Greg GT, you plant stand out players from here will were rotate around
and then we'll go to Evan. What stands out to me about ar Lincoln
is the linebackers. They chose three linebackers. I had them choosing a linebacker
in my mock draft. I thought linebacker was a bit of a weakness on
defense for them, especially in pass coverage over the middle. Their linebackers are
getting older, Donald Payne in the middle, so they've really infused some youth
into the second line of defense there. Cale and DeLoach kind of a linebacker's
safety hybrid. People talk about him being like miscast maybe as a linebacker better
suited for strong seats to safe given his size. So he's an interesting pick
there, Amari Gainer out of U and see but Rick Her out of the
Air Force. So I think they did need to replenish and add some youth
to the linebacker corps, get some guys who can maybe cover over the middle
a little better. I mean, we saw so many plays that were just
routes over the middle, you know, easy routes for quarterbacks and for receivers,
and that was what Arlington was burned by quite a bit. So three
linebackers in this draft really stood out to me for them. Havan for you.
Yeah, I mean Drake Stoops, I think is obviously the one that
a lot of people were talking about, you know, because Bob Stoops is
the head coach and you know, he's draft and his son. To me,
this doesn't really confirm that he's coming back next year. You know,
it doesn't really change much for me because right now Drake Stoops is in the
NFL with the Los Angeles Rams. And it's worth noting that he had you
know, a huge senior season or you know, final season maybe fifth year,
compared to the rest of you know, his production during his time in
Oklahoma, So I won't focus much on him. The guy I really want
to talk about is Griffin McDowell, the tackle out of Chattanooga. This is
a guy interviewed during the you know, pre draft process last year. Transferred
down to the FCS level for his last season. He played five seasons at
the University of Florida, has a wealth of experience at numerous positions. Not
only did he play offensive line, but he played defensive line, tight end,
special teams. You know. So he was a bit on the slimmer
side, kind of two hundred and eighty five pounds. You know, not
exactly what you'd want to see for a tackle, but when he went down
to the FCS level, put on some weight, got back up to three
hundred, was able to start, turned into a very good performer there.
Signed with the Kansas City Chiefs as an undrafted free agent. Likely projects more
as a guard at the next level, again, just given his size and
kind of his skill set. But you know, that's an interesting one that
I don't think is going to get talked about enough. And then John Reeves
Plumbley. I was going to talk about all the first round quarterbacks in one
go, so I guess I'll just do that now. There were three quarterbacks
taken in the first round. Obviously, we've got John Reese Plumbley here,
a quarterback out of UCF, Chavon Cordero, quarterback out of San Jose State,
previously at Hawaii, was selected by the BattleHawks. And then Jason Bean
the quarterback from Kansas previously played at North Texas and was drafted by the show
Boats. So all these guys are mobile. I thought that was an interesting
trend. I mean, we talk about, you know, just in draft
circles in any league, you know, mobile quarterbacks becoming more important. The
previous NFL MVP was Lamar Jackson, and I know maybe that wasn't the most
deserving MVP ever, but the idea is that, you know, mobile quarterbacks
are you know, starting to become more valuable. You look at what Jalen
Hurts has done with the Eagles things like that, So they're all mobile guys.
So I like that worth noting that Cordero is the only one of the
three that's not currently signed to the NFL. He was previously with the Seahawks
let go, So that's something to note in terms of, you know,
odds of the guy actually coming to the league. And then if I had
to pick, you know, the most upside out of those three, I'd
probably picked Jason Bean from Kansas just because I think he has the most hour
five starting experience. I've actually seen John rus Plumbley throw around. I was
like standing right next to him watching him go through progressions and drills when I
scouted at Tulane in the AAC Championship game in twenty twenty two against UCF,
So I've you know, got a pretty up close and personal look at him.
You know, he's a guy I can see coming to this league.
I think it would be beneficial for him, just because I don't know if
he's fully ready for the NFL yet, just given where he came from and
just some of the tools that he has. But all three are very intriguing
options. And you know, again it's I guess it's nice to see three
quarterbacks all kind of you know that fit the more modern standard being taken in
the first round of this draft today, Anthony, the last question for you
about the Rennygates here. Obviously we joked the Stoops and Drake and all that,
Like, I don't know, yeah, confirmation Stoops, Like, I
guess we're all setting that rather we operating. Then Greg can co sign as
well if he wants. But like, obviously these are the eight teams.
Stoops back, like, I think at this point we would know if anything
is shaken out. Do you feel differently about that? I mean, we
we asked Stoops and that last media availability for the Renegades like last week of
the season, like do you want to come back or like what's your what's
your what's your future look like? And he said, like, I want,
I want to come back. I think the only thing that's going to
hold him back. I think it's gonna be the financial like it. I
don't think he does. I don't know if he's exactly said financial, but
he's like, you know, there there there's gonna be uncertainty after the contracts
are released that I think it's I think the financial part is probably going to
play a factor in it. But I think he has every desire to come
back. I think he's enjoying it. You know, he doesn't have to.
You know, he always talks about like he doesn't have to go to
the grind of what college is like and going out and scouting and worrying about
you know, are the kids going to class and stuff like that. Like,
he doesn't want to worry about that kind of stuff. He wants to
work with professionals, and he wants to have a shorter schedule. So it
makes sense for him because he'll have his time off in the fall and stuff
like that to spend time with his family, and then in the spring just
you know, three months, go coach the you know in UFL. So
the schedule fits him and he seems to still have a passion for it,
and so I think there's still a chance he comes back. It's really just
going to depend on what is the UFL going to offer these coaches for twenty
twenty five and beyond in terms of salary, because if it's not gonna be
a lot, then maybe he doesn't Maybe that makes no sense for him.
But I mean, Arlington's a good location for you know, where him and
his family is because they're they're around the area sort of, you know,
in Oklahoma and stuff like that. So I think I'm under the assumption he's
gonna come back unless it's something you know, draftic financially that the UFL offers
Greg. Any thoughts on that. I think I saw someone comment to say,
like, oh, the means there's no expansion, but eighteen's were moving
forward and then we'll move on to Burley Birmingham after that. So any thoughts
on that, and then we can segue into kind of thoughts about the Stallions.
You're not you're not gonna trick me into talking about expansion on this show.
Read don't don't even think about it. So no, I agree with
Anthony. I think it's really unfortunate the situation that the head coaches find themselves
in through no fault to their own. I think Bob Stoops is good for
the league, and so I hope that they're able to agree on a contract
and he's able to return. So let's get in here to the Stallions.
You know, the rich get richer here. Obviously, I want to make
sure right thing here and bring up obviously, you know, we just were
in Saint Luisie and all that Greg thoughts and anyone stand out that the that
the the science brought on. Well, they were in a unique position,
very different than I think a lot of the teams in this league in that
they didn't have any glaring weaknesses or holes positionally that they needed to look to
fill here in this draft, so they could really kind of sit back and
take the best players available that fit their scheme. And so you know,
you look at the first two picks, offensive lineman Frank Crumb from Wyoming.
You know, I think he was at the NFL Combine. Some people had
draftable grades on him in terms of the NFL draft. And Monnie Bailey is
in an interesting pick out of TCU or running back. You know. Again
the four offensive lineman Sam Hart, you know, Birmingham is different also because
if you're a player who's on I use the example of Keton Slovas earlier in
the show. And if you're a player who's kind of on the fringe of
signing a futures contract and then you're looking at the UFL prospects and you're like,
do I really want to go in there? I mean, if somebody
has their rights owned by Birmingham, they might want to take that risk.
I mean, Birmingham playing for Skip Holds, You're going to put up numbers,
You're going to be part of a successful team. So I don't know
how much that plays a part in people's thinking when it comes to these spring
leagues, whether it's just they look at the league overall and what can this
league do for me, or they look at a team and say, well,
Birmingham owns my rights. I know they're a really good team. I
know Skip Holds is a really good offensive coach. I'm an offensive player who
wants to improve that certain parts of my game, and I know that he
can do that. Maybe I will take this jump where if it was the
Houston Roughnecks, they might not have. So when you're looking at that aspect
of it from a player acquisition point of view, some of these guys may
find Birmingham more attractive than if they were drafted by another team. Yeah,
I want someone to pull I a Cale Williams. Yeah, I'm not going
to the show bouts here, like I really really gonna have these. I
have been at sandat players from this part here as we go through. Yeah,
I've got two of them. I mean the first one is kind of
the elephant in the room to a degree, and that's obviously Sam Hartman,
the quarterback from Notre Dame, probably one of the bigger college quarterbacks that a
lot of people have watched in recent years. Spent you know, several seasons
at Wake Forest and the transferred to Notre Dame for his final season. I
think, you know, the pick has garnered the most media attention just because
Birmingham has a track record of, you know, developing quarterbacks really well,
especially this past year, not only with you know, the league MVP Adrian
Martinez who came out of Kansas State and signed with the Detroit Lions and then
eventually ended up with Birmingham, but also Matt Carral. You know, i'd
give them credit for getting him in there and kind of I guess in a
sense saving his career. You know, something it looked like he was never
going to play football again with everything that happened between him in Carolina and him
in New England. So Sam Hartman, you know, through for over four
thousand yards and almost forty touchdowns and twenty twenty one at wake Forest, transferred
to Notre Dame for last season and had the highest quarterback rating of his career.
It was about the same. It was just like a tick over what
it was in twenty twenty two at wake Forest. And that's according to ESPN.
And then, like you said, Reid He's currently signed with the Washington
Commanders, And I don't know. He's a guy that I think, you
know, does actually have a decent chance of making it on the fifty three
or at least being a practice squad player and sticking around in the NFL.
So I don't know. If he comes to the Stallions, I don't know
if that's in his best interest, but I'm you know, if he does,
I think, you know, that would turn a lot of heads.
And you know, I think he would play really well in this league,
just based off the college tape. Yeah, And I don't know. It's
weird because I was having a Commander's fan and Jay Danis and all that,
but like there's been a ton of like for basically being that, because we
have Mario, like for being the third string, fourth string quarterback. Like
there's been a ton of pub coming from you know, obviously the commanders and
then you get all the aggregators or theever Like. I don't know if it's
just because he's like good looking, like like I think Mike Mitchell said he
kind of looks like Pat Raffino with longer hair, Like I just I've just
seen this ton of him, Like I I'm a commander's fan. If I'm
a commander's fan enough to know like who's the fourth string quarterback or who's kind
of on the fringe to come on, I'm like, I even I'm like,
oh yeah, Sam, Like I know, like I'm aware of that.
So it's just weird to me that and obviously kind of be in the
notable name there. Anthony thoughts on Sam or anyone else here coming out from
the Science. Yeah, I think Sam Hartman's an interesting choice. I wouldn't
compare him to like the skill set that guys like Alex McGough and Adrian Martinez
had at the quarterback position. I would say he may be a little bit
more of a pocket quarterback. He may be a little more like a J.
Morris Smith type, But I think he could be somebody that could develop,
you know, in the UFL. I don't I don't ever see him
wearing a Stallion's jersey personally. Maybe a couple of years down the road.
I can definitely see him, you know, making the Washington Commander's team as
a third string quarterback. So I mean, unfortunately, I don't think we're
ever going to see him in that. The two guys that really that pointed
out to me was was a Money Bailey, which he had a really good
season last year for TC over twelve hundred yards rushing. Not the fastest guy,
but I think he actually fits the Stallion's offensive system really well. This
is a team that wants to be able to run the football. You don't
need to be a fast running back to be in that backfield for the Stallions.
So I actually think Bailey is actually a pretty good fit for what they
want to do. So if he does end up playing for them, I
think he couldn't succeed in that system. And then Jeff Co for Arkansas I
like him as well. I think he kind of got buried under depth charts
when he was at like Missouri and Arkansas, but he's had some really nice
moments. I think he's a good pass rusher. I think he could,
you know, even play hybrid outside linebacker as well. I think he's got
that talent to do it. So those are the two that I that I
really like. I think Bailey, you know, if he can get into
this offense for Birringham, if he ends up going to the UFL, I
think, you know, he can maybe be that number one running back that
Yeah, I know they're a running back by committee team, but you know,
maybe he could be that replacement for both Scarborough Evan. You want to
move on here, Will I talked to Fenders and we'll circle back to Greg
here. I think he said, I actually had one more play for the
staffs. Yeah, go for it, just real quick down. Holker,
the tight end from Colorado State. You know, he gained a lot of
attention when Colorado State played Colorado. I'm sure a lot of people remember that
game, you know, kind of chippy. I think that was the game
Travis Hunter got injured. But this guy, Dalen Hoker, he had six
catches for one hundred and nine yards and two touchdowns in that game, and
then he finished the season as a first team All Mountain West and second team
All American performer. He's currently signed with the New Orleans Saints. Just because
you know, he's a group of five guy. I wanted to give him
a shout out. But again, we talked about in terms of, you
know, awe of guys actually coming into this league and doing something. He's
a guy that you know I could see just you know, I could see
him in the Stallion's uniform. I guess is what I'm trying to say.
Oh good, I appreciate that. Let's keep with you here. Let's god
defenders, and then we'll circle around again here. Like I said, I
think Greg it tied a couple of quarterbacks taken that thought's what the defenders did.
Yeah, I have four players to talk about with the defenders, and
two of them are the quarterbacks. So I'll start with that. Keaton Slowas
is the first one. I know. Greg's already mentioned his name a couple
of times. Breakout first year at USC in twenty nineteen, I mean,
he looked like he was going to be the future of that program and get
them back on track, kind of like you know what, Taylor Williams ended
up doing breakout year in twenty nineteen and then just never was able to capture
that same energy. He played decently at USC for the two seasons that followed,
but could never really get it together, and then transferred to Pitt had
an okay season there, transferred to BYU, had an ok season there,
so kind of dropped off a bit. But I can definitely see him as
a project guy somebody could develop, and obviously I think that's why he wasn't
one of the first quarterbacks taken in this draft. He wasn't the first round
pick. Interestingly enough, he's currently in training camp along with Jason Bean,
who was the number one overall pick with the Indianapolis Colts, Jason Bean going
to the Showbotes of course at the first round, and then Tanner Mordecai,
the quarterback from Wisconsin. He started his career at Oklahoma, but he was
obviously much more remembered for his time at SMU. In twenty twenty one and
twenty twenty two, he had it combined seven and fifty two passing yards and
seventy two touchdowns over those two seasons combined was good enough to transfer up back
to the Power five level, which wasn't much of a surprise. Went to
Wisconsin, which was kind of an interesting decision, but had a down year
there, only threw for nine touchdowns, but just because of what he did
at SMU, that was enough for a team to want to bring him in.
The San Francisco forty nine Ers signed him as an undrafted free agent.
So, you know, I don't know if either of those guys are gonna
come. I mean, I think if they were to come to d C,
they'd be If both of them came, they'd be probably competing for a
backup job. And then the other two guys I wanted to talk about real
quick, Garrett Greenfield, the offensive tackle from South Dakota State. He's not
the only South Dakota State guy I'm gonna talk about in this draft because they
took a lot of them. He's a three time FCS All American. That
unit was one of the best, you know, that I've seen in a
hot minute. North Dakota State has a lot of NFL ready lineman too,
but South Dakota State as well, who just won the FCS championship. I
think that's why they had a lot of draft picks. But one of his
teammates, Garrett Mason McCormick, was actually drafted by the Pittsburgh Steelers in the
fourth round. And then Greenfield is currently with the Seattle Seahawks, who signed
him as an undrafted free agent. So maybe somebody to watch again. You
just talk about high upside guy, you know, coming out of a small
school. Maybe something there. The last guy we'll talk about for d C
Dallas Gant, the linebacker from Toledo, started his career at Ohio State,
played three or four seasons there, didn't really do a lot, didn't get
on the field much. Then he turned up at Toledo in twenty two and
exploded. Had two hundred and thirty three tackles over the past two seasons combined,
added fourteen and a half tackles for loss and eight passes defended. It's
interesting because the two seasons at Toledo were almost identical. I think he had
like one more tackle this past season that he did in twenty two. Anyways,
he was a two time first team All MAC performer, and the Minnesota
Vikings signed him as a UDFA. What was interesting too. A number of
guys I noticed it was. I think the Vikings and the Raiders were taken
in terms of like I said, you know teams, the NFL teams,
you know, have these guys as udfas. When I was looking around,
I noticed there was a lot of Raider guys and a lot of Vikings guys
that seemed to be in this draft. So again, maybe some you know,
pre existing connections there between personnel people, I don't know, but just
something else to note, Greg Circle that you here thought some of the defenders.
Yeah, I'm looking at my list right now, and I think the
Vikings stood out to me too as a team that I think six of their
undrafted free agents were drafted by the UFL today, So that was a team
definitely that as I was noting them as the draft was going on, that
that stuck in my head. If you're looking at a from a pure talent
standpoint, I think DC might have had the best draft up and down this
list. I think this may be the most talented draft class, which isn't
always the best thing because if it's the most talented, it's probably the least
likely to get these guys into the UFL, so it's kind of a double
edged sword for DC. There. Yeah, I thought that Michael Wiley I
liked running back out of Arizona. I thought was a nice pick. I
think Slovas has a starter ceiling in a league like the UFL, so bringing
him in would be interesting. I will say about Tanner Mordecai, you know,
he comes from a spread system in SMU and as Evan mentioned, hite
a down year at Wisconsin. Part of that was they were transitioning first year
under Luke Fickele and offensive coordinator Phil Longo. They were transitioning from traditional Wisconsin
power football to the spread offense. And I don't think you can make a
bigger transition in one year than that. So I think part of it was
personnel, you know, that was an issue with that transition in Wisconsin and
transitioning to a completely different offense. But he's a guy who came out and
ran a super fast forty at the Wisconsin prote that surprised a lot of people.
So you know, I'm not saying he could be that Derek King backup
role that was really missing and really lacking in DC this year, that offensive
spark, But I could see him in that kind of role where they have
packages for him as a backup in DC coach greg here says fun fact,
Kurt Warner coach fullvis in high school. So just checking in here as well,
here Anthony vous for you for the defenders. Yeah, I'll just add
that I like what they did on de line. Obviously this week they lost
their top pass rusher and Malie Fisher who signed with the Houston Texans. So
Brady McGregor out of Michigan, and then you know, Leonard Taylor out of
Miami. Taylor's three hundred and five pounds, big dude, Kim, you
know, really have a great ability of stopping the run in the middle.
So I like what DC did there. And then McGregor is quick on the
on the outside of Michigan on the edge. You know, again, this
is Michigan's defense was super talented last year on their runs to the national titles.
So you know, maybe didn't get as many looks as if you would
like, but I think he's a guy that can maybe step in and develop
and be a nice replacement for Fisher. So I like what the I like
what DC did on the on the defensive line and defense in general. I
thought they drafted really well, and we talked about that the signings that Greg
had mentioned earlier on you only fourteen here coming and that was the one this
week, Like Greg, is it just we've been doing these spring leaks now
for four years. It's just not enough spots. And then Mike talks about
that a lot. Mike Mitchell kind of in our group chat like thoughts on
that, just in terms of just to kind of take a break here for
two seconds, just about kind of the signings coming from the UFL, I
think really more so than anything else, if you it's the time of year,
right, If you look at the transactions in the NFL, there really
haven't been any for the last month because they're off. You know, they're
resting before training camp. There's no OTAs, there's no practices going on or
anything like that. So you know, gms are taking a break, coaches
are taking a break before the season begins. So I would really expect that
number to go up here as we get into training camp. But you know,
that's part of the argument against playing the time of year that the UFL
did and kicking off the time of year it did, is because you may
get a couple signings at the very end of the year where teams are completing
OTAs and things like that. But there's going to be a long gap where
there's just no transactions in the league period because this is the break time,
the dead zone before training camp begins. So I think that's more of the
case than any kind of spring league fatigue in terms of the NFL trying to
sign these players. Evan, if that's on that or else we can transition
to the Roughnecks, where do you want to go? Yeah, I mean,
I think that's accurate what Greg said. You know, the timeline,
you know, might be something you know, to consider next year, depending
on how many signings, Like we're gonna have to wait, you know,
a couple of months. We're playing the waiting game now to see how many
guys are going to sign, you know, during the NFL cycle, which
you know really goes all the way through I guess, you know, December
January, the regular season, you know, so it's just a wait and
see. But now I agree with Greg Evan standad's here from the Roughnecks.
As we continue on, Yeah, I had two Roughnecks players and I already
pointed out that Their draft was interesting because eight of their ten guys were not
under contract by NFL team, So I'm going to focus on two of those
guys of the eighth. The first guy is Trey Flewan. I think that's
how he pronounced his name. Safety for Middle Tennessee. He transferred up from
SCS Houston Christian. He's also from the Houston area, so I thought that
kind of added a nice tie into the pick. But anyways, his production
was down a bit in twenty twenty three compared to twenty twenty two. He
had over one hundred tackles in twenty twenty two from the safety spot, which
I thought was impressive, five combined interceptions and sixteen combined passes defended over the
previous two seasons. The biggest thing with him is the Tours ACL towards the
end of the season in November. I think it was against Florida International,
and I know that's what hindered his NFL interest. I'm sure he would have
been in an NFL mini camp had he not suffered an injury. But you
know that could work to the Roughnecks advantage. You get a very talented player
who was going to be in the NFL but because of the injury in the
rehab process was not able you know, to attend you know, such events
like mini camps, training camps, whatever, and therefore he wasn't going to
be signed. So I like that. And then the second guy, Malik
Dunlap, the dB from Texas Tech later round pick I think at round nine.
This is to me more of like a diamond in the rough pick some
again another selection that people aren't going to talk about as much. He recorded
twenty three combined passes defended between twenty twenty two and twenty twenty three seasons.
Super great size six three two twenty so pretty intimidating from a frame perspective.
And then this is kind of just a tie in. But he played in
the same secondary as a guy Dadrian Taylor Demerson, who was drafted by the
Arizona Cardinals in the fourth round. And that was a guy who initially stood
out to me as another underrated DV during this process. So the fact that
you're getting one of his teammates who played at the same school, played at
the same system, that could work for their benefit as well, because I
thought he was an interesting player. Let's good the Anthony and I for I
should have mentioned off the top. I didn't want to come of Evan obviously,
the Roughnecks a new GM here, Will Lewis coming in here. Curious
Anthony's thoughts on that, how it would relate to their draft and then stand
out players and I'm going to go get some waters. I'm going to meet
myself. But Anthony thoughts on that and then thoughts on the drafts itself.
Love bred Beck. Yeah, I think the Roughnecks needed to make a change
on the front office, and honestly, they probably need to make a change
at head coach too. I know we've talked to us multiple times that,
you know, c J. Johnson just didn't get the job done this year.
So I'll be interested to see if they still make a coaching change.
But this is a third different GM in the last three years for the Houston
Roughnecks, so you know, I you know, there are probably more moves
they're gonna be made. You know, even if C. J. Johnson
ends up coming back, they're gonna have to They're gonna have to do some
work on that coaching staff because they just didn't get the job done. You
know, do you you know, do you look at the office coordinator Eric
Price, and do you make a change there? You know, did Price
do what he needed to do to get that offense rolling? I don't know,
I I you know, I think this was an offense that really struggled.
You know, I think, you know, the quarterback position. I'm
really surprised that the Roughnecks didn't go after a quarterback in this draft. You
know, I would have liked to have seen them get somebody that they could
develop. But I think they have a good group of quarterbacks right now,
but none of them like really stood out as you know, guys that can
be stars in this league. I think no one. Henderson had some nice
moments, you know, Readsen, it's a veteran quarterback, you know,
you know Jared Garantano, you know, maybe could develop. I think they
were hoping that he would be that you know, prototypical quarterback that could be
the guy. But he couldn't stay healthy. So there's a lot of instability
at the quarterback position. So I wish they would have done something there.
I would say the one player that stood out to me was Malcolm P's with
the Pittsburgh This is a guy that he's bounced around a little bit in college.
He was actually a wide receiver at one point, but I like the
upside ability that he has six six, two hundred and forty four pounds.
You know, he's a tall guy, athletic. I think he can make
some plays on this offense. You know, tight end position was a little
was a pun non attended, but a little rough for the Roughnecks. I
know they had some injury issues there, so it looks like they made a
couple moves at the tight end position to add some depth. Though. I
really like Malcolm and I think he's somebody that can you know, again,
he played wide receiver at Texas, so he he's an athletic guy, and
I think he could really make a difference if he can just you know,
maybe just develop a little more in his blocking. I think he could,
you know, he could move up in this Broadnecks depth chart and maybe be
a starting tight end and could be, you know, a top pass catcher,
somebody like a sou Canela as they question that. Greg just thoughts on
the Refnecks draft definitely different than all the other teams, and they took two
players the only two players in the draft who did not participate in rookie minicamp,
either as a tryout player or an undrafted free agent in the NFL.
Evan talked about Trey Fluellen out of Middle Tennessee State. He's got an excuse
towards ACL in November. The other one was Xavier Benson out of Oklahoma State.
Started twenty seven games the last two seasons, fifth leading tackler on the
team this past year. So you know, it's not like they're taking a
guy who wasn't invited to rookie mini camp because he was a backup and hardly
saw the field. I mean, Benson's going to be an intriguing guy to
look out for and could be a guy who ends up in the UFL if
he doesn't even have any interest in the NFL coming out in May. The
other guy on a spotlight is Droquarius Spivey, their last pick in the draft.
Kind of funny that Houston would take two tight ends. Anthony talked about
Malcolm Apps, but they didn't feature the tight end at least in the passing
game very often, so interesting that they take two tight ends here. Spivey
actually had to sit out in twenty twenty three. He started at Mississippi State
transferred to CCU try to transfer back to Mississippi State in twenty twenty three,
but just before the season opener, he was told by the NCAA that he
was ineligible for the season, so he ended up working out at Mississippi State's
pro day, ran a four six two forty and has actually tried out for
three NFL teams this spring. He was in two rookie mini camps and also
tried out at one of the veteran mini camps. So there's some NFL interest
even though he is I believe unsigned right now. But he's He's got an
interesting background of the guys that they drafted. God bless Greg for the pronunciation
guy here going into this because like I saw some of these, I mean,
the worst is when we do it live. It's like, what's going
on here? So good for that, I'll never forget it, and I'll
never forget you furrowing your brow over diego fejo on. He in the XFL
twenty twenty two draft, and I tried to hop in and save on that
one. And I think he's with the CFL now right that Evan would know
that. I think he moved up north here. Let's go Evan Showboats.
Here, we'll go round. I think this is a good pace here.
We'll get through the teams here and then we can do final thoughts by that
Evan, and we tied Jason Bean and all of that, But any other
thoughts on the Showboats draft? Yeah, this is fun. The Showboats might
have had my favorite pick in the entire draft, and that's this guy,
Jalen Cocher from holy Cross. Great combination of size and production. They have
him listed at six three, two hundred and thirteen pounds, had fifty nine
catches for one thousand and forty yards and fifteen tds. So to crunch the
numbers there, he was averaging about seventeen point six yards per catch and had
to score every three point nine catches, so you know, if you round
up, that's a touchdown four catches or every four times he's touching the ball,
which is ridiculous. I don't care what level that's at. Holy Cross
is an FCS program. Those numbers are just incredible. He's currently signed with
the Carolina Panthers. He's a guy that I would like to see, you
know, in the NFL, you know, maybe breakthrough and get an opportunity
he's gotten uphill battle, but obviously Carolina is one of the teams. You
know, they were at the bottom of the NFL last year, so he
might have, you know, some benefit of the doubt. But that was
probably my favorite pick of the draft. The other guy that I'll talk about,
and this is a guy that I've had, you know, some history
with too, just from the scouting perspective. McCallan Castles, the tight end
out of Tennessee. He was one of the best tight ends at the FCS
level at UC Davis and then moved into SEC competition last year for his final
year. Incredibly versatile player. He was blocking more last year, but he
doesn't have a problem catching. You know, caught five touchdowns on just twenty
two receptions in twenty twenty three, and then he landed with the Philadelphia Eagles
Anthony's team as an undrafted free agent this year. So I don't know,
that's a guy that I could see, you know, sticking around on the
NFL practice squad too. But boy, you know, if he comes,
if both those guys Jal and Coke Graham accown Castles, if they come to
the UFL, uh, you know that that'd be pretty good for Memphis.
We might talk about them. You throw Jason Bean in there, they might
have the best draft class. I don't know, Uh, Anthony, we've
seen here in Chris steven as a comment, you know, show botes and
we're talking, you know, offensive line and kind of all that stuff.
Black thereof thoughts on you know, you would have thought maybe they go a
little bit more of that, But thoughts on on the show bots draft here.
I actually like the Jason Bean draft pick. And look, they've been
dealing with case Cookis last year and he's probably the most statue of liberty quarterback
in this league. Like he is, he is the terrible choice for this
offensive line. And and yeah, I mean I wish they would have drafted
off offensive lineman. But Jason Bean can actually move around in the pocket,
and that's somebody Memphis needed. They you know, Troy Williams was able to
do a little bit more. But you know, Troy Williams, I really
don't He's not really a starting He shouldn't be a starting quarterback, hate to
say it, being could develop and be a starting quarterback, So that would
be a lot of fun if they can. If he ends up getting into
the UFL. I think he would have a real shot at starting for Memphis.
I would say a couple of standouts. You know, Blake Watson was
really good at Memphis. You know, he had a good career at Old
Dominion and then you know, had a nice run with Memphis last year.
He's ran for one thousand yards a couple of times in the last three years.
He's a versatile back, be able to catch out of the backfield.
So I think he would be a good a good compliment to Darius Victor,
who is more of a powerback. So I obviously Watson is a hometown guy
too. You know, havn't gone to school there, So that was a
really smart pick on their part. And then I got to give a shout
out to the IVY League pick there with Mason Tipton. You know, he's
the third all time leading receiver at Yale. He was a first team All
IVY League last year, led the league in touch downs with ten. I
think he's a really solid receiver and somebody that I can see. I don't
know if he would be on the outside. He may be more of a
of a sought receiver, but I think he's somebody that can be sneaky and
maybe help out with that mephis offense. Chris here has a question, Christopher,
I thought Blake Watson is going to be the first overall pick. Thoughts
on that, I mean pigging, you know, I know we tied the
Jason Bean and all that. I guess we'll go back to Anthony on that.
Just that they would go to the quarterback now they're running back. I
don't just in terms of getting players into the league, are you surprised they
would quarterback number one? I would Yeah, I guess I was a little
bit surprised. I mean there's a We've all talked about it. I think
there's other position needs that they had, and you know, the biggest one
being on the offensive line. But I mean it's a sexy pick. I
mean it's one that's going to get people talking. So you know, I
don't I don't blame them for going after another quarterback. Like I said,
like case Cookis is not a mobile quarterback. Like it's getting to the point
now where you know, I like case Cookis. I think he has good
trades him. I just don't know if he's really fit for spring football anymore.
He just he just hey, He's been really on and off the last
couple of years, and I just don't know if I really see that kind
of impact in him. And you know that Memphis offense, they moved the
ball a little bit better with Troy Williams at quarterback than they did with case
Cookis. So maybe it makes sense to have Jason Bean as the draft pick
and if he ends up, you know, heading over to the UFL,
I do think he could legitimately start for this team, and I think he
would add a spark to the offense. Greg any thoughts on that or else
we'll move over to Michigan. Any other thoughts on I think we've kind of
have we done the round on Memphis, not me yet, So sorry,
Yeah, no, it's it's okay. I know it's it's not easy,
you know, just they they had a lot of holes. They addressed almost
every level of their offense and defense with at least one pick. Again,
offensive line is something that I wish they would have concentrated a little more on.
But then again, you wonder is that a position they're going to look
to fill with veterans instead of rookies. That might be the better play for
a team like Memphis. I think the one thing they did is they got
more dynamic on offense, which is something they needed. You know, Jason
Bean is an athletic quarterback. Blake Watson runs a four to four flat forty.
You know, you've got Mason Tipton who runs a four to three,
four to forty. Mckallan Castle's is a threat at tight end. So they
added a lot of speed on offense, and I think that was key for
them. And yeah, other than that, Indrew Raim I like at center,
but I thought they could have used a little more offensive line, even
if even if they're waiting to sign veterans to start, I think they even
needed depth across the offensive line. They could have even considered drafting some high
level rookies to play his backups as well. Well. And not that we
want to, I mean we've had this conversation, but yeah, like,
couldn't you sign some of these players? I'm just always confused of like doing
this draft when it's kind of in the USFL. We kind of have the
difference of all that. Evan, do you want to tie I guess any
thoughts on that will to Panthers because yeah, I mean, can you sign
I just never understand the place of this is supposed, like besides getting pub
publicity, but then we didn't really publicize it. So we're doing this.
I don't know any other thoughts on that. Why you wouldn't just sign these
guys and then we I guess we can move out to the Panthers. I
mean, you're taking a gamble, you know. I mean, of course,
I would prefer a draft where everybody was just eligible for this draft and
not signed in a league like the NFL or the CFL. You just have
street free agents. Again, I like how the Roughnecks prioritize that and they
only took you know, two chances on guys that were in the NFL,
and the rest of their guys would be available to sign right now. I
think that's a great approach, not saying that's going to happen. But we'll
transition into Michigan here because I've only got one Michigan player to talk about,
so it'll be quick. That's their quarterback Rocky Lombardi. This is an interesting
one. You know, former Michigan State player, so there's that tie in.
He saw his most playing time at Michigan State during their COVID season in
twenty twenty, and then he transferred to Northern Illinois played three seasons there twenty
twenty one through twenty twenty three. His best year there was probably his first
year in twenty twenty one. You think he had twenty four total touchdowns,
fifteen passing, nine rushing. This is a guy I've actually seen throw in
person before as well. Not at an NIU game, but when he was
training down in Florida with a couple of NFL or other NFL quarterbacks, including
Michael Pratt from Tulane who was drafted by the Green Bay Packers. Saw them
throw down in Florida when I was there for a camp, so I've you
know, seen him in person. Doesn't tremendously overwhelm me. Again, guy
was taken in the fifth round, so you're probably looking at him if he
does come of course, he's with the Bengals right now. If he does
come in, he'd probably be a backup option. But you know, Michigan,
they played a lot of different quarterbacks this year, so I think it
doesn't hurt too much for them to, you know, continue looking at depth
and looking at options, just like Evan and all you guys, Because I
bring on everyone here because I don't know anything. I'm just a facilitator of
all this. But like, let it not be last year and Evan like
well I think you know, first year he threw twenty four. Like it's
always incredible to me, Like the wealth of knowledge everybody has of this,
Like you know, God forbid if anyone from the league and I then we've
got people moving on and everything else. But like this was like us on
the zoom call and for you know what I mean, Like it just like
the work that went into this to get and the knowledge that everyone has.
Like imagine if you had like a stack of these players on the list and
kind of everything else to be able to dive into all this stuff. I
just think, like to be able to elevate the coverage of this, I
just think it would be incredible because I think we do a great job with
just like us on webcams and sitting outside or sitting Evan's home with everything else.
But Anthony thoughts on the Panthers here anything from you? Yeah, I
like their first choice Julian Pearl from Illinois. I think lots of time.
Michigan drafted a tackle as their first pick with Jared Horse. I think it
worked out really well for them. He ended up being there starting left tackle.
I praise him. I think he's one of the most underrated offensive linemen
in this league. I don't think a lot of people talk about it much,
but when he was on the field for the Panthers, when he wasn't
dealing with injuries, I mean, that dude with bullying people. So you
know, can Julian come in and you know, if he does come into
and end up playing for Michigan, can he come in and maybe be the
right tackle. He's a guy that played left end right tackle at Illinois and
he was I think two times he was on the All Big Ten Honorable Mentioned
team. He's a really good pass walker. I think he can come in
and you know, be a bully on that offensive line for Michigan. With
with Horse, so you know, Michigan was a really good running team.
You know, obviously they ran through five million quarterbacks, but it didn't matter
to him. They were always winning games, and I think a big part
of that was because of the consistency of the running game. So offensive line
was very apparent to be important to Michigan. I think they end up signing
three guys, so that's you know, imperative to them to make sure they
have a strong depth of up at the line position, which I think was
really a strong suit for this team. And Chris is going crazy in the
chat and then haven't I already talked about it? But Rocky Lombardi, I
mean, really like a plus a plus football name here, I think in
terms of anyone else here, a lot of these phenomenal names, do they?
Greg got thoughts on the Panthers. One of the things that I wrote
about in my by the Numbers column out today on ufl board dot com was
something that I know read you have talked about. Mike Mitchell's talked about it
either on the marccast or on social media. But it's the idea that with
the UFL on so many of these markets struggling to attract fans, why not
do a a draft in which you can claim local players, right, And
we've had to jump in. We've had a lot of even comments on here
I haven't read talking about that, which you thought they would do that,
So yes, you hear, Actually Michigan kind of did that themselves here.
They they told them that, Yeah, they took JD to play out of
Michigan State. They took Brian Duley out of Eastern Michigan. As Evan mentioned,
a Rocky Lombardi, former Michigan State player. Even Isaac Oko with the
defensive end, is as an undirected free agent of the Lions. So he's
a local guy right now anyway. So you know, in terms of territorial
selections, the UFL didn't do that here, but really the teams kind of
you know, we talked about Blake Watson from Memphis being drafted by the Showboats
and McClellan Castles out of Tennessee being drafted by the show Boats. Now again,
these players that may never end up suiting up for these teams that are
drafting them, but you can get a story in the local newspaper about,
hey, the show Bolts drafted this hometown guy. It can't hurt. I
think it's a no brainer, and that mean it's something that doesn't cost a
penny at all, and you just do it that way. I agree with
you, Greg, when we're trying to get these immediate people. If I'm
if I'm in Michigan, if I'm mem Berwie him, if I'm in with
ever, I'm trying to figure out like what they had to talk about,
like I mean, and yeah, like obviously you should dive deeper and do
these other player interest stories. But it's a no brainer in terms of like
something that that's just easy fruit to pick from that of like, this is
a story that we can run and talk about Greg. Anything else from that
we can transition on to who we got the promise next? Anything else?
Uh no, I'll jump in with the promise here. So again, they're
a team that didn't draft a quarterback despite having some issues quarterbacks at this point
that revealed themselves in the championship games. So again, could be a situation
where they decide to wait out a veteran or something like that, add them
in a future draft, add them in free agency. Maybe they end up
being happy with what they have. Maybe they run with Quentin Dormandy as a
starter next year if they decide against Chase Garber. So a strong defense got
stronger. Their first two picks are along the defensive line, Game Haul Gabriel
Murphy, whose brother Grayson also played for UCLA. You know again, offensive
line since her Hayinesworth center. They've got Alex Molett at center, one of
the best centers in the league. So interesting that they take a center here.
So it didn't feel so much to me like they were trying to fill
holes necessarily on the team other than, you know, trying to get perhaps
the best talent they could out there that fit their system. I mean more
so than any other team perhaps is you know, they have a particular fit
that they look for, especially with offensive skill position players to fit into that
AJ Smith run and shoot based offense. So that's what you're going to look
at for those skill position players on offense. Evan thoughts for you on this
and obviously covering the roughnecks back for you prior and then then now the Brahmas
and we've had all this Wade Phillips and everything in AJA Smith and everything else.
Curious, Like I didn't even know how they approached this in terms of
I mean, I guess Wade sticking around right, We've had all these conversations
about AJ Smith in the offseason. But curious your thoughts on this is just
because I feel like, you know the team obviously super well. Yeah,
well, here's a good story about one of their draft picks. One of
the guys I was going to talk about anyways, Sincere Hainesworth, the offensive
center from Tulane. Mark Lilllybridge, who is the GM of the San Antonio
Bramas, his son, Hudson lily Bridge was an offensive lineman at Tulane.
I watched him play, and Sincere Haynesworth was one of his teammates. So
I have a feeling that that's why Sincere Haynesworth was the selection here even though
they already have Alex Molett, and Sincere Hainesworth is currently signed with the New
Orleans Saints in the NFL, he stayed local. Hudson has since transferred over
to Missouri State, which is in the FCS. But I thought that was
a cool story because I, you know, got up close in personal with
Sincere Hainesworth when I was doing some scout and stuff at Tulane. You know,
same game where I saw like John Rees Plumbley in the AC Championship and
a bunch of other guys you know that have gone on to the NFL.
The other guy I want to talk about with the Brahmas is Joshua c the
wide receiver from UTSA. So they're bringing in, you know, somebody who
played I guess in the Alamodome. You know, at UTSA, that's their
that's their facility. From my understanding, he's put up great numbers to pass
three college seasons going back to twenty twenty one, improved every year at UTSA
during his time there. He was there for five seasons. You know,
had a I think one and fifty yards receiving last year that was something like
fifteenth best in the nation if I'm not mistaken at the FBS level, you
know, so he'll be kind of like a local fan favorite obviously if he
plays in the UFL. Currently signed with the Jacksonville jo Jaguars. Again,
a lot of NFL guys here, but he's a guy who again just really
liked the progress that he's made. UTSA isn't the biggest school, but again,
if he comes into this league, he'd be a great fit. And
I think he'd be a great fit, you know, not just for again
the culture, but the offense that they run. We talked a lot about,
you know, scheme and kind of what they run. Like. I
look at Ladiritrad Griffin from Mississippi State, you know, prior to this season,
Mike Leech rest in Peace was the head coach at Mississippi State, and
you know A. J. Smith has gone on record talking about running the
Mike Leach offense, which is a combination of air raid and run shoot concepts
with the promise, So you know that's something to keeping keep in mind as
well. And the will hop do you hear on this? Yeah? Obviously
defense was a focus for San Antonio. Seven out of the ten picks were
on the defensive side, so I'm sure that, uh, that ass kicking
they took from Birmingham, we have the we need offense. Yeah, but
the defense wasn't able to stop the run and stuff like that. So yeah,
I can see that the and Waite Phillips is a defensive minded coach and
I know he wasn't one making the picks, but it was very clear they
they wanted to focus on defense. Gabriel Murphy is a guy that really sent
out to me. That dude was a stud at U c l A.
I mean, he was another guy that you know versat can play outside linebacker,
can play on the defensive end. I think he had eight sacks last
year for the Bruins. So he's a guy that you know, I think
he fits Wade Phillips defense really well, and I think he's a guy that
can come in and be an impactful player. I don't know if he'll be
a starter, because you know they're they're that front seven is really good for
San Antonio, but I think he can come in and be a guy that
can step in and help out. So I like, I like that pick
with Murphy. Yeah, it's just it's funny again, I know they're nown
for defense all that. It's like the Mariner We just had the baseball drafts
and like, I think whatever they draft thirty players, I think twenty seven
of thirty was like pitching for the Maritors. Like, I understand we have
a good pitching, but get like and I understand this. It's like different
circumstances here with all this, but they sure be nice. Okay, Ca
ca Batlehawks. Who wants to start here? I guess they'll go back.
Greg thoughts on the battle Hawks. Here. We talked about Houston selecting mostly
players who are not under contract to the NFL right now. Saint Louis picked
the second. They picked five players who are not under contract to NFL teams
right now and could conceivably sign with the UFL tomorrow if the UFL has contracts
reready, which we don't know about. But that's a whole, other,
whole other situation. But you know, Bradley Ashmore out of Vanderbilt is a
guy I watched this year. I thought he was really impressive to me and
could come in in a backup role at least and developed for a year in
Saint Louis. And you know, again, starter ceiling. You know,
that's kind of what you look at for these guys in the rookie draft.
They may not come in and start right away, but what's their ceiling?
And I think some of these guys do have that ceiling to them. Whether
they ever get there or not, who knows, but they have that ability.
Cody Schrader, another local guy out of Missouri running back, is very
talented. Saint Louis has some good running backs right now. They've got Mateo
Durant who is hurt early, would expect him back healthy this year. Jacob
Sailors is now in the NFL with the New York Giants, so perhaps they're
looking at needing to replace his production or at least a backup spot to Durant
and Wayne Goleman this year so Schrader could certainly do that and more. And
then Chavon Cordero talked about at the top of the show, how I had
to take a quarterback in my mock draft. They take a quarterback first round.
I think that's going to surprise a lot of people. Doesn't really surprise
me with aj McCarron, and you know, the decision he's on year to
year, right, I mean, he's he could hang him up just as
easily as he could come back in twenty twenty five. So you're going to
start needing to develop young quarterbacks behind him. Manny Wilkins is not going to
be the answer. Brandon Silver's sorry, Reid is not going to be the
answer at quarterback to replace mccaren So you know, you've got to start compiling
some bodies there, whether they're rookies like Cordero or players that you bring in
that are a little more veteran, but that's a position that's kind of a
sneaky need for them here in this draft. Evan thoughts, Yeah, I've
got three guys. I'll talk about Cody Schrader to the running back from Missouri.
I mean, we talked about like kind of fan favorite with Josh Cephis
and UTSA in that connection. I think Cody Schrader, if he comes to
this league will be the ultimate fan favorite, just knowing you know, how
big and deep the Saint Louis fan base is great story. You know,
played at D two Truman State, which is another school in Missouri, so
he stayed local his entire football career, but wasn't always that, you know,
the big school missoo. But when he did get up there, you
know, to the power five level in the SEC, he did some great
things. They were talking about him a ton last year. Again, his
journey's been really well documented. He's currently under contract with the San Francisco forty
nine ers, so we'll see what happens to him. You know, that's
a guy I don't know if he's going to come or not, but kind
of hoping that he does again because it would just add a great you know,
we talk about storylines in this league. That would be a fantastic one.
Jelanie Baker, the wide receiver from Limestone. I know Cody Schrader.
I talked about him playing D two. This was technically the only Division two
players selected in the draft. Just the definition at that level at least of
being a number one option. Seventy five catches, one thousand eighty nine yards,
fourteen touchdowns last year, you know, again made about a five hundred
yard jump from the season before. You know, I think he could come
to this league just because I mean, well maybe not, just because again,
he was a very highly productive receiver. He's got the ideal size you'd
want, just under two hundred pounds I think sixty one six to two.
But he did well in kick returns last year. And I know, again
it's the Division two level, so maybe you take that with a grain of
salt, but you could see this guy getting worked in on special teams,
just kind of like a guy, you know, Juwa Minigo, who was
a D three guy who had to play in Mexico before he came to the
UFL. This season with Arlington kind of worked his way up. Again.
You just look for those things, right. So there's Jelanie Baker. He
was signed by the Baltimore Ravens as a UDFA. Don't know if he's still
with them or not, but I know he did have an NFL contract.
And then the last out talk about is another receiver that they took, Jayden
Junky I think is how he pronounced his last name, Jankie Yankee, Johnky
something like that. Anyway, again, another South Dakota State guy I talked
about, Garrett Greenfield. I think Isaiah Staalberg was the other one, and
then Jayden here. He was slightly more productive in twenty twenty three than his
twin brother Jackson. Again, that's another well documented story. If you watch
SCS football, he has a twin brother that plays on the same team.
They played the same position. They were both undrafted in the NFL and both
signed with the Houston Texans, so they've stuck together. Would be interesting to
see, you know, maybe if Jayden comes to the UFL with Saint Louis,
maybe they bring his brother with them, you know, and I know
that's not he wasn't drafted obviously, but again just down the line if he
chooses to do so. He was again slightly more productive than him last year,
fell just short of a thousand yard season, but had double digit touchdowns
for the first time in his career at South Dakota State, which he was
there for five years, I think. And then, like I said,
signed by the Hues. Saint Texas is UDFA, so again, all Saint
Louis just had a lot of you know, cool story type of guys,
and I always like that. I think that's a good kind of way to
round things out because this is the last team that we're talking about. But
again, like Greg was saying, you know, five guys that aren't under
contract with the NFL. So in terms of you know players potentially you know,
suiting up uh in twenty twenty five, you know, Saint Louis might
have a higher chance, a higher success rate, I should say with this
draft compared to other teams because of that final thoughts here on this team,
Anthony, and then we'll do a final go home question, then we'll get
out of here. I appreciate it. Everyone's time. Yeah, so Cordero,
I think of the tape that I've watched from quarterbacks that were drafted today,
like looking at them, Cort Darrow's was the most fun to watch,
and I think he's somebody that I think he's the quarterback that I think Saint
Louis was hoping Manny Wilkins would have been, because I think after watching many
start this year, I think there are legitimate concerns about that backup quarterback position.
So I thought it was a really smart move to get Cordeo. He
was the he's the all time lady patterer in the Mountain West. But the
one thing, the one really good thing about Cordero is the last couple of
years he's improved his efficiency and like protecting the football. You know, his
turnovers cut down. He was making better decisions. And I think that's a
really big deal when it comes down to the BattleHawks, because that's a really
big thing with Aj mccaerron is that he protects the ball well. But you
know, Wilkins turned the ball over a few times, so they need a
quarterback in there who is mobile. He I mean, Cordero is super fast
when he's in the open fields. He's a lot like Plumbley. So I
think he's a guy that can come in and I think he you know,
if AJ mccartt doesn't come back, I think Cordero can compete for the starting
job and then Cody Schrader. Obviously it's a big name here that he was
a Dope Walker finalist last year. Dude is quick. I mean, he
can, he can do a lot of things in the offense, and I
think he could be somebody that maybe they were hoping Max boor he would be.
I think he there's a little versatility to him. And you know,
Trader, it's kind of similar to the Memphis Showboats pick with with Blake Watson,
and you know, getting a guy that is local that can get a
local name in there. And Trader is a massive name with the Missouri Tigers.
So he's a guy that I think could definitely start and be a really
good replacement for Jacob Slayers. Well, this is good eight teams here moving
through. I think we did a pretty good risk pace. I appreciated a
deep dive on all those. Let's go around before we get out in Greg,
I know this is you know, we've tied about the top and kind
of different circumstances for this. But who do you feel highest on in terms
of what they did today of these eight teams in terms of like this is
a smart way to approach the draft. Before we get out of here,
we'll go around. Well, I mean really, Houston and Saint Louis are
the only ones that approach the draft differently than anybody else. So you know,
we won't know the results of that approach until January. February when training
camp opens and we can count how many players from this draft or in each
team's camp. But I think this is, you know, this is the
first time the UFL is holding a draft of this nature where you know,
undrafted free agents under contract to the NFL are available to be drafted. So
I think everybody's kind of flying blind a little bit here and kind of feeling
around in the dark and really not sure how to approach this. I think
next year, when we can actually look at this list and say, gee,
zero players from this team are in the UFL, I think you may
see gms then next year sort of adjust their game plan off of that.
But I think at this point, you know, taking best players available,
doing that sort of thing. I can't really fault them for doing that.
Just taking flyers on these guys is really what they're doing, and unfortunately they're
they're kind of hoping the guys that they drafted are not good enough for the
NFL, which is kind of a weird thing to hope if you're a general
manager taking these players, but you really do want them. I do wonder
what kind of communication, if any, there were with gms and agents.
I know you asked Evan earlier. How would you approach this draft from a
from a personnel standpoint? You know, if I'm a GM and I know
that there's a lot on the plate of these UFL gms, they're responsible for
sifting through all twelve thousand of these players basically on their own unless they get
help from the coaching staffs, which they're probably not going to get because they're
no longer under contract. But you know, I'd be reaching out to agents
of these players that I have on my draft board, and I'd be saying,
hey, you're Blake Watson's agent, is there any chance that this guy
could consider the UFL if the NFL doesn't work out? And if they say
flat no, he's off my draft board. Like, I'm not going to
bother drafting him if his agent is telling me, look, i've talked to
him there, we're not interested in that option. So I'd be reaching out
to agents and saying, you know, hey, if I draft your guy,
is there any possibility that he might come and play in the UFL,
Because otherwise you're really throwing darts here in a lot of ways. You know,
you're taking guys who maybe scheme fits, but you don't really have any
idea if they're even interested in in the UFL, and that's that's a very
dificult proposition to be tasked with for these gms. Well, and I think
that's a perfect seguay to talk to Evan because and I know that you and
Sam and we talk a lot in the in our group chat about you know,
the arena and the IFL, and like, how do you get these
players? And you know, it's the same thing here, like we got
the NFL. Okay, you want to go to the UFL. You're doing
that same kind of convincing role whatever. So I guess segue off of Greg's
comments, but then kind of just you know when I initially brought that,
But I'm curious your thoughts on that too, because I think it's interesting.
Yeah, well, Greg's spot on. I mean my number one thing.
You know, when you're initially contacting the player you're interested, you got to
gauge the level of interest, like, hey, would you actually come and
play in our league and be interested in signing a contract, Because there's a
good number of guys, especially guys that have touched the NFL, that are
still clinging on to that hope of making a roster or getting a camp invite
or whatever. They're not going to do it. They're like, well,
I don't want to do this, you know, my focus is on the
NFL or again, like we're talking about here, maybe UFL. I've heard
some things about that. You know, I always say player education is important,
you know, having guys understand what options there are out there, how
much money, you know, you make schedules, things like that. There's
a lot that goes into it. But yeah, I mean, like Greg
said, it's a lot easier to kind of trim down this giant pool of
thousands of players if you just find the guys you're really interested in and then
get in contact with them or their agent and be like, hey, you
know, would you actually consider doing this? And if half of them say
no, well then you've chopped that in half, so you can be you
know, way more condensed and more precise, I guess in your process.
But to answer your original question, read, I mean in terms of you
know, who I thought had you know, the best or most productive draft
for me, it's between Memphis and DC. Again DC, just because I
love, you know, von Hutchins approach what he does. I know he
has a lot of connections. He's very vocal and open and honest about you
know, what they're doing from a personnel standpoint, which I appreciate. And
then Memphis just had a lot of flashy guys. Again not saying that those
guys are going to come play. It's not a guarantee, but you like
the upside there. And then you know, I look at like the Roughnecks
and the battle Hawks, like Greg and the rest of us have already talked
about, you know, taking guys you know that aren't under contract with the
NFL, which means that they have a higher chance of coming into the league.
But again, you know, maybe that doesn't work out, and maybe,
you know, the guys that Houston brings in just aren't talented enough to
make the cut, you know, because they were overlooked in the NFL.
And usually that's for a reason. A lot of times, you know,
NFL personnel people, they don't get things wrong, you know, the scouts,
the gms. I mean, you hear about, you know, some
of the more highly publicized stuff like a Johnny Manziel situation or something, but
with a lot of the you know, small or more intricate things when it
comes to scouting, they don't miss on a lot of players, Like the
guys that you know should be in the NFL are in the NFL and they're
there for good reasons. So I'll leave it at that, Anthony, take
us home here. Yeah, it is like Greg said, it's kind of
like in binding. Hey if you if you're dating, the dance doesn't work
out, then like I'm standing by here. Really it feels like that a
little bit here anti final thoughts, like kind of what team you the approach
to you today? Yeah, So I like what Memphis and Saint Louis did
offensively. I thought they had the strongest rafts on the offensive side. Really
like what san Antonio did on the on the defense defensive side of things.
I would say, like, if they can make any changes to this college
rookie draft, they should separate into two, Like they should do one in
the summer where whoever is available, like actually available and not under contract with
the NFL, like have them be available for it, and then do a
second one when cuts are made and stuff like that. I know that's typically
what they did with the veterans, but maybe you do one with just rookies
that were cut by by teams by NFL teams are are still available and you
can put them in a pool and then do if you need to do a
third one, do a third one. I mean the spring these spring leeks
typically love doing you know, like three to five drafts in the off season,
because one, it is a publicity, which I know read you don't
think it is, but I think it's. I think it's kind of I
think it can be. I mean, you did, you did show off
of it, so I mean it's it's it's counting for something. So but
I think it's good to have. Any way that the league can generate some
kind of news I think is always good. So I think the more drafts
are better. I mean, throwing as many as you want, because I
do think you're opening up opportunities for players to get a chance to be signed.
And these are leaks. I can use as many players as possible to
phillip rosters before going into training camp. So try to get as much talent
as you can. I agree. I think, uh, And like Greg
said, presumably more drafts to come here, right, and we have the
showcases. We're not doing the combine this year, right, We're doing the
showcases. Presumably that, and then we'll have another draft right early fall,
and then maybe one after kind of the end of the NFL season, going
into trading camp. It's just hard because I get like, and they said,
doing the publicity, we want to do this, we want to be
a thing. But most of the stories that come out today are players that
were like, well, I didn't even know I was in this or what's
going on? And so like, I think there's ways to do this.
I've given the work that I feel that this does at this point because I
could bring on eighty seven people to talk about football stuff, and I think
there's a there's a ceiling to kind of the interest for this. I think
we did a phenomenal drop today. I appreciate all three people coming on.
I know Pat wanted to hop on as well, and the Pat's busy with
work stuff, and then Andy Murray, the professor, wanted to hop on
as well. Just circumstances and stuff. So I appreciate everyone coming on.
Like I said, like it, subscribe. But if you're finding this now,
I don't know if we are. We're still working through all this.
I would like to get more of a picture of what we want this UFL
offseason to look like. I know that Jeff and Anthony had his article out
Jeff the VP of Coms stepping down mutually party ways with the league. I've
had my own kind of issues with the league, and maybe we have the
discussion for another point, but I haven't been super motivated to kind of figure
out, like, Okay, what is the plan? Here? Are we
having more drafts? We had rest Julia on last season kind of talking nowt
I thought that was a proitful conversation. But you know, we're all here
where we are now, so like, get subscribe. I talked on the
Monday show, Hussey and I are taking the two week break. I got
vacations here. We're going to the lake, We're going to Boston. We'll
be back if there's any breaking news. I'm sure I'll have my laptop,
Greg anything you on the plug ufl board, we'll do that real quick and
we'll get out because I know it's late for everyone. Yeah, a lot
of content coming to ufl board. I had my by the numbers looking at
kind of a macro look at the draft today. I'll have more micro looks
at each team, comments on each player over the next few days. Those
will be split up by USFL Conference XFL Conference, take a look at analyze
what each team did, and then next week. I've been compiling throughout the
last week or so players who participated in the UFL showcases in Saint Louis and
DC last weekend. So I'm gonna have a couple pieces out that profile,
do short little bios on the players that I was able to find scouring social
media to find out who attend. The decence the league is not releasing those
names, and it's probably going to be the most comprehensive list that's going to
be out there of players who attended the UFL showcases. So I'll be on
the lookout for that next week. And I mean, just for crying out
loud, like I understand Greg last year when it's like we don't want to
release the names because we've got to deal with the USFL and all that stuff,
Like put the names out there, right if you're the UFL at this
point, put the names out there. Where are we hiding? Evan,
are you guys winning an IFL championship? What do we got here? Before
we get out of here? I sure hope some inn you know, just
clinched playoffs and we got our last regular season game this weekend, so always
looking around. You know, I do plan, you know, to go
to the UFL showcases in Orlando hopefully and San Diego, which are I think
September and October. That's in my schedule or I'm working it in, so
you know, always looking around, always happy to talk football, always happy
to talk players. That's obviously my my thing, my bread and butter.
So yeah, you know, had a good time, and like you said,
hopefully you know, we come out as champ. Everyone's here, happy
comedy, happy words, Anthony, hardest working man and that you know for
the all football news stuff right now, what do you got coming out and
then we'll get out of here. Yeah. So obviously CFL season is hot
and heavy, so that's kind of where our big focus of that. You
know. Thank god this draft happens and now I can do some UFL breakdown.
So I know, Mike just finished up his DC Defenders one, so
hopefully they'll come out probably tomorrow, and then I'll do the breakdown on the
rest of the teams and then yeah, there's gonna be a lot of CFL
content. It's gonna be busy this weekend with two games on I guess Friday.
There's no games tomorrow, so it's just gonna be two games on Friday,
one on Saturday and Sunday, so a lot of preview games, and
then tomorrow probably do some I want to do a breakdown of what's going on
in Edmonton and and all the on all that jazz with the quarterback position and
stuff, so we'll be on the lookout for that. Yeah. I saw
Rashmdani tweet out that friend of me of the show and he's like, there's
no right now, what's the CFL doing. I'm like, UFL College Draft,
bro, Like wake up, Like when we're going, yeah, if
you're God forbid, if you're we got a lot of people still on this
hour and three or five minutes say if you're like into this CFL season has
been great, Like and I know and it's your your mileage, Mayberry,
but it's been a phenomenal CFL season. BC number one in the West.
We're gonna be hosting the Great Cup. Should be excited. Appreciate everyone,
Evan, Greg Anthony, thank you guys all so much. I'm gonna go
get some dinner here. Well, I'm gonna shower after working there, then
we'll go get some dinner. I appreciate everyone enjoy the new outro graphics,
so we'll see you guys next Sex