WEBVTT

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We could go right to the ka
Common Sparrel hotline and bring out our guy

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Ryan Michael, Ryan, how's it
going, Buddy? Doing well? Man?

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Nick? How are you guys tonight? Doing pretty well? We had

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an interesting start to the show.
Presidential comments sort of derailed the beginning there

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that we had going on. But
we think we've hit our stride here and

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it's good to hear your voice back
to go a little bit inside the numbers.

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And I want to know what you
want to start with tonight. Well,

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you know, I think we left
off last week. We're just talking

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about what the expectations should be for
the twenty and twenty four draft class.

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And I've said this number of times
and I'll say it again. I'm very

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high on the twenty twenty four draft
class for two reasons. Essentially. The

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first is given the salary cap fallout
from letting Russell Wilson go, we're obviously

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fighting with one arm tied behind our
back and without having a second round draft

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selection. You know, we went
into the draft itself without a lot of

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ammunition. And when I look at
the players that we took in the draft,

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for me, fit is always one
of the most important things. I'm

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not of the mindset to take a
guy just for the sake of taking the

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guy. You want to get somebody
who shits your system and fits the need

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that you have. So you know, bo Nicks was the second highest rated

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quarterback on my board after Caleb Williams, and I understand that I was in

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the minority for seeing him that way. But time will tell. We'll see

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if that's a good caller or not. But what I especially appreciate about bow

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is that his strengths fits on Peyton
strength. We're coming in as a team

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where under Russell Wilson, tintished twenty
seventh in sack percentage. That seemed to

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be one of the biggest points of
contention, and so we draft the quarterback

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who set the NCAA single season completion
percentage mark, but he was also the

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least side quarterback in college football at
one point one percent of his dropbacks.

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I looked at our defense as a
unit that struggled to generate pressure, so

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we bring in Joan Allis, who
was seventh in all of college football in

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zacks, a second amongst defensive players
taken to the draft. I look at

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our team. We finished twenty eighth
in rushing touchdowns. Last year, we

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didn't produce on the ground. So
you get Audrick Estimat in the fifth round,

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and he's a guy who rushed for
eighteen touchdowns last year, eleven of

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them. We're in the final five
games. So if you look at the

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players that we got at the spots
that we got, not only do I

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think that they were a fantastic fit
for the systems that we're going to be

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running on both offense and defense,
but I think we got tremendous value because

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we got the second best quarterback in
the draft on paper, just my own

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personal opinion, at the twelfth spot, and I think Joe Allis is easily

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a second round caliber draft prospect,
perhaps even first round. When helping you

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can't really ask for anything better on
paper than that then, and that's really

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all that we can talk about until
the preseason gets ripped up, all right,

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right, I'm glad that you led
off with that, because what we've

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seen since George Paydon has been here
as GM, a lot of his draft

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picks play early, and they play
in key rows and are very productive.

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Of the guys you just listed right
now, just doing a little forecasting,

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I know we haven't seen, you
know, any practices yet or any preseason

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games. But who would you forecast
is probably at the start of the season.

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Let's go small samba size week four, right. That's enough one right

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there that you think will make a
larger impact with the Broncos early on in

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the season. That's a great question. And when I look at the players

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that we drafted, I'm still of
the mindset that I feel bone Knicks will

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start being one. I don't think
it's a sure thing. I do think

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he will be the eventual starter.
So is it possible that Jared Sidham gets

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us going week one? It's possible. I think Jared as a short term

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solution. We all know what the
future is going to be. So Bonnicks

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if he does play Week one,
and I don't expect for him to light

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the league up. That's not his
style of football. I think he's the

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kind of player that once he gets
acclimated to Sean's system, we're eventually going

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to see that efficiency down the line, perhaps at the end of season one,

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maybe towards the beginning of season two. I'll tell you, if Jonah

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Ellis can be healthy, I think
that he might be an early contender for

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Defensive Lookie of the Year. I'm
very excited to see what he's going to

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be able to do in advanced Joseph
system. And he was just one of

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the most explosive edge rushers on tape
of any player in the drop, one

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of the most explosive players that we've
seed in years. So if I had

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to pick one specific player to make
an early impact, I would go to

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John Allis if he's healthy. One
of the things that you brought up there,

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I want to go back to with
bo Nicks because what you described the

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quarterback that's efficient doesn't necessarily like the
World on Fire, gets in Sean Payton's

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system and sort of succeeds, describes
a quarterback that Broncos fans have already seen.

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What's the difference between bo Nicks and
Teddy bri The difference between Bonix and

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Teddy Bridgewater is Teddy was very proficient
at doing the simple things with consistency.

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And I know that bow has been
knocked quite a bit for his alleged lack

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of ability to be proficient in the
depassing game. And if you look at

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a lot of the Pro Football focus
marks that we've talked about, over the

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past few weeks, you'll see that
in the intermediate game, Bell is arguably

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the most efficient quarterback in college football, and tearing him obviously with Troy Franklin,

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I suspect to see them stretch the
field, not down in, down

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out, but I do see them
connecting here and there in a way that

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you wouldn't have seen out of Teddy
Bridgewater. So Bridgewater brought the experience,

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and you could make the argument that
if we could take Teddy Bridgewater in a

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time machine from his opening days as
a Denver Bronco and paired him up with

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Donicks, he might even get similar
results in the first few games. Bownix

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is a long term investment, now
a short term investment. I believe his

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ceiling was quite high. Well,
Ryan, where did you stand on this

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idea that a quarterback throwing the checkdown? Because the idea when I played was

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you can't go broke taking a profit. But with the I guess everyone leaning

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more towards exposed to plays. It
just seems as though everyone has fallen away

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from taking the six yard five yard
checkdown and putting the ball in your best

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player's hands. Once again, where
do you come down on that? Viewpoint,

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I would say that if you have
a quarterback who is at the very

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top of the league in terms of
efficiency in executing the quick game, this

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is what Drew Brees was the greatest
of all time in doing so. If

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he looked at his final season in
twenty twenty, he had arguably the weakest

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farm strength of any starting quarterback I've
seen in over a decade. But he's

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still completed routinely nearly seventy five percent
of his passes. Now, I don't

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believe that Bonix is Drew Brees.
I've affectionately referred to him as as Drew

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Brees white with a little bit of
deals, But I do think that he

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has the ceiling potential over time to
develop in a similar in a similar vein

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to what Drew Brees did the more
time he had in Sean Payton's system.

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So if he can reach even a
poor man's version of that level, and

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he can complete with any kind of
regularity sixty nine to seventy seventy one percent

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of his passes, it's a very
different style of football than the quarterbacks who

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are taking the checkdowns just because they're
not capable of doing anything else. It's

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a matter of muscle memory, and
it's a matter of experience within the system.

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And I think that if he starts
week one or starts early by week

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four, as you had mentioned,
that that's going to give him a significant

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advantage heading into the year two.
That's when I think we're going to start

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to see the biggest results coming out
from his development. Talking with Ryan Michael

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at the Ryan Michael on Twitter,
everybody, fans are always excited about their

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draft classes, a top to bottom. We got all our guys. These

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guys are all going to be stars, are all going to be start You

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know, there's been some recent articles
about Aldic tom fifth round or one hundred

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and forty seventh pick, that he
could maybe even make a play for the

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starting job, you know, things
like that. But how realistic is that

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when we look for when we look
back at history, what are some historical

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comps for players taking kind of at
the same position in the same spot in

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the draft. Well as high as
I am on audrich Sma, I see

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him as more of a red zone
threat, a guy who may produce rushing

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touchdowns similar to what Legarrett Blunt did
in the Patriot system with Tom Brady.

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Bear in mind, bone Nicks is
not Tom Brady, and our system is

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not exactly the system that New England
ran with such efficiency for so long.

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We have to work all way towards
that. So when I look at a

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number of the players taken in the
draft this year, and we took Jay

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Cutler at number eleven in two thousand
and six, so that's the closest spot

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in terms of a comparison to bone
Nicks and Jake Cutler, for whatever happened

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later in his career in Chicago,
actually played fairly efficient football during his first

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three years, and we started to
see him take off in year three,

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setting a Bronco's single season record for
passing yards. While Alzado in terms of

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an edge rusher, he has taken
seventy nine in nineteen eighty five, so

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we have join Alice taken at seventy
six. If he can perform anywhere close

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to the level that Alzato did,
that would be a very nice ceiling.

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The reality is, statistically, at
all of the positions, especially quarterback,

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a percentage of these draft picks are
not going to work out. So as

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much as it's easy to point to
one specific statistic and say a running back

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like audric estimate fills a hole here, let's just start him in RB one.

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Is it possible. It's certainly possible, But history tells us that a

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percentage of these draft picks are not
going to be long term solutions. In

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terms of starting players playing at a
high level, it's just a matter of

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who's going to be the boom,
who's going to be the bust. Now,

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you say boom and buzz is always
high risk, high reward. But

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when you look at the the idea
of starting a rookie quarterback, what would

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you say to the listening audience as
far as what are your rewards or what

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do you can see the risk might
be at this time? And once again

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speaking and say both Nicks is the
starter for the Denver Broncos. That's a

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great question. I would say.
The benefits for starting early if you are

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a quarterback who has it in your
fabric to develop into the kind of quarterback

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you hope to get. Taking a
guy in the twelve spot, the benefits

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are you have exposure to the system, You're acquiring knowledge, You're growing greater

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familiarity, the muscle memory, even
athletic muscle memory. In terms of getting

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those game time reps, as you
know, is very different from just the

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reps in practice, the spatial awareness, the on field visual familiarity in terms

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of what's happening at the next level, I think it would be impossible to

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overstate just how important that is.
The downside this double edged sword, the

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risk that comes with that is if
you're a team that isn't prepared to surround

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your starting quarterbacks with success the way
that the Chiefs did for Paunt Mahomes in

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twenty eighteen, you're running the risk
of your quarterback losing their confidence from on

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field failure. I think of David
Carr, I think of Josh Rosen as

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two great examples of quarterbacks who on
paper had the potential to be really good

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quarterbacks in the NFL and never quite
reach that potential, especially in the case

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of Josh Rosen. And I also
think that people sometimes underestimate just how much

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of a step up it is.
In terms of conditioning. You have to

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bulk up and condition your body to
take hits at the level. So if

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you're not prepared and you're forced into
the starting role too early, you're running

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the risk of injury and the loss
of confidence. So that's a decision that

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I'm sure quick Stayton is going to
make in the best interest of the team,

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and I'm confident that Boonicks is the
quarterback who is ready for that kind

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of challenge. I'll think about quarterbacks
in the NFL, we always talk about

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developing them, but you can kind
of tell pretty early if a guy sort

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of got it or doesn't got it. You know, we look over the

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history of the game in the modern
era and we can sort of tell quarterbacks

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tend to make a super Bowl pretty
young when they win or to lose.

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They tend to make a super Bowl
pretty young if they're going to be if

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they're going to be dominant, you
know, down the line, and they

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can continue to make them as they
get older. But it's very rare that

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someone comes in and is very old
when they finally make their first super Bowl.

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There are occasions of that, but
it's really more rare than anything else,

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especially the playoffs. Too young quarterbacks
they make the playoffs quicker they tend

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not to, and then they become
sort of sort of journeyman. We look

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at booms and busts among rookie quarterbacks
who started early in recent years. Who

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stands out to you in either one
of those categories. Well, I would

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say the two that stand out to
me who would be the closest comps for

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boneecks and they're not perfect comparisons,
would be Peyton Manning and Matt Ryan.

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Matt Ryan was excellent as a rookie
quarterback in Atlanta. Peyton Manning. Everyone

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talks about the twenty eight perceptions that
he threw, but they talk a little

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bit less about the fact that he
led the as in passing, He was

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top five in touchdown passes and really
found his fitting towards the end of the

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year. So I think for quarterbacks
who are with their strengths are pocket presence,

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quick release, information processing, accuracy, this certainly falls in line with

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both mixes fields they can be positioned
for success over the long run. And

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then you also have quarterbacks who boomed
early who are dual threats Russell Wilson RG

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three and who look was a little
bit of bolth Cam Newton, and so

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quarterbacks like that give defensive coordinators nightmares
when there isn't a lot of tape to

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study on them, and they usually
kind of come back down to earth in

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the following years. What separates the
good ones from the great ones or the

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ones who can continue to reinvent themselves
and succeed in spite of that. That's

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really been the case for Russell Wilson
for over a decade. When you look

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at some of the boss do you
see busts who are pocket pasthers. You

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see busts who are dual threats like
Zach Wilson and Justin Fields. What they

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typically have in common, outside of
a skill set that might not exactly cater

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itself to the next level, is
the fact that they were surrounded by very

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tough situations. If you don't surround
your quarterback that support early on, it's

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going to be a nightmare for almost
everybody. So with the Broncos, I

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think need to focus on more than
anything that's building the team around Box and

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that's for Sean Payton to feel out
whether or not it's the best move to

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put him in week one, week
four, or perhaps towards the end of

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year one. Yeah. I was
talking with Ryan Edwards yesterday and I said,

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lok Bonux is either going to come
out and take the job, or

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it's going to be a situation where
you're running with with Jared Stidham or or

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Zach Wilson, whomever, until you're
eliminating for the playoffs, and then you've

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got to see which is This year
is about finding out. What bot Nick

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says as a first round of Ryan, we always appreciate the time, man.

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Look forward to talking to you again
next week. Sounds good, Ben,

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Thanks for having me on. Take
Care. That's Ryan Michael at the

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Ryan Michael on Twitter