I spent an embarrassing amount

of time figuring out which pick I wanted since I get to pick the order. Since I won the regular season picks contest, I have boards based on me having the first pick, Deontay having the first pick, Shield having the first pick. I'm trying to figure out how to get the right combination of teams I want. So I put a lot of thought into this.

I didn't put nearly as much thought into it. I don't, I don't know where you are on the range. Don't get me wrong. I prepared for the pot. I got my teams, but I was more instinct. God, there were a couple where I flip flop, but not, not too long.

Yeah. I tried to spend more time just looking at my board and making sure I had it lined up properly. And then I feel like because I knew Steven was going to be, or is likely to choose the first pick that I was kind of trying to judge what would be available based off of that. So I spent a little bit more time on that. I just feel like if you're a ringer NFL listener, you should be extremely excited about us working a draft. Because if I remember properly, when we were previewing the conferences, we had to stop for about 10 to 12 minutes to try to sort out who had picked what teams to make the playoffs and win the division. So I can't wait to see how we trip over our own feet with this one. I'm not buying it from either of you two. You guys are playing coy. I don't believe it.

You guys, you guys studied the board. All

right. All right. So here's what we are, what we're doing here. Okay. We're going to do the draft. As we do the draft, we're going to talk about the wildcard games this weekend. We're going to talk about all the teams, what we think about them, whether it's this weekend or in the wider scope of the playoffs. And then we're still doing our picks. We're still doing our picks contest from the regular season where we each have three picks minus 120 or better each week. We're going to see where we end up at the end of the regular season. Right now, Ruiz is in the lead 33 and 21. I'm second at 28 and 26. Deontay third at 27 and 27. So listen, we still have three rounds left. Everybody's in it. No one's mathematically eliminated. All you got to do is go on a little heater. Then this thing can flip by the time we're done at the Super Bowl in New Orleans. All right, so let's get to the draft here. Here's the format. So you get one point if your team gets to the divisional round. So if you get the Chiefs or the Lions, you get the one point already because they're already in the divisional round. You get two points if your team reaches the championship round, you get three points. If your team gets to the Superbowl and you get five points, if your team wins the Superbowl, thank you to Dan Comer, our friend for coming up with the scoring system there. So we decided that since Ruiz is in the lead with the picks contest, there should be some kind of bonus. This is like our version of a first round by he gets to choose which pick he won. So it's not that he gets the first pick because he might not want the first pick we're doing snake order. And so Ruiz, you get to choose which spot you're drafting in. What

do you got? I don't want the first pick. Okay. I've thought about this. It was between the second and third pick. And I ultimately went with the third pick and I'm hoping to get two teams in particular. If I get those two teams, I'll be happy. If I don't, then this will be a horrible miscalculation. All

right. So Ruiz gets the third pick, so he will snake in the first round. I get to choose second, and I'm going to go with the second pick. I like being in that in-between spot. I don't have to pick two teams at a time, which means Deontay, you get to kick off the draft with the first pick in the, I still call it the 2024 season, the 2024, or maybe we'll do the 2025 NFL playoffs draft. Who are

you selecting? I just want to say this was literally the one spot I did not want to land.

It was the worst spot. When I went through all the possibilities, this was the one that I didn't want either. All the combinations I came up with the possible board were not good for me. So yeah, that's why I passed it on. I

will say though, with the first pick, I'm going to take the same team I took when we were previewing conferences before the season started. It's Baltimore. I'm going to take them number one. I think that there are a lot of arguments to make for the Lions and the Chiefs. I spent a lot of time staring at both of those teams if I were to land first. But I think ultimately everything that I've wanted to see from the Ravens I've seen over the last six weeks. You know, obviously, it was a little bit rocky over the first two or so months of the year. But you look, I mean, they've been first in defensive passing EPA basically since they made the change to put Kyle Hamilton back at deep safety. I think Marlon Humphrey's been playing like an all pro, you know, and I think that the run defense has basically been steady throughout the year. And then what we've seen is that some of the ways that they kind of tripped themselves up on offense at times last season, trying to figure out what their identity was. I think that having Derrick Henry has actually done a lot more, a lot more for just figuring out who needs to be on what role outside of just his own rushing production. I feel like Todd Munkin has a better understanding of when to get into heavier personnel, when to set up the play action game, knowing when to take a load off of Lamar Jackson. And I think that that's going to be a big piece of Baltimore's postseason run is that they finally have another gear they can tap into offensively. If they do get a one or two score lead, they can sit on the ball now in a way that I don't think they could have without asking Lamar to use his legs a bunch. And I think that that's going to be a big, big difference making factor for them. So I'm taking them with the first pick. I feel like the big

criticism of Todd Munkin after the playoff loss to the Chiefs last year was that he forgot about the run game. He abandoned the run game early on. And I feel like the Ravens have one of the best run games every year before Derek Henry got here. They had one of the best run games every year. But I feel like having Derek Henry on the sideline or just there for Munkin is going to be a reminder that, hey, we can't abandon the run game. And I don't think you will when one of your star players is at the running back position. I think it's just a reminder that you need to keep pounding the rock and that eventually things are going to break through, especially with Derrick Henry. You see the stats, like he dominates in the second half of games, he dominates at the end of seasons. And I think it's really going to help them out that he was able to, at least compared to his typical workload, it was a lighter workload. And I think this is the strongest we're ever going to see Derrick Henry in the playoffs. He hasn't really, outside of that Baltimore game in 2019, he hasn't really had that dominant

postseason performance yet, or postseason run, I should say. And maybe this is the year we get it. They average six yards a carry on first down runs. If they're going to maintain anything close to that, that's going to be a huge factor for this offense going through the postseason.

We always like to get into the details and the nuances of this game, but in the zoom out, you know, narrative aspect of the NFL playoffs, no one has more at stake than Lamar Jackson, right? I mean, like if they have a early playoff exit, and I know not every year has been the same, and I know not every playoff loss has been his, but he's been, I mean, he could potentially win his third MVP to have three MVPs and to have not gotten to a Superbowl. You know, we know what the conversations are going to be. Why, why can't it, why hasn't it happened yet in the playoffs here? So I feel like he's got a lot at stake, but he also has the path where the way he's playing this year, the pieces they have. And I'm with you guys. When I was doing my deep playoff dive this week, I'm like, man, the analytical part of my brain is like the Ravens look like the best team and the most complete team. They've got the best offense. You laid it out, Deontay, second half of the season. They've really had the best defense or one of the best defenses in the NFL. Lamar Jackson is healthy. I think John Harbaugh is a good coach. I think Todd Munkin is a good offensive coordinator. So like they kind of checked every box I was looking for as I was going through these teams. He will have to go to Buffalo most likely and then go to Arrowhead most likely and then beat whoever comes out of the NFC to get his first Lombardi trophy. Now, if he just gets to the Super Bowl, that's obviously a big step as well. But like we could be at the end of this going, man, those conversations about Lamar in the playoffs were so stupid. Look at what he just did. He erased them all. Those are dead forever. And now we can just talk about this guy as I mean, we probably already can talk about him that way, given what he's done. But it kind of reaches that next level on sort of the national narrative legacy thing.

Absolutely. I mean, and I think that had that conference championship game not gone the way it went, we might not be having these conversations. I think that ultimately you're going to be judged based on how you look against number 15. If you do have to match up against Kansas city. And that was definitely a, a big kind of chasm between the two is that we saw Patrick Mahomes be lights out in that first half of the AFC championship game last year. And Lamar had the strip sack. He struggled to push the ball downfield. They weren't able to separate against Kansas City's DBs. And we saw Lamar kind of press. I think that this year, while it's hard to guarantee anything, I just, the way he's been working as a dropback passer this season, I think he's been more willing to work the ball in the tight windows. And they haven't had to see many tight windows because when they run play action with Derek Henry on the field, I mean, there's just really not much defenses can do to try to take away those intermediate throwing windows. And I think as long as those guys are healthy, we obviously have to see what the status is of Zay Flowers, assuming that they win this weekend and move on. if he's able to stay active or get back active and be on the field, you said it, Shield. I mean, the complement of pieces that he has around him offensively, as well as a defense that looks like it can be trusted in a playoff environment again, and special teams that has been cleaned up over the last month or so of the season. Like you said, I mean, and this is the same conversation we were having last year about the Ravens. They have all the pieces to get it done. I think that, like you said, there's a lot at stake for Lamar, But I would also reframe that and say I think that he has the most to gain from having another deep playoff run because the narrative on him is that he has not won many big games. And I've made this comparison before, but it reminds me so much of Peyton Manning before he broke through. And that was always a conversation is, when is he going to beat the truly elite teams in a playoff environment? And then you get that Super Bowl run, and there was nothing to talk about again after that. Right. So I think that this is a great opportunity to do so. Obviously, going on the road for both the divisional and the conference championship game, if it plays out that way, it would be difficult. But I have a lot of trust in what the Ravens have put on tape over the last two months.

Zay Flowers out for this game. Now, they're still nine and a point favorites against the Pittsburgh Steelers. We'll see when the Steelers get picked, if the Steelers get picked in this game. But if you're a Ravens fan, I feel like that makes you at least a little bit nervous with the passing game. That knows Zay Flowers in this game and the Tomlin magic. But man, that would be a big, that would be the biggest upset of the playoffs this year if the Steelers somehow went into Baltimore and won that football game. To your guys' point, they have so many different ways to win games that I feel like that could be an excuse in the divisional round. That can't be an excuse in this round, right, Ruiz? Yeah, yeah. I'm thinking along

those lines. I have a pick from this game. I'm going to go Derrick Henry under 99.5 rush yards. If you remember, I made the same mistake the second time these two teams played. I took the under on Derrick Henry. We remember how that game went. The Steelers wanted the ball in his hands when the Ravens were doing the zone replays. They kept it out of Lamar's hand, and Derrick Henry just ran wild on them. I'm assuming there's going to be a different approach, a different defensive approach, especially in the run game this time around. I'm assuming Mike Tomlin's not going to let Derrick Henry run for 150 yards or whatever he ran for last time. And I'm hoping that maybe they force Lamar Jackson to be more of a runner and hope that wears him down. I think that's not a bad strategy is trying to get hits on Lamar Jackson and make them wear down in the fourth quarter. If things are still close, maybe you get a break and you win that game. So I'm hoping that's the path to victory for Pittsburgh. At least that's how they view it.

And the Steelers' defense is healthier now. You know, Joey Porter's playing in this game. They're pass rushers. All those guys are playing in this game. So we'll see. Do they have a Tomlin special? Ugly it up Saturday night in the cold in Baltimore. And we're all going, wait a minute. How is this the score in the fourth quarter? We'll see if it's that type of game. By the way, end of this episode, we will all have to give our full playoff predictions from the wildcard round to the Super Bowl champ. So as you're listening, you might be able to, you know, have some guesses. Oh, Deontay likes the Ravens. That's interesting. So keep that in mind. But we will go on the record at the end of this episode. All right. I have the second pick here. I am going to go with the Detroit Lions. I can't pick. And then so Ruiz is going to get his Kansas City Chiefs. We'll see who his second team is. But I like the Lions because you can obviously get the guaranteed divisional round. So I'm getting a point there. Maybe I'm a little risk averse, but I also think they got a great shot to get to the Superbowl. You know, if you just look at the odds or if you're just look at it objectively second round, who knows who they're going to get. They could potentially get a team like the Washington commanders. And then you just have to win one big game after that at home, maybe against a team like the Eagle. So I trust their offense. I just, it's hard for me to come up with a scenario where this Lions offense gets shut down for an entire game, a possession, a quarter, weird turnovers, fine, but down to down, snap to snap. I just feel like between Jameer Gibbs and the pan, the scheme and I'm on Ross St. Brown and the way Jared Goff's been playing and Jameson Williams, the element he's added. And of course, Ben Johnson tying it all together. I think they're going to be able to put up points every week. And then I probably honestly have some recency bias with the defense where I just look at it, what they did against Minnesota. And I go, maybe, maybe they found some answers and the defense can be competitive enough to keep them in it. So Ruiz, I've got the Lions as my number one pick.

You've got to be happy about that. Yeah, that's what I had on my mock draft. I had Deontay taking the Ravens first and you taking the Lions second. Really? Wait, you did an actual mock? This is incredible. Yeah, so I'm feeling good about my picks right now. But no, I totally agree with you on the Lions. I think the offense, it's hard to envision them not having a big game. Even if Jericho, we've seen Jericho had bad games in terms of multiple turnovers. And they've won two of those three games where he's thrown at least two picks, including one where he threw five picks against the Texans. So it's tough to imagine them scoring less than like 24 points in a game. But I do think the one concern is that last week against Minnesota, Sam Darnold missing some throws kind of, I don't know, misled us a little bit on the defense. Before that, when we last saw the defense, they were getting just run over by the Rams and the Bills. I mean, not the Rams, sorry about that. But I don't know if they can replicate that same game plan, even if they play Minnesota again. I think there were some opportunities that Sam Darnold missed out there, and that if Kevin O'Connell just makes a few key tweaks, especially against the cover zero blitzes, that Minnesota's offense will have a better chance if that is the second round matchup. The Lions would have been my third pick. I would have liked the Ravens. I just didn't want to pick first, and I knew Deontay was going to take the Ravens first. He's got moles in our buildings, Deontay. All right. Tell your staff. Spend too much time talking to Steven. That's the real problem. Deontay writes power rankings, which made it very easy to come up with his big board. Yeah, I figured.

I figured that's why I ended up with the first pick.

I'm not going to lie. I cheated too, and I looked at the rigger. We have the predictions on the site. I saw both of your guys' bracket already. All right. That's fair. Listen, that that's on the

record. So that's just doing the work, which, you know, I was not willing to put in there. All right, Ruiz, you've got back to back the third and the fourth picks. I'm very intrigued to see who the, I know who one's going to be. I'm intrigued to see who the other one's going to be.

Well, you're going to hear the other one first, just to make you guys look worse for letting me get the Chiefs fourth, since it is a snake draft. I'm going to go, and then I could drive down there, you know, their contract demands. You technically got drafted fourth, not third, different drafts. I'm going to go with the Bills third. That's the team I'm going to take. It was between the Bills and the Eagles. I thought about like diversifying my grouping and having an AFC contender and an NFC contender, but I said, screw that. I'd rather have one of these two teams. I think these are the two quarterbacks I trust the most in the playoffs. We'll start with the Bills. I think the Bills are the team that I'm most concerned about just because of that defensive success rate. They rank 24th in defensive success rate. I think you can keep Josh Allen off the field. I think when we've seen Josh Allen kind of struggle in those hero moments when he has to play on third and long and the receivers can't get open and teams are able to keep him in the pocket. I think we've seen troubles or issues with that Bills offense and that offensive approach where they're a little bit run first on first down. But at the end of the day, Josh Allen is playing so, so well that even if you shut down the Bills run game, even if they give up 40 points on defense, I think they have a chance to win a football game. And if they win this game against the Broncos, which I do think they will, I think they have a good chance of upsetting the Ravens. And I'm, I was a little concerned about having the Ravens and seeing them losing that second round and just not having a Super Bowl contender anymore, which I would have had to do if I had the first pick.

Yeah, that, that is going to be an epic, we get it, divisional round game. We better get it, man. We better get it. And they better be healthy, too. I don't need any weird finger injury, something going on in the third, fourth quarter when the game's over. Yes, I want Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson healthy in the divisional round. I'm with you. You know, again, doing the deep dive this week, I was like, well, that kind of concerns me. If you look at some turnover stuff, you know, like I think their offense, I think has lost the fewest EPA on turnovers. And I think their defense has gained either it's the most or top three, but basically some of the randomness that you look at where you say, don't let this shape kind of the narrative of the team has gone in their favor. I also just looked at it and go, Josh Allen, like they're going to have a chance, um, really any, any game they play, like you said, he's playing at a high level. The stuff I said about Lamar Jackson applies to Josh Allen. Like they've both been so good. What's going to be the year that they finally break through? Is it going to be one of them, uh, this year or not, but just it's been kind of the year of Josh Allen, the narrative, you lose Stefan Diggs, is it a reset year? And he comes in and he plays some of the best football of his career. So yeah, I think that that certainly makes sense to me in this spot.

My biggest concern is the third down defense. Like I think they've been good on early downs on defense, but we've seen them on occasion get cut up by some good passing offenses and some good quarterbacks, Lamar cj stroud geno smith jared goff drake may even even two had a big game in the second game on third down so that's my one concern is that they're going to go up against some of these you know good passing games whether it's homes whether it's uh lamar jackson i don't know if it's going to happen in the first round but i do think they can be victimized on third down and i am a little worried about that if the bulls are in the nfc i might have picked them first, you know, if I had the first pick

in this exercise. And I do like the way that the roster is constructed. I would say it's kind of interesting. This is probably the worst roster for Sean McDermott to chase a Super Bowl. I know if you ask him in his heart of hearts, he would like to have a better defensive backfield than he has right now. And that's definitely been an issue for them. They've been kind of constrained in how they can play because they can't really trust their safeties, even their corners. You know, I think they play well when you give receivers a lot of space. I think that the issue for them and the reason why I had them fifth on my, on my board was the matchups that they're going to have to take in order to get to the Superbowl. They don't work in this defense's favor. I think that not only can you take that Sunday night game where they lost to the Ravens and think of some ways that that can be instructive, I just think that the matchup is bad because Baltimore can get heavy with personnel in a way that Buffalo's defense can't. And we didn't even need to see that all that often in that game that they played early in the season because they got the explosive plays to basically put that one before halftime. And then I think with Kansas city, the thing that they've been able to do throughout the season and certainly over the last few, last few weeks of the year when they started getting guys back is they went in the ways that Steven was kind of laying out that makes it the worst on the bills defense. They are, they are perfectly fine going to third down and asking, you know, the receivers to just get a sliver of space and get eight and a yards when you need eight. Right. And Patrick Mahomes can extend. I think that that game that they won was a lot more about Josh Allen going back and watching it than I thought at first. I think I had the third down plays that are playing man and getting pressure kind of at the front of mind. And we were podcasting about it the week that it happened and going back and watching it. You really just see that that was about Josh Allen doing the Patrick Mahomes thing of winning on every third down and having an answer against everything Steve Spagnuolo was throwing at that offense I do have some issues with those matchups for that reason but I do think I mean if you're just talking about a team that is built around its quarterback to win a Super Bowl outside of the Ravens you'd probably have a heart and maybe the Eagles I would say you'd have a hard time finding an offensive depth chart that is better constructed to get their quarterback to the conference championship game at the worst, and if not win a Super Bowl.

O-line, the Adamari Cooper, Khalil Shakir. Yeah, you're right. It looks a lot different, and we talk about it a lot differently now than we did before the season when you're like, maybe it doesn't, I think we were all like, well, they still have a chance, but how's it exactly going to come together? It has come together. Well, they've been one of the best offenses in the NFL. Now, Ruiz, my only issue with now, like if the Chiefs win the Superbowl, now people can be like, they went fourth in, in these idiots, you know, ringer NFL draft. So that might come back to haunt us down the stretch. Not me individually. I'll be able to say that I picked the Chiefs. That's true.

And I do, before we go to break, I did have a pick from this game almost. That slipped my mind. When they're playing the Broncos, I'm going with Dawson Kincaid over 33 and a half receiving yards. I think that Denver's done a pretty good job of keeping tight ends in the middle of the field pretty well contained for how often they blitz. I just think that the way that Joe Brady likes to call the passing game, getting quick options in a drop back game, especially on early downs, there's going to be a lot of opportunities, I would think, for Don Kincaid to find voids in the zone. I think that because of the corner talent that you have on the perimeter with Denver's defense with Patrick Sertan and Riley Moss when he's healthy and playing at his best, there should be a lot more opportunities, I would think, to work the ball into the slot, work it underneath on checkdowns, give screen opportunities off of play actions. I think that if the Bills are going to look their best when they play the Broncos, I think that the pathway to do so is going to be based off the run game and then quick passes. And if they're able to get the ball out in two and a half seconds, which has been the best version of Josh Allen this year outside of the scrambling, I think that they should be able to keep that offense on schedule pretty well.

I like it. Dalton Kincaid, what was it? 33 and a half? 33

and a half.

Dalton Kincaid over 33 and a half receiving yards for Deontay's first pick. All right, let's take a break. We come back, get to the second round of this draft.