Albert Breer on Rashee Rice, Steelers QB Depth, Nashville Super Bowl

So this is something that the Chiefs are going to have to deal with.

All right.

Welcome in.

It is the Breer Report for Wednesday, May 20th.

The NFL spring meeting is in the books.

We are still in Orlando, about to leave here, um, but we have a lot to get to both from the meetings and from outside the meetings.

The NFL did approve Minneapolis as the host of the 2028 draft.

The International Series is expanding again.

In 2027.

And then we will get to this a little later on.

Nashville has been awarded Super Bowl 64 in February 2030.

So plenty to get to.

We are going to start with the news of Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver, Raschi Rice.

Testing positive for THC in the state of Texas , that violates his probation, which means now he's going to have to serve a 30-day sentence.

That was a sentence that he was gonna have to serve over a longer period of time.

It triggers now, and the question becomes how this relates to the personal conduct policy.

And this is a bit of a murky one because The NFL no longer suspends players for failing marijuana tests.

However, this is a separate issue because it does relate to his probation.

He obviously has prior um track record with a personal conduct policy.

So this is something that the Chiefs are going to have to deal with, and Rashi Rice is somebody that they are relying on.

They didn't spend a high draft pick on a receiver, they didn't spend a lot of capital in the offseason on the position.

They were relying on Rashi Rice once again to be their #1 receiver, just like they were last year when they had a suspension at the beginning of the year.

This clearly is a player that they have not been able to count on.

Since drafting him a few years ago, they've felt all along like he has the potential to be a top 10 receiver.

In the NFL and he has not become that, mostly because of the stuff off the field.

And so, this is another brick in that wall.

And of course, this is gonna raise questions about how comfortable you feel going forward with him after this year, those big picture questions, and of course, the smaller picture questions of what the Chiefs do.

Receiver now.

Do they go back?

Do they circle back and maybe look at the idea of trading for AJ Brown?

Uh, I don't think that happens.

Um, they had that opportunity.

They were on AJ Brown's list.

Um, they said no to the Eagles in the first place, but I think if you're the Chiefs, you have to look at all of these things going forward because Raschi Rice clearly looks like somebody.

That you have not been able to rely on.

All right, our second topic for today, and that's the Steelers' quarterback depth chart.

Obviously, over the weekend, Aaron Rodgers officially became a Pittsburgh Steeler again, and he'll be his second year playing in Pittsburgh, and he reunites with Mike McCarthy after I can't believe it's already been 8 years apart.

They were last together in 2018, they will reunite in 2026.

They first got together 20 years ago in Aaron Rodgers' 2nd year in the NFL playing for the Packers.

Um, that was Mike McCarthy's 1st year in Green Bay.

And so the quarterback depth chart in Pittsburgh gets reshuffled.

And the interesting thing about this is the communication between the Steelers.

And Aaron Rodgers has actually been really good over the course of the last few weeks and even the last few months.

They had an idea that he was coming back.

They had an idea when he was coming back.

They had to work out the money.

The money is materially different than it was last year.

So that was one thing that needed to be hammered out and it was hammered out.

He did a deal at $22 million with another $3 million in roster bonuses and incentives that he can achieve.

And the question now becomes what does the depth chart look like behind him, and that can be an important thing with an older quarterback.

Obviously there's the risk of injury there.

And so I'd say right now, it looks like Will Howard is going to get the first crack at being the 2nd string quarterback in Pittsburgh.

I think it's a fascinating, fascinating situation because They have Will Howard there.

They have Mason Rudolph, who would be a reliable number 2, you know what you're getting with him, and then they have Drew Allard.

Do you carry 4 quarterbacks?

Are you comfortable with Will Howard as the second guy, and then you get rid of Mason Rudolph?

I don't think you're gonna get rid of Drew Aller as a 3rd round pick.

I think he's on the team, um, injury permitting in 2026.

And so that's sort of a subplot to what's going on in Pittsburgh at the position.

Obviously, the most important thing is where Aaron Rodgers is going into his 22nd year.

But it is important looking at the future of the position and what they're doing at the position going forward.

And I think one thing that was sort of interesting is In the background, when Rodgers and the Steelers, that's Omar Khan, that's Mike McCarthy, were discussing when he, when he should come in.

It was really important to Mike McCarthy that he come in for the start of OTAs, which was on Monday.

But they felt like there was a little bit of a benefit for him staying away over the first few weeks of the offseason program, because that would give Mike McCarthy time to work one on one with Will Howard, which he was able to do and get a better idea of what he had in Will Howard.

And so, I, I'm not saying that they think Will Howard is going to be the quarterback for the 10 years after Rodgers is gone.

Um, but I do think Mike McCarthy sees a little something there and wanted to take a closer look and has had the chance to do that now early in the offseason program.

And we'll see if Will Howard can win the 2nd.

The, the, the, the, the, the backup quarterback job.

If he can beat out Mason Rudolph for the backup quarterback job, that simplifies things for the Steelers, then they've got two developmental guys in Howard and Aller on the depth chart, and they can go forward with that.

If they do feel the need to keep Rudolph, that obviously complicates things a little bit.

With the younger guys.

And finally, our third topic for today, Super Bowl 64, scheduled for February 2030, has been awarded to Nashville.

It will be the first Super Bowl Nashville has hosted.

It'll be in the Titans' new stadium, the new Nissan Stadium, which at that point will be in its third year, Nissan Stadium.

The new Nissan Stadium opens in 2027.

So that Super Bowl, will be at the tail end of its third year online.

And this is interesting to me because of the size of Nashville.

Nashville's grown a ton.

It is still a relatively small city.

The metropolitan area, the market, which measures metropolitan area size, I think is the best gauge of the size of the city.

Nashville is the 26th largest market in America.

There have only been 4 cities that are outside the current top 25 that have hosted Super Bowls.

Two of those four are Las Vegas and New Orleans, which are event cities.

Like their business, their commerce is events, and Nashville is that to a degree.

The 3rd 1 is San Diego, which last hosted the Super Bowl a quarter century ago, lost its NFL team since, and then the 4th is Jacksonville, which hosted 1 Super Bowl, that was a one-off situation and it was a mess.

So, there are some challenges ahead for Nashville.

Again, it's not as big as a typical Super Bowl city.

The most comparable city and the only one really in its category as far as the market size goes now is Indianapolis, which is the 25th biggest market .

Uh other than those two, everyone else, other than those two in the previous four, everyone else is inside the top 18.

Indianapolis handled it well because everything was centralized downtown.

So how Nashville handles all this will be interesting.

And Nashville continues to grow and it's interesting to hear some of the metrics on the growth of the city as a tourism destination.

Right now, there are 62,000 hotel rooms in the Nashville area.

That's a lot for a city its size.

It is gonna be 80,000 hotel rooms by the time that Super Bowl comes around.

So hotel infrastructure is there.

I think a lot of the downtown infrastructure is there.

It's not a huge downtown, but there's a lot of restaurants and bars and all of that stuff, obviously.

And then I think you have to consider what it's gonna be like to get around in that city.

And I could just tell you from my own experience, their traffic can be difficult because the growth of population in Nashville has outpaced the growth of the infrastructure.

So there's a lot of work to do, but I think it's got a chance.

To, to be a really good Super Bowl city.

Again, it'll be interesting to see how they prepare for the Super Bowl, so what some of the things they're able to do from an infrastructure standpoint to get ready for it, how that stuff helps them.

Um, handle what is one of America's biggest events, sports or otherwise.

Appreciate you guys coming out.

Um, I'm headed home from Orlando here.

It's bright and early here in Orlando, but as always, you guys can leave your comments down below here on the YouTube page or you can get to me on my social media at Albert Breer on Twitter, at Albert Aubrey on Facebook, at Albert_Breer on Instagram.

We've got a mailbag edition coming for you tomorrow.

We'll see you guys then.