We Disagree With the Bad Jordan Davis Trade Grades

Let's move over to uh Jordan Davis and this one, Albert, uh, and, and really the Jaguars as a whole, right?

Um, this one made me incredibly, uh, angry and feisty, and I know that I am on squarely on one side of the go for it decision.

I think you should, you always should.

When you're close, you should go for it.

Um, in those situations, having a first-round pick for a later day at like 25 to 32 just does nothing for me.

Um, but I, I'm, I wanna ask a big picture question first, and then we'll get into the Davis thing.

The part of the reason that picks are so valuable, I think, is that.

Even if you're not gonna spend them on a quarterback, the idea that a pick can one day become.

Part of a trade for a quarterback is kind of what makes it, especially 1st-round picks, it's kind of what makes them so valuable, right?

It's like, even if you're not there, it can be a stepping stone to get you there, um, to the #1 pick, to the #2 pick.

Now that the quarterback class and the landscape is so scattershot, and every year, it's impossible to predict who's coming out.

And who's leaving to go back and make $8 million.

It's not like as regimented as it was before, where it's 2 years, 3 years, 4, and then you jump.

Do we have to have a different conversation about, cause I, I was talking about this on the radio with someone last night.

They referenced the seminal study, um, Cade Massey and Richard Thaler and the trade back and accumulate more draft picks, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, you know, uh, that changed the way that football thought for years.

But that study was done in 2000.

Whatever 9, right?

And back then.

Picks were so much more easy to predict, uh, you know, classes of guys coming out were so much easier to predict.

And I'm not saying that the players are coming out more ready, but the players are coming out with a mastery of a scheme.

Now, you're getting players who are like, OK, I played at Grand Valley State for 1 year, I played at JMU for 1 year, I played at Toledo for 1 year, I played at Nebraska for 1 year, and now I'm coming out with kind of a decent knowledge of 4 different defenses, or if you're a quarterback, right?

You know, basically, I skidded through.

4 different stops and the offense had to be so quick and simple just to get me baked into it and ready to go.

Now, there are some, some of these guys are getting more reps, which is great, and that's what you want.

And there's, you know, there's the Bo Nix and the Jaden Daniels of it all, and that helped them in their first year.

But, big picture, our picks, do we need to have a conversation about the value of picks generally, now that the NIL era has kind of exploded everything.

And should we be less married to the idea that these things are sacred, I guess is my question.

No, I, so I think drafting and developing in a salary cap to NFL is always gonna be vital to team building.

Always.

I do think the conversation.

Like It could be more.

Like, what's the value of first-round picks, right?

Like, what's the value of first-round picks versus having volume of picks?

Cause that to me is like, you know, one of the things that's sort of interesting about the Rams, and we've said this on the show, but James Gladstone was there.

The Jaguars GM was, was in Los Angeles for 8 years, right?

So in those 8 years, the, the, the Rams had precisely 1 first-round pick.

It was Jarredverse.

It wound up being a home run.

It was in Gladstone's last year there.

So Gladstone was only there for 1 first-round pick's rookie year.

That was it, right?

Yet, over that period of time, those eight seasons, 2017 to 2024, they were third in total draft picks, right?

So You know, in the NIL era, I think it creates more volatility, you know, with guys at the top of the draft.

But, you know, I think when you look at the, in the grand scheme of things, it's still gonna be important to fill out your roster with those guys because eventually, because eventually the entire league is gonna be guys coming from this era or sort of in that in-between now, you know, where it's just what would it be now.

So NIL, the first year of NIL was 2021.

So then guys who were their last year in college was first year of NIL.

Now you're talking about.

So, those guys would be in their 5th year, right?

So you're talking about guys who are 5 years or less in the NFL right now or NIL.

That's not reversing itself.

So, 5 years from now, it's gonna be almost everybody in the NFL was, was an NIL baby, so to speak, you know.

So, um, I, I mean, like I, the way I look at it is, it maybe like, creates some more.

I'd say more volatility, you know, um, yeah, and I, I wanna pull up the Rams draft history here because I, I think it's instructive to look at it because I think that's part of what they're doing here, you know, is.

Um, You know, it's just, hang on.

But, while you're doing that though, I think it's fascinating because I want to counter my own point by saying this, right?

If you look at Seattle's roster, for example, it's a team that won the Super Bowl last year, first round picks, it's, it's Jack Jackson Smith and Jigba, Charles Cross, uh, Nicky Memori was a 2nd round pick, Devin Witherspoon and Byron Murphy.

Everybody else was a hired gun, you know, right, but you can't do that.

You can't do that.

Unless you have those guys as your core, 100%.

And so, I mean, I, I think that there's no one way to, to, to skin a cat, but I think it's interesting to at least have that conversation, you know what I mean?

So like, yeah, I think we can go through here and look at just what the Rams, and this to me is like the amazing thing, right?

And it destroys the F them picks thing because anybody who is there would tell you, again, because of the volume of picks they were able to make the first rounders.

Sort of disposable, not completely disposable, but you know what I'm saying, you could use them to go get high-end players.

So, over those eight years, outside of the first round, they drafted Blake Braden Fisk, Blake Coorum, Cam Knchins, uh, Steve Avila, Byron Young, Kobe Tururner, Stetson Bennett, Davis Allen, Puka Nakua, Kobe Kobe Durant.

Kyron Williams, Quentin Lake, Tutu Atwell, Ernest Jones, Bobby Brown, Van Jefferson, uh, Jordan Fuller, Taylor Rapp, David Long, David Edwards, Nick Scott, Joe Noboom, John Franklin Myers, Sebastian Joseph Day, Cooper Cupp, Gerald Everett, John Johnson, Josh Reynolds, and Samson Ecubaum.

Those are all guys who started games for them, and I might be missing, but I, that's just like going down the list.

Like that's why it worked because they could fill out the rest of their roster and they didn't have, like, normally if you go all in the way that they did, the risk would be, well, you're gonna be a ghost ship everywhere else, right?

Like you go and you take huge swings and trade first-round picks and sign free agency, you know what's gonna happen.

If you're gonna have a five-man team, you know, and you're gonna be absolutely terrible everywhere else, and in the ultimate team game, that's not gonna work.

It worked because they nailed draft picks everywhere else, you know, and I think so many people miss that and think like the draft doesn't really matter as much as everybody thinks.

That's not the truth.

The truth is the draft is always the lifeblood to building.

Now, like again, I think NIL, what it's done.

It's created a little less certainty, right?

A little less, like because you're getting guys who maybe are a little more raw coming out.

You may know a little more about them personally because they've already had to handle having money, so that's part of it too.

But, like there's pieces of it where, you know, maybe you, maybe you don't have the fully formed product coming into the NFL that you had.

10 years ago, and you have to project more.

And so, if you, if your, if your point is the first-round picks, there's more volatility to with them, I, I'd agree.

I think there is more volatility with them than there has been in the past.

Um, and maybe that does make them less valuable, but just as far as having draft picks, period, I don't think that's the case.

And I think the Rams who are like the ultimate like, Like for, for, for people who want to make this case, like they're the ultimate, like, oh, the draft doesn't really matter, whatever with the picks, like, they're proof that it does matter because what facilitated that strategy was them drafting well outside the first round cause they only had one first-round pick in that 8-year period, and they actually nailed that first-rounder too, cause that guy wound up being Defensive Rookie of the Year and then a key piece in the Miles Garrett trade.

The Jaguars still, by the way, and, uh, you know, so we're gonna get into that because of that, that's why I wanted to get into this discussion.

They still have 1234567.

They still have 7 picks, 2 comps, uh, 3 comps, uh, a 5th and, uh, and 26th.

Um, and then, Would they get the?

We still don't know the another piece too is like that their, their core is in place.

Right, and they maybe, and they'll probably trade Brian Thomas after the season.

They didn't want to do that in-season cause they didn't want to make their, their team worse in the here and now, but they could trade Brian Thomas when we get to the offseason.

So now you're talking about those picks starting to backfill and maybe now, before you know, you have 10 picks.

I think they had a lot the last couple of years too.

I'm gonna have to look at that.

I'll look that up, but I mean, it's Yeah, so the last two years, they had 123456789.

They had 10 picks this year, and then last year they had 123456.

They had 19 picks the last two years.

Yeah.

Um, and the other, the, the last part of it, and then let's actually get into the trade, but like, They drafted guys like Boricer last year in the 2nd round, and, you know, whatever, it's, it's, it's non-consent like, you know, the consensus big board did not have him anywhere near there.

But their internal evaluations, and there's a really interesting discussion about that.

Uh, Albert, that involves like AI and different teams, you know, the way that they, you know, what their own calculations and wants and desires are spitting out to them in terms of metrics and how we're seeing a lot of some of these players that are purportedly reaches, but it's really just teams inputting different stuff in their formula, um, but Borker.

Like, to me, that leads me to say that like the Jaguars are thinking differently anyway about the players that they want, and they may be off other people's boards.

So, as long as you have picks, period, like, maybe it doesn't necessarily matter, and That's a a good segue into Jordan Davis.

I.

Every draft grader gave this like an F, uh, or every trade grader gave this thing an F, because Jordan Davis isn't a pass rushing defensive tackle.

Well, guess what?

Um, in Anthony Campanile's, uh, uh, uh, defense, the most important ingredient is a two-gap run-stuffing defensive tackle.

And what did they lose in Devon Hamilton?

A two-gap run-stuffing defensive tackle.

What's Jordan Davis really good at?

Say it from the back, being a two-gap run-stuffing defensive tackle.

And guess what?

What, like, you know, the, the market doesn't differentiate between Jordan Davis and Quinnin Williams.

It just doesn't, right?

It's like, this is a star defensive tackle.

One is more of a pass rusher, one's more of a run stuffer.

Doesn't matter.

That's what it costs.

It costs what Quinnin Williams costs, right?

And so, deal with it.

Either you want him, Either that's important or it's not, and the Jaguars decided it's important.

I don't know why we're all coming out here and going, it's an F.

It's an, he's like, it's crazy to me, you know.

I mean, Jordan Davis was also drafted to play in Jonathan Gannon's defense, and that's just something that we don't really pay attention to as much either.

Um, you know, so like he wasn't drafted to play, he wasn't drafted to play in Vic Fangio's defense.

And, you know, the way somebody explained it to me, um, after the trade went down was, The Eagles' defense is an attack then react defense for defensive linemen.

The Jaguars' defense is a react then attack defense.

And if you're playing defensive linemen that way, functionally, what that means, if you're react and attack, that means you have to take on blocks, right?

Or if you're attacking first, you're getting past the block, and then you react, then you react, right?

But if your job is to react, and that's two gap versus 1 gap, which is what you're referencing, um, the, the way that they play, it's, Jordan Davis is more valuable to them, and for that matter, Devon Gochow is more valuable to them than he would be to other teams.

And it's .

It's the same thing as like tight ends are more valuable to the Rams because of the way that they play.

So they drafted tight ends in the 2nd round in consecutive years and Terrence Ferguson and Max Clair.

You know, people don't apply that stuff to defense, but it does exist and it is different, you know, like there are, there are differences in the way that you run your front.

Corners are more important to some teams than others for obvious reasons, um, and so like this is like sort of an in the weeds thing, but You know, the, the Jaguars defense, the way it's set up is for the superpower to be, we stop the run, we force you into bad down a distance, then we create havoc.

That's the whole idea.

And so having, you know, losing, losing Hamilton, who one person they described as an anvil, which I like that.

He was an anvil in the middle of our defense, losing Hamilton.

Like, OK, like, now we already, we were already looking for defensive tackles, and we lose Hamilton in that blowout loss or the blowout win over the, the Colts.

And so now, instead of looking for one, we're looking for two.

And they got two guys who are really, really good in that area, one of whom they have background with, um, God Chow was with Campanelli in, in Miami, and then the other, of course, who I think is as Bigger runs stuffing monsters you have in the league, and just maybe because his skill set didn't really fit the defensive coordinator, wasn't as valuable to the Eagles now as he was 3 years ago.

Yeah, yeah, And it's exactly what the Jaguars need.

And, and, and I think this is the other part of the draft pick conversation, right?

You know, I think about.

We talked at the top of the show about my son being a Giants fan.

And, you know , if I were to take him to a game while they're in first place in the NFC, even if JJ McCarthy is a quarterback, all in, that's gonna be a $600 to $1000 investment on, on my part, and that's me not, you know, Trying to call in a favor and say like, hey, can I get a parking pass?

Like, that's me doing it, like, like anybody else would do it, right ?

Um, And Here's the thing.

You have to decide.

At some point, if you're a GM, if you're a coach, if you're a fan, or if you're a GM, if you're a coach, you're an owner.

What the cost of this is versus the award that you're giving the fan base.

And I know sometimes like that, I, I, I, I feel like I miss out on it when I'm hosting a show and, you know, I feel like sometimes I'm talking down to an audience, but the truth of the matter is like, The fans deserve this, and uh we made this point on um We made this point on the trade deadline show, Albert, but it's like baseball.

We got so obsessed for years about analytics and cost versus production, bah bah bah bah bah bah bah bah bah.

And then the Dodgers just came in and said, it, dude.

People want to see great players do great things, and we're gonna spend a ton of money, and, you know, like, that's where it's headed, you know.

And if you want to be like the cool small market team that's like, oh, neat, we're the Rays and like, we somehow, we sometimes have good seasons despite Spending $40 on players, look at, you could get into the trap for like $75 during the, uh, during the World Series, you know, nobody cares.

And, you know, nobody cares cause you're not investing.

And so, I think it's good, good for the Jaguars, good for them spending money.

I like the Amani or uh I like the Jesse Bates trade too.

I just think that This defense, and I was making calls actually on Anthony Campanile the other day.

The physicality that he coaches this defense with is out of this world.

He's coached on both sides of the ball.

He's been an offensive position coach.

He knows how to attack and short circuit the defenses.

You load them up and you let them rip.

Like, I, I think if the Vikings were out of the picture as a defense, we would be talking about Jacksonville and maybe Jacksonville maybe being far and away the best defense in the NFL this year, Albert.

Yeah, and I, and I look at it too, like I'm with you on that.

Like Jacksonville, I think, is one of the best defenses in the NFL.

I don't know if I take them over the Vikings, but no, no, no, yeah, if you take the Vikings out of it, right , right, right, right.

So I think, I think they're right in there, yeah, and, and I pulled this up too.

I mean, it's.

To me, like they sort of have their, they have their, their core intact, right?

Like, so like that, that's another thing that gives you the flexibility to move picks is like you kind of already know who you guys are.

You know, you've got Trevor Lawrence, a receiver, you got Jacoby Myers, you're probably gonna pay Parker Washington after this year, at least I would assume you will.

Um, you got one tackle who's paid, you got another who's hurt in Harrison, but he's gonna be coming back off the injury next year.

You've got your edge players in, and Josh Hinesow and Trayvon Walker.

You've got your corner and Travis Hunter, you know, you, you sort of already have like, this is the group that we're gonna be going forward with for the next couple of years, which I think gives you a little more flexibility too, which again, is part of the Rams model is like once you have your core in place, you can start to be a little bit more creative with your draft picks too.