Why is everyone obsessed with Shedeur Sanders? ft. Bomani Jones + Top 10 NFL defenders in 2025
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Welcome to Football 301. This is your co-host, Charles McDonald. Today, I'm joined by Bomayu Jones to talk about Shador Sanders, the Shamar Stewart holdout with the Cincinnati Bengals, and Aaron Rodgers joining the Pittsburgh Steelers. And later, Nate, Matt, and I rank our top 10 defenders heading into the 2025 season. See you in a sec.

It's the NBA offseason, everybody. That means it's the best time to check out my podcast, The Kevin O'Connor Show. We're breaking down everything that's going down. Draft pick performance in Summer League, NBA trades, free agency news, and what it all means for the coming season with all of these teams making big changes this offseason and how it could change the entire landscape of the NBA. So check out The Kevin O'Connor Show wherever you get your podcasts. ♪

Welcome to Football 301. The voice you hear that is usually Nate Tice is one Charles McDonald. Nate is out on paternity leave. He's about to have a new baby. So I am commandeering the show today to talk to my friend Bomani Jones. Stick around later in the show as Nate, Matt Harmon, and I rank the top 10 defenders heading into the 2025 season.

But, Manny, thank you for joining the show today. How you doing, man? Man, all good. I mean, Nate, once again, reaffirming that they let anybody do that.

Not to do that. In a very short amount of time, he's popping out too. He's about to have his hand pulled. Hey, man. Look. Like I said, it's amazing how low the prerequisites are for the ability to bring life into the world. Anybody can do it. It's the craziest thing. Don't even need to be that good at it, honestly. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Just need to be a little bit slow, a little bit late. Boom. There you go.

Speaking of a little bit slow, it's June. Covering the NFL, there's not too much going on right now, which is nice because it gives us a chance to just survey a handful of topics. And I'm going to throw a handful. I'm going to throw a few at you. I want you to pick a couple that we're going to talk about. And then we're going to get into a conversation about Shador Sanders a little bit later. But a topic that I have for you.

There's a, I think there's a funny thing in the NBA right now where people are talking about market size. I am, as someone who is NFL brains, the idea of choosing whether or not you're going to watch the finals based on market size is kind of crazy to me. That's one. Two, do we care about Dak Prescott and his legacy talk? Because there's been a bunch of that this week.

Three, any thoughts on the Bengals and Shamar Stewart situation? Four, thoughts on Ashton Hall, the meme water guy who was splashing water in space getting smoked by another streamer in a race? And five, does Aaron Rodgers joining the Steelers actually make them a more interesting team? Okay. I actually have to say that that is a pretty interesting collection of topics that you had. I had four of them that I found to be interesting. Remind me what the first and second one were.

The first and second one were market size. Is it kind of crazy that people are choosing that they're going to watch these games whether or not they care about the cities involved? Because imagine looking at the AFC title game last year and saying, it's Buffalo versus Kansas City. Who gives a crap about that? That's kind of crazy to me. So let's jump on that one, right? Because I do think that it is interesting, but I think...

A lot of the success of the NFL is not because of anybody's particular genius. Right. And a significant part of it has but so much to do with the actual game of football itself.

It is everyone's good fortune that that game is so goddamn violent that you can only play once a week. Right. And everybody plays it on Saturday. I mean, on Sunday by, you know, college is on Saturday. NFL is on Sunday. And like those of us who work in the general sports world or have you fall off of college football over the years as you get older, because you have to take what you got to have one day, like especially to marry dudes. Yeah.

Yeah, like the married dude's like, look, man, you got to pick one or you got to pick the other. But the nature of how the NFL works and the nature of the national television broadcast in 430 and at 8 o'clock or 415 at 8 o'clock.

the league can sell a league rather than so much selling individual teams. Now there are national teams, but it's interesting. The Packers, we would say our national team, the Steelers, we would say our national team, obviously the Cowboys, our national team and that sneaky one, the Raiders, right? Like these are, yeah. Right. Like these, like the Raiders are the, the Raiders transcend city. They're just like, yo, we'll just move anywhere. And people, you know, our guy, our people show up.

But those are national brands. Everywhere else, they are really, by and large, without a couple of exceptions, but those are the four big ones that jump out. They're kind of local regional brands, but since everybody's watching on Sunday, they're

And the games are so few, everything feels a certain way. On top of that, the biggest games are going on in the dead of cold, right? Ain't nobody really got nowhere to go. They laying up around the crib like during that time. So you get invested in a manageable story because there's so few games.

And then they whittle off the teams to the place where, yeah, when the Super Bowl comes around, the AFC Championship game comes around, you watch because that's what you do at that given point in time. Every other sport has a certain dependence for the television performance of their finals on who's in it. The World Series. It's really...

Almost entirely determined what the audience is going to be based on the size of the markets of the teams who are there. I don't think that anybody that really cares about basketball is like, oh, it's Oklahoma City and Indiana. I'm not going to watch that. What I think has happened is throughout this year, people just haven't watched those teams.

They have not had the appeal of it. So when you talk about it in the context of television, then yeah, the baseline for a television audience is going to be the local market. And then you sprinkle on top of that. Toronto is a fairly large market, but it is a death sentence to American television because Toronto's televisions don't count on American ratings, right? So it doesn't matter how many people are, everybody in Canada could be watching it. The league itself doesn't care. But I do think that,

The NBA has a couple, like three, maybe like national type of brands. But like in the NFL, the Patriots did not become a national brand after they won all those championships. The Bulls somehow completely stopped mattering to any of all those Bulls fans. For those of us who were of the age to remember the Jordan era, Jordan left. All the people went with him. It was like they were never there. The NFL, for whatever reason, doesn't work like that.

NBA fans are typically more attracted to players. But I think for Oklahoma City, for example, they're going to be in this for a long time, I believe. And I think that we will see their numbers pick up because I know when they had Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, they were actually a huge television draw in spite of the fact that they were in what has to be one of the three smallest markets in the NBA. Yeah, because I was...

I was at a cookout for the final game of Pacers-Knicks, and everyone after the game was over was like, "Oh, the Pacers. Man, I thought I was going to watch the Pacers versus Thunder in the finals." And I'm like, "Guys, y'all know Shay is 26, and Jalen Williams is 23, and Chet is 24, in that range." The oldest player on the team is Al Caruso. He just turned 31 in February.

like are you just gonna you're gonna bail on this for a couple years because they're not going anywhere this is a cycle that the internet has produced the social media in large part like a frustration i have now when people talk about rap is people talk about rap like they shareholders in the record company streaming right like they out here rattling off how many platinum plaques and sales and first week and stuff like that like bro i thought you was here to listen to music you understand what i'm saying and so

When it comes to this ratings discussion, I think it winds up being a bit of a feedback loop because, yes, if you have particularly around for the David Stern era, you can laugh at the idea of how frustrated he would be at the idea of a Pacers Thunder final. Right. Like his line was his dream finals every year would be the Lakers and the Lakers.

Like, this is, you know, so there's a humor that I think that people who follow the league and actually like it can have about this. But then there's also another wing of people on the other side that become fiercely protective of the league because there's always so many bad faith arguments that are made against it. But if you were to say, I'm not going to watch it because it is those franchises.

That is taking the rooting for laundry thing to a completely different level. What I wonder about and hope for to a degree is that just because it helps the larger discussion that people have watched these teams and now they have some sort of sensation about them. Because like if I were still doing daily television, for example, I started doing daily TV when LeBron was in Miami and we could talk about every single Miami Heat game. It was amazing. By the way, Miami, not the large market that people think it is.

But we could do that, and then from there you could spill out and you could talk about the rest of the league. Hopefully there'll be enough people that watch, say, Oklahoma City and Indiana that as we get farther into the year, you can fuel calling a first take by talking about what's going on with the Pacers because people saw them play in the finals. Again, the Thunder are going to be here for a really long time. People are going to develop opinions about them. But I think the internet has made –

I said the thing about social media generally, but Twitter in particular when it first dropped, my point was it allowed famous people to act like regular people and that was kind of their way to make a connection. It allowed...

regular people to act like famous people in the worst ways or perhaps worse than saying they act like famous people, regular people to think they're brands. And so everybody really comes out there thinking with business brain. It's so crazy. Yeah, it is. It is weird. Everyone's trying to like platform themselves. I'm like, bro, I'm just here to tweet for the most part.

And those days are over. Like as somebody who I think, I think I use leverage that platform to make a pretty nice living for myself in a number of ways. Bro, those days are gone. Ain't nobody getting on like that.

Yeah. I mean, I never took a journal class my whole life, but I got on Twitter and I figured it out. And I feel like because I got younger kids ask me, well, how do I break in? I don't know. I don't know. I think the whole new game maybe has to be all kinds of the other way to ask me is like, do you have any internships, brother? I'm a person.

No, I do not have an internship. No, I don't know who does. I don't know who gives away the internships. I'm 45 years old. This is the most that's the most irrelevant piece of information for my whole life. I have absolutely no idea. But yeah, they're like, you got any advice for me on how to break into the game? Be good. That's all I got. Be good.

That's what I would be telling Shador Sanders right now as we try to figure out if he's going to make this Browns team right now. That is one thing I really want to talk to you about. Are you surprised that people are still at this level of fervor, even though we've seen him be a fifth round pick? So it's interesting. I thought it would die off a little bit. Well...

I hate to tie everything back to my doom and gloom feelings about the Internet, but I do think that this is where the algorithmic loop comes into play, which is the algorithm rewards stories that people think are interesting and thereby people keep feeding the algorithm the stories that they know the algorithm likes and will spit back out. And for whatever reason, he does it.

Right. Like he is a for someone who has not demonstrated himself to be interesting at all. He really, really like captivates people. I think he's going to make the team. Yeah, I would be surprised if he did not make the team. I think the question to ask is really about those two old guys. Like and I guess they have one old guy in Kenny Pickett. That's unfair to Kenny Pickett. But there's no reason to have two of those.

on the team. Joe Flacco was really, really popular up that way. He was so popular that I don't think they could have brought him back last year because they would have had a real issue before Watson got hurt. We've talked about, well, I've talked about this, about quarterbacks and blackups and that you needed to have a blackup for Deshaun Watson. And Joe Flacco, after he went out there and didn't play well, but they won a bunch of games, it was a good time. It was vibes, right?

Come on, man. What are we still doing here? So you take Dylan Gabriel in the third round. I assume that he will be on the team. And then I assume it will be one of the two older guys. If you think Kenny Pickett has a chance, then maybe it's him. I don't, I see no reason for Joe Flacco to be playing for your team at this point. Like this is they, they try, they were begging for him to take the job for Anthony Richardson last year. And nope, it just, it,

It wasn't a go. So I think Shador makes it. Somebody traded draft capital to go get him. It wasn't the most draft capital in the world, but somebody, they didn't just let him fall to them. Somebody made a concerted effort to go get him. And I think that if he plays better than Dylan Gabriel, then he'll get on the field before Dylan Gabriel. Like I had a lot of people jump down my throat about this, where I don't think him going in the fifth round rather than the third round matters that much. I think him going in the fifth round rather than call it the second round, that's,

That matters. Second-round picks are intended to be starters, right? Third-round picks, eh. We'll see. We'd like to get you out there. We'd like to see you do some things. But nobody – I don't believe for a second that the margins are –

are wide enough that the difference between Dylan Gabriel being a third round pick and Shador Sanders being a fifth round pick is that important now if you want to make the point that Dylan Gabriel being a third round pick is a reflection that somebody up there really likes him now we're having a different discussion but it's not simply about the fact that Shador went in the fifth round no I think he winds up on that team yeah and I the one thing I will give the people who are fascinated fascinated by Shador for whatever reason whether it's

you know, his play, I guess last year was kind of fun. If you're just like a guy who grew up, like loving Deion Sanders and pass that love on down to your kids, I can see why you're like that. The one thing I will give them is,

You're looking at this quarterback room. If you're a fan of Shador and say, why can't he go beat Dylan Gabriel or Joe Flacco or Kenny Pickett? You know, so I do understand that part of it. Because why not? Why couldn't he be the Brown starter in October or November? That looks like a quarterback room where everyone will get a chance to start. Yeah.

And I don't mean that in no good way. Everybody, what is the difference between trying any of these out here on the field in terms of the bottom line? And look, I don't pretend that I watch Kenny Pickett that closely. Was there any cause for optimism? Because when I saw what was going on, I didn't see it at all. No. I mean, he got to play with a really good team for a couple games in the Eagles last year.

Still look like Kenny Pickett, just on a really good team. Hey, man, this I feel like is axiomatic. If you want to take a quarterback in the top 10, fine. If you want to take a quarterback between 10 and 20 or 10 and 19, that's cool. You want to take a quarterback with the very last pick in the first round and anything after that, knock yourself out. You take a quarterback in the 20s, he stinks.

Except Lamar Jackson. He's like the only one. 32. Okay, 32. That's right. That's right. 32. No, I engineered that in. But you think about it. Every time somebody takes a quarterback, like who's that? The Giants took Jackson Dart. You might as well have waited, man. Because now he's...

now he's going to stink and so if you take him at the first pick of the second round like Carolina did with Jimmy Clawson in the year of our Lord 2010 that does not stop you from taking that's right they don't stop you from taking Superman in the next draft that's all I'm saying yeah yeah yeah

Yeah, that's a the whole Shador Sanders thing has been really interesting to me because I'm not going to lie. At first, I thought it was like, is this just like a two Americas thing where I'm talking to all my friends about Shador Sanders and they're freaking out? And then last week I saw some ESPN radio host in Cleveland screaming like belligerently furious that Shador needs quarterback one reps with the Browns. I'm like, y'all, it's

it's june they've only had minicamp and and rookie minicamp yeah yeah yeah but he's in cleveland right like you can always get a crack and talk about the browns like that's that's the thing about this is covering football on a national level you're looking at it and you're kind of like hey we don't really have that much news to help dictate what we're talking about i mean i guess just hypothetically i guess we'll do an nfc north preview or whatever but if you're in a market like cleveland

There is no time that you can't get it going by talking about the Browns. Right. And so what they have there is a guy whose name rings out, who people are very, very familiar with, which I think is not really the case with college players as it was in the past. Right. Just because there's so much going on and attention is more distracted. So you've got somebody black quarterbacks are still a fairly provocative notion. Right. So you've got like the the the subtext.

that comes along with him and not just a black quarterback, but one who the word on the street was, was acting, acting a bit of a donkey when he went and did all these interviews and stuff. He, he don't tighten it up since then. Right. Everything I've heard him say in those interviews, it ain't none of that. Don't draft me. If you don't want to change the culture, he is in there blending in, fitting in with the homies now, but it's going to, it's going to keep people going for a long time. Like you don't have any more, a lot of honest to God, uh,

quarterback controversies in training camp like who's going to be the starter we don't really have that like even where there's questions about whether the young guy is going to start you know the young guy is eventually going to start this one is honestly why would there's a why not on every one of the guys that they have there so there's a I mean there's suspense in terms of who is going to lead them in the last place

Yeah, that is the kicker for all of this because not only did, you know, all the grounds, they're going to stink this year, but they also, they have the Jaguars first round pick in next year's draft. Like they're drafting a quarterback next year. Yes, that was an amazing, amazingly lucky trade that, I mean, Jacksonville is going, or they have done this. They have bought a Rolls Royce. They have bought a Ferrari.

And they're going to drive it 100 miles each way to work every day, every day. That's what they did. They traded up to run that boy into the ground. I don't know when they're going to get hip, but the only way that trade made sense is if you think you have a legitimate Pro Bowl two-way player. And even trying to do that is incredibly stupid.

As far as I'm excited to see them try, though. I mean, you're going to be excited to be out here tearing up his tearing up his hamstrings or whatever else. Now, it does look like I just seen the clips of him in training camp. That boy can't stay still.

Like, apparently that's why – maybe that's why Colorado put him out there to play wide receiver. Like, man, get him away from me, dog. You're making me feel weird. My good friend John Shipley, who covers the Jaguars, he's been saying that Travis has been in second team on defense and first team on offense, which is like, man, let's just – why are we wasting time on that? Let's just get first team both ways. Let's figure it out because –

If we're going to drive the Ferrari 100 miles per hour, I'm putting my pedals in the metal. So my thing is, I think he could be one of a few good wide receivers. Like, I don't have the greatest eye for this, but that's for me watching him at Colorado. He looked like a Pro Bowl corner, like, to date.

So I'm a little surprised that it's gone on that level. But on the other hand, they got a quarterback that the Heat has finally come to. And it is very interesting because I take a guy like Matthew Stafford. The Heat never came. He no number one pick has ever existed under less pressure while being a number one overall pick that people were forecasting in that place as he was a junior in high school. Yep.

Two-time Pro Bowler Matthew Stafford. Did he finally get to the third? Either way, it's one of those. But he never got the weight. It's always people telling you he's better than you think. How does that work with former number one overall pick? We've been waiting on it since he was at Georgia. Now people are looking at Trevor Lawrence like, hey, it's about time to get it done, young man. And so maybe that's it. You give him Travis Hunter and we go from there.

That's a funny-ass point because I kind of thought that once Trevor got to Jacksonville, people would just kind of stop being interested in him. And it hasn't been like maybe the most fervorous thing. I don't know. Online, it's kind of bad. But outside, I don't really know if people have too many opinions about him. But that's a good comparison between him and Matthew Stafford because Stafford, no one gave a crap that he was just up there. Callum Johnson for a couple years and then forgot about him until he got to the Rams for a little bit. Yo, in all the...

all this talk about, well, he played for the Lions. He played with Calvin Johnson. Like he had that one year, his the 2011 year where all the stats were spiked. Right. And he had that really good year and he threw for 5,000 yards. He has been a good to very good NFL quarterback. You know what I'm saying? Like normally first overall picks have to answer a lot more questions. Even Andrew Luck took more questions.

about things. And Andrew Luck was out there by and large playing for Dolo. The other thing for Trevor Lawrence that remains fascinating is, man, that draft, weird. That's the post-COVID draft. The 2021 draft.

post-COVID draft, right? So all the guys who sat out, like Panay Sewell, Micah Parsons, Jamar Chase, worked out pretty well. All those guys who played, man, it'd make you wonder if they all caught it and it stuck with them. Like, it all went funny.

That was supposed to be the quarterback draft, too. We got Trevor Lawrence, Zach Wilson, Justin Fields, Trey Lance, Mack Jones. And none of those guys, none of them, none of them were as good as anybody thought that they were going to be. Okay, hold on.

Mac Jones is exactly as good as I thought he was going to be. But Bill Belichick apparently thought it was the other way. You had another topic I wanted to hit because we got a little more time right fast. And it tied into me saying that the Browns are going to finish in last place. I talked to Dominique about this the other day.

if the players get to vote for these things, they're going to make Shamar Stewart team captain, right? That man walked in the door and already knew the state of affairs. Like, bro, they ain't even about winning. That man got 17 sacks and they can't even give him his paper? What's really good?

He said, I know I am 100% right. I love it. And from what I've read and from what I understand, it doesn't seem like he's asking for anything more than what Amarius Mims got last year, who was also the 18th pick in the draft to the Cincinnati Bengals. So...

I don't know what's going on here, but I respect it. I respect the stand he's taking. Do you realize the fortitude you have to have at that age under these circumstances to look at the world and say,

I know I'm right and not like a jerk. He's just like, no, I'm sorry, man. I am on the side of right on this one. They are tripping. I ain't doing this. I was, I was sitting here wondering, I was like, man, like,

Why are you guys hardballing, you know, Shamar and Trey? You're trying to win the Super Bowl, right? And then it's the Bengals. That's what they do. That's what they've always... Look, the team of Joe Burrow and Jamar Chase, because I do feel like while Joe Burrow is my guy, I have lots of good things to say about him. He is a very good quarterback.

But we ain't never seen them do it for Dolo, right? It has been the team of Joe Burrow and Jamar Chase. And they are so good that for a little while, we forgot.

that these were the Cincinnati Bengals, right? And before Burrow got drafted, I was on TV like, hey, bro, don't go there. And the Cincinnati people were all mad. Why would he not come here? Da, da, da. Y'all know goddamn well why he wouldn't come here. Y'all be rooting for this team. Y'all used to have them dudes reusing jock straps. You out here asking me why he shouldn't come here. Look around you right now. Look around you right now. You know what I'm saying? They're going to score like 60 points a game next year, and they're going to give up 63.

Big 12 ball. Yes, that is exactly what they're going to be out there playing. They're going to be playing 2013 Big 12 football. Oh, man. So I guess that answers the question. Does Aaron Rodgers joining the Steelers actually make them more interesting? Oh, it does. It does. It does. I just want to give a pop shot. Yeah. But no, no. Let me tell you. Here's why I find that to be interesting. Aaron Rodgers is an eccentric, but he's not a fool guy.

and I think he knows so much he can get away with up there. He says all that snide stuff and does it when and where he can get away with it. I think he knows he can't get away with it up there, and I think this is a big thing. I think Aaron Rodgers cares a lot about what we think, and the way it went with the Jets,

Back in the day, that's when somebody retires. Like, that's the end of it. He has made the decision. Yeah, he's made the decision. He's not going out like this. Look, no, the list of quarterbacks who didn't go out like that is incredibly short. It is basically Roger Staubach, John Elway, and in a lesser degree, Phillip Rivers.

But even Peyton Manning walked out with a ring. But boy, did he look terrible. Got benched for Brock Osweiler. Tom Brady had a nice little end because they had the game against the Rams where he threw for a million yards. But Stafford and Kup got him. Yeah, you're right. It's small, though. It's small, man. Like you chasing boxers.

Most of them go out like just they try to hit for one more lick, right? Let's try to get another chance. And they go out there and they get it. And so he makes them more interesting because the stakes are so high for everybody. You know, there's the legitimately fair case of.

You keep making the playoffs, but you don't win playoff games, though I think making the playoffs of some of these rosters has been incredible enough. It's kind of like Marvin Lewis. You didn't win a playoff game with Andy Dalton, and it's like, say that again? I feel like you're going to get to the bottom of this.

right before i even have to say a word if you just say that one more time so no we're we're going to see what this is because the other thing too and you look you know actual football way better than i do you could put together a nice little package of aaron rogers plays from last year that looked like a rogers the back half of the season he was kind of all right uh and i i i do think the fact that he cares so much about making this work it does make it a little bit more interesting um

But, man, I still look at them and see, like, Baltimore. Like, how do you stab them? Well, they did beat Baltimore one time last year. And then once they got to the actual games that mattered, they got stampeded. So I don't know. They're just kind of interesting plays because I do think – I agree with you. There's still some clips from last year where Aaron Rodgers still looks pretty good. But I don't know. He's 41 now.

We don't find out if Lamar Jackson, he had been on a Rocky montage offseason. Like this would be the year, right? You know what I'm saying? Like running heels, everything else like this is after they stole that MVP from him last year. Like, I don't know how much he cares about that, but I don't think we talk nearly enough about the fact that they literally gave Josh Allen MVP or they gave Lamar Jackson first team all pro prone.

One of them didn't deserve it. You can't make the argument that they both did, right? One of them did not. It is Lamar Jackson, the kind of petty to be like, huh? Huh? That's what made me so damn mad. How was the MVP not going to be a first team all pro? Look, let me tell you something, man. My father is 88 years old and he doesn't really follow this stuff as much as he used to. I can only imagine if this were 15, 20 years ago and I,

Lamar Jackson was the first team all pro, but they gave the MVP to Josh Allen. He

He'd have been up in arms like he was that day when they turned on Monday Night Football and they thought Jefferson Street Joe Gilliam was going to be starting it. Instead, it was Terry Bradshaw. He would have been marching in the streets. It was absurd. Hey, that's kind of how I felt when I heard Matt Ryan's name get called. I was like 13 years old when they made that pick. I was like, hold up, hold up, hold up, hold up, hold up, hold up.

I thought we were going to run this thing back when Mike got out of jail. No. Oh, you thought that? That's what I thought at the time. That's what I thought at the time. I was like, let's go take Darren McFadden. Let's take Darren McFadden and go rush for the 3,000 yards when he gets out of jail next year. I had never considered that anybody would have thought that you would just hold on until Mike got back. No.

I never thought that that was a possible scenario. No, no. I mean, now as someone in their 30s, it sounds pretty stupid. But at 12 or 13, that was genius. Yo, shout out to your pops for letting you live that dream. Because I just stomped on that. Oh, appreciate you coming on, Bill. Anything you want to plug before we get out of here?

Appreciate you, man. Check out The Right Time with Beaumont Jones Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays on YouTube and wherever you get podcasts for free. All right. Be right back after the break with Nate and Matt for our top 10 defenders heading into the 2025 NFL season. All right, here we are. We are recording this at some point in May because I am on paternity leave currently, but we're going to continue recording

our lists, our top 10 things list. This time we're doing defenders, which I think is fun. You know, sometimes they come here with the afterthought. We kind of go, oh yeah, this guy's good. This guy's great. Oh yeah, all pro team. All right, see you next year. You know, look at some sack numbers and everything. So we're going to provide a little bit of nuance. I'm actually very curious about

where Charles and Matt are going to go with this top 10 defenders list. So let's just jump right into it. Again, we are going to say just for 2025, not contracts, not age. I mean, you might have some age too, if you think there's a drop off too. So you might have a guy off your list. I might have someone like that, but we're going to go 10, 9, 8, discuss, and then just continue down the list one by one. Top 10 defenders, 2025 NFL season. I think I have all the disclaimers out there. So no one

get mad i think my short list went to 20 maybe 18 this was hard i'm looking back i i might be a defensive line list only next year and then a back seven yeah you know just split it up because smart it got a little hard and also my preferences started weighing in and it's like oh god oh god i got a little heavy on the defensive line you guys kind of have the same thing going on before we jump in

Oh, you know my biases. Hell yeah. There's lots of DMs that put the bottom of my list. But I didn't. I actually, I thought I was being like biased maybe. And then honestly, I kind of started scrumming around the internet. And I was like, what?

What are the other top 10 lists? Okay. All defensive linemen for the most part. Got it. Okay. We're good. We're good. Yeah. Those are guys get paid. There's a lot of them out there right now. And I know, and Matt might be Mr. Reception Perception, but now we get some IDP thoughts here. You know, I get to hear kind of what he thinks, you know, preferences for those. But Matt, actually, let's start off. Let's give your 10, 9, 8, and then we'll jump to Charles and I'll jump to mine and we'll discuss all three of ours. But it's here. Your 10, 9, and 8 top 10 defenders 2025. Okay.

Yeah. Number 10, I have Jalen Carter. Number nine, I have Aiden Hutchinson. And number eight, I have Derek Stingley. And yeah, I mean, it's a there's definitely a lot of guys that could compete for that nine and 10 spot for sure. Like I had a long list as well. And I have the same sort of thing. Spoiler alert. A lot of like pass rushers, defensive linemen. It's just for me, it's like.

Who do you like? Whose impact do you really just sense when you're watching a game and who's the most consistently disruptive players? And, you know, unfortunately, maybe that that's where the bias creeps in. It's certainly the guys up front. So, yeah, again, Jalen Carter, Aiden Hutchinson, Derek Stingley. That's 10, 9, 8. Good start to the list. Charles, what are your 10, 9 and 8? My 10, 9 and 8 was 10 Jalen Carter, 9 Kyle Hamilton, 8 Nick Bosa.

Okay. All right. We got a good little mix to start. All right. My 10 and 9, 10, 9 and 8. I got 10, Nick Bosa, 9, TJ Watt, which we'll discuss in a minute. And then 8, Dexter Lawrence was in at number 8, which...

To be honest, I should have bumped him two higher. I'm already going to review my list. I feel like after reviewing it already, I'm like, I should have had you maybe one or two spots higher. But I'll say we have some notes because we send these to our producers beforehand. We do not know each other's top tens.

but they got a little kind of some tidbits. So we kind of know where some of these guys might slot. I'm the only one with TJ Watt in my top 10, and I'm just going to get, I'm going to just get this off. This is a legacy vote for me. It's one of those where I just didn't feel right keeping him off because I know he's going to get his,

probably nine plus sacks. I was going to say double digit plus sacks, but even last year, which felt like was maybe not his best year, still has a ton of force fumbles is still a one really hard to block one-on-one just affects so many games. And it's truly one of those true game record types. And I just kind of have a bias towards that. Like guys that I just picture. It's like, if I were coaching against this team, who am I double teaming? Who am I providing chip help to? Who am I doing that? Cause you feel the games where TJ Watts not getting that help. Um,

So was there a reason maybe, Charles, we'll start with you, that maybe you kept TJ Watt off? This is just for my own ego because I just want to hear maybe why you kept him off. Man, it's hard. Well, it's hard because Steelers fans are very sensitive about TJ Watt.

I don't think it's... Especially about T.J. Watt. Especially about T.J. Watt. And I mean, he's one of the best defensive players of this decade. If I can say you're one of the best defensive Pittsburgh Steelers of all time, like you are certified, right? You're on a good list. Yeah. I just thought that last year, for me at least...

Where you have these years where TJ Watt is in deep play contention or he wins or he comes in second to Myles Garrett and Steelers fans are freaking out. I think if you look at some of the metrics at even his best years, it's a little boom bust as a pass rusher where...

He's not getting like consistent pressure, I think, like a Myles Garrett or a Micah Parsons. But when he does get pressure, he's almost always wrecking the offense. And I thought that this past year, as he gets a little older, was kind of maybe like the biggest extenuation we've seen of that, where there's some plays where or some games where he was kind of quiet. Or you can look at like the first game against Atlanta where he crushed them. And you're just kind of right. Yes, yes.

You got TJ Wann and Caleb McGarry and your quarterback can't move. It got ugly pretty fast. I just think, I thought last year was a little bit too much boom bust for his game. But he was like fringe top 10 for me. It's not like this is a slight. He still had 11 sacks and led the league in forced fumbles. So I don't think having him here is wrong. I just thought there were some guys who were a little bit more consistent down and down.

That's very fair. And Matt, you same kind of thing for your same line of thinking. You were the only one with Ian Hutchinson in your top 10 would actually surprise me because he was I to full disclosure here. TJ was like my last ad to the list. I kind of have like my little short list. I flopped out Hutch and flopped out like three other guys, Quinn and Williams. I'll

spoilers did not make my list. He was another guy trying to sneak into my top 10. I just couldn't figure out how to get him in there, but that was the guy that I was looking at too. But I know last year, and it was a great bull take. You had Aiden Hutchinson defensive player of the year. It was looking great for you. And it kind of, and then the injury happened. And we, when we looks like that, he was trying to come back. If they made a playoff run, they say that. So we'll see hopefully coming back this year, but why do you have Hutchinson on your list outside? I mean,

I know he's a great player, but why did you put him onto this top 10 list? Yeah, I mean, it was tough, obviously, because you're only measuring six weeks from him, five games, six weeks has had an early buy. But he was the best pass rusher in the NFL from a production standpoint, seven and a half sacks, 25 percent pressure rate, 16 QB hits like again, all leads the NFL in the first six weeks. And just he was somebody that

could not just, I thought was a consistent player down to down, but also was, as Charles mentioned about TJ Watt, who was one of my first cuts as well. You know, honestly, the only, the reason that I, I couldn't put TJ Watt on the list is because I think he was, I think Cam Hayward was better than him last year. And like, Hayward wasn't making my list. So that was kind of, it may be that stupid logic, but that's a big part of why I didn't have a lot on my top 10. Or again, he's like one of the first,

players off. And I agree with Charles, like he wasn't as consistently impactful down the stretch. Whereas again, with, as Charles said about TJ watt, like Hutchinson could wreck an entire offense, especially obviously if he was going against a, a subpar tackle. And I know in some people's minds, like, all right, well we got to dock him a little bit, you know, for the level of competition, but it's, it's similar to when you're scouting players for college, uh,

Okay, well, yeah, if he's absolutely dominating that lower level of competition, he's clearly the best player on the field. If he's wrecking the entire unit on the other side, I think you can still give that production a premium. So, yeah, to me, I thought he kind of had to make the list, especially if we're saying...

We're taking him for 2025. I do think he is one of the first 10 defenders I would take for this season. And it seems not fair because so Nick Bosa for me, why he's 10 is I've always thought Nick Bosa is kind of a middling run defender. And that's why I've never considered him like, I mean, he's unbelievable as a pass rusher. Like just he's ridiculous, gets pressure after pressure, after pressure, after pressure. But.

but as a run defender, that's why I always kind of have him a half tier below some of the other guys. And that's same for me with Hutch is that it's that same kind of thing. It's like, oh, you're just kind of average against that. And that's the, but again, he's really good. It's just that we're in now this tier of the elite guys. So it's like, well, this is your blemish that makes you 12 as opposed to eight or nine or 10, like, which again, we're splitting hairs here and it's going to suck when they

social media tweets out the top 10 list and then Hutchinson's not on there. They, no one's going to hear these honorable mentions or these discussions, but I, that's why I maybe my, my splitting hair stuff is why I maybe knocked him off just that one little step of that. That was it for me. But, uh, the Nick Bosa stuff is kind of funny because I was, I was looking at his pro football reference.

this morning because i agree with you like with the run defense stuff it's kind of inconsistent but it does feel crazy to say that like if i'm a 49s fan i'm like yo this guy gets 15 to 20 tfls a year what are you talking about yeah but you know it's it's the style of play right it's the boom buzz like i'm hunting and you know hunters miss sometimes and that can kill you did you know nick bosa has the according to next gen stats god i love this stuff is crack uh

miles garrett and nick bosa have the fastest get off times in the nfl that makes sense seven seconds is their average get off that is at and i mean these guys are big like bosa looks skinnier but he's still like a big dude and garrett of course is just a freak but i'm sure we'll talk about him later down on the list all right i also want to bring up derrick stingley matt had him at eight i'm

Charles might have him as well. He was one of my first cuts, and this one hurt my heart so much. Because, again, this was a preference of tier. This was a, okay, I'm always going to build around the defensive line, the edges before the corners. But I do think Derek Stingley is either...

corner two or corner three at worst in the NFL right now. But I do want to mention that. I know we're going to talk about him probably in a second as well. And then Charles, you had Kyle Hamilton at nine. He was another one of my guys that just missed the cut. The slot guys were hard for me. I'd like three slot guys are all next to each other, but we'll talk more about him. I'm sure he is further down the list. So let's get into defenders seven and six, because this is actually where even some more crossover happens. Matt,

Start us off with defenders seven and six on your top ten list. Yeah, I've got two niners here. I've got Nick Bosa and Fred Warner. And honestly, after I submitted the list, I kind of wish I had swapped Bosa and Stingley. That's just how high I feel about Derek Stingley. But yeah, so two niners here for me. And Fred Warner is the only linebacker on... I mean, like, true off-ball linebacker on my list. And honestly, like, the only guy who really...

thought about other than I think if like at the very end if I if we publish the honorable mentions like I put Zach Bond at the very end of my honorable mentions just because he had that type of campaign but I mean again the body of work is obviously shorter with him than with everybody else but I felt like those two guys had to make it yeah I agree with a lot of what you guys said about Bosa but he's still for me from a past work standpoint is just unbelievable so he's so good

I know, and the numbers bear that out too. Charles, your defender, seven and six? Seven, six. I have Chris Jones and Dexter Lawrence. Mmm. Beef. Beef. All right. My seven and six, I got Max Crosby and Jalen Carter. And so now we all have Carter on our list. So Matt had him at 10. Charles had him at 10. I had him at six. I actually thought I would be the low guy. I thought Charles might be a little...

A little hot on him because that was your dark horse defensive player of the candidate, which I love that too, because he's ascending. I think anyone who watched the playoffs knows he is ascending. But why did he make your list? Let's talk a little bit about Jalen Carter because he's on all of our lists so far.

Oh, man. At his best. I mean, at his best, you can convince me he's the best defensive player in the league. Truly unblockable. Truly unblockable. And it's not just like the traits that you see. Dude, he's so smart when it comes to –

reading blocks and knowing how to exploit them and setting himself up for his teammates and then also being able to make plays by himself. I just thought the guys above him maybe were a little bit more consistent. Like I have Dexter Lawrence in here. To me, he's the best defensive tackle in football right now.

um and then chris jones i just there's so much you can do with him and i think he's he saves a lot from some of the other talent that they've actually collected on that defensive line like it it helps if you've missed on a couple picks when you put chris jones at edge and feel good about him getting off the edge and getting a sack so uh the versatility there just pushed me up a little bit and like i said for dexamorris i think he's i think he's the best defensive tackle in the game right now so it's it's there's a

There's a lot, and it's been kind of interesting to see who's filled the post-Aaron Donald void. I wouldn't be surprised if Jalen Carter is the best defensive tackle in football this year because he's still a young guy, still got a lot of time. I just thought there's a little bit of consistency where you see him run a little cold sometimes, but even then, if you look from

sophomore year versus rookie year, like that was a big improvement because rookie year, I remember like the first five games, I was like, holy, is this like a deep play candidate? And then hit the wall and, you know,

Back half the season wasn't as good. But this year, you saw all the way through the Super Bowl, he was that guy. I guess I just want to see him do it again. But Dexter Lawrence, that's the dude. That's the dude. Yeah. No, he's very... Yeah, Dexter Lawrence was eight for me. And you don't see nose tackles as disruptive as that. On top of having the size of a traditional nose tackle, but...

He can do the two gapping or hold it, but then that's not using his strengths. He's a gap shooter at 340 pounds. Honestly, I've been really trying to find a comparison protection Lawrence in my brain, and it's been maybe one of those Jaguars defensive tackles. I can't understand or something like that.

But he's better than that, right? Yeah, he's more disruptive. He's quicker. He's more disruptive. But yeah, he's just a rare talent. And that's the guy I wish I actually bumped a little bit because he was, again, on a defensive player of your track as well at nose tackle on a bad team. But because he was just doing crazy things at that position. And then, Matt, you said Fred Warner, though, which I love. I might have him a little bit higher. Speak to like...

watching, I know you do a lot of charting. I'm sure when you watch the 49ers defense, Fred Warner shows up a lot. So speak to like kind of how that like that coverage ability and why he makes this top 10 pretty easily. Definitively. I mean, he's going to be high up on all of our boards. Yeah, it's slam dunk had to be and it certainly could have had him higher and

Yeah, he just... It doesn't quite erase the middle of the field from a coverage standpoint, but he makes it a pain in the ass to try to throw over the middle for any team. Like a really good center in basketball. Yeah, it's a great way of saying it. That's the thing. It's just the arm length and just the size. That alone makes it a problem, but it's also...

instincts can kind of be like, is it instincts or is it preparation? And like, you wouldn't really know unless you actually sat down and like had walked through every piece of film with him, but whatever it is, either instincts or preparation is elite and like rare at this position. And again, I think it is, he's so far and away the best off ball linebacker in the NFL. That's a big part of it too. But yeah, I mean just so many teams want to attack over the middle of the field. So many teams want to like take these shots off play action, like

overs and digs. And he's just almost never in the wrong place. He's not biting on play action too hard. And if he does give it a second forward jump, the recovery speed to still run down the middle and close those gaps is just unbelievable. We talk about...

top 10 cornerbacks like elite cornerbacks just like blocking off one side of the field like oh you're not throwing over to Revis Island again Fred Warner doesn't quite have that level of impact but pretty damn close pretty damn close it's a cover play it's a little yeah it's kind of he kind of does have that area I want we'll talk more about him but I kind of want to wet the beak a little bit because it's just he's

Truly one of my favorite players in the league and has been. I mean, not just me. I think anyone that watches the 49ers or watches NFL, it's like he's just different. There's not a lot of guys like this right now that can truly do it. And knock on wood, doesn't miss a lot of time either, which is pretty astounding considering his body type and everything. The one guy I was high on, the only one to have Max Crosby in the top 10. And I understand this one because there's so many tiebreakers I have with this.

I love the effort. I love that he's a plus run defender and a plus pass to pass rusher. And he played, he's always on the field, which probably led to some stuff last year, but always on the field. He's an iron man plays hard. Some of his production is because he's on the field. The most, you know, like the counting stats are always going to be higher because he's playing a thousand plus snaps, but

But when you watch him, it's 120 miles an hour on top of having great hands, top of having bend. And then the thing that he can hold up against the run and be disruptive against the run. Like Max Crosby fits in any type of defense and in any type of role. And so that's why I kind of just always, I always start these lists and he didn't make my top 10. I'll be honest. When I first kind of did, I always like just do all right right now without thinking on it. These are the first 10 names that come to my mind. He did not make that. And then I was, oh yeah, Max Crosby.

I love Max Crosby. That guy just kept moving them up, moving them up, moving them up. And maybe this is a tad high. Maybe I truly honestly, maybe prefer Bosa on his best day more than Max. But I just think just that run ability, always hitting the snaps, always just be able to handle all that. That's why I kind of gave him the nod to make the top 10. It's kind of just one of those guys I admire because of his play style and everything. So just again,

preferences of these guys because there's so many good defenders right now, so many good defense alignment and edges. We're going to take our, I guess, our next break, I should say, and we'll come back with the top five defenders for 2025. All right, we are back and we're going to get into our top five. Matt, why don't you start us off? Numbers five and four from your top 10 defenders list.

uh number five i have chris jones don't really feel like i need to explain that one to anybody who's watched watched the nfl in the last few seasons uh but number four i have kyle hamilton uh definitely seems like i'm i'm the high guy on on hamilton here it's a good player though so i can't wait to talk about him charles five and four for you number five i had derrick stingley at five uh i have fred warner at four are we about to all have the same top three

Probably. I felt like the top three was pretty locked in. It's fun that we have a... Hold on. We'll get to it. Five, Fred Warner. Four, Chris Jones. Looks like we are

are working towards that same top three. I mean, there's, these guys are just all awesome. So it's kind of like, who do you want to gush about now? Charles, you have Derek Stingley at five, Matt, you had him at eight, did not make my list and it broke my heart because I love Derek Stingley, but Charles, why is he a top five defender? You, and I'm going to guess corner two, uh,

I'm assuming here because the reigning defensive player of the year is a corner. But why is he corner two in the NFL to you and one of the top five defenders? I...

Dude, there's just something about watching a guy who can just beat the crap out of receivers and man coverage that is just so much fun. I know. Dude, Derek Singley at the catch point is as fun as anything I think you can find in the league. And also, I just think...

As someone who never sniffed playing defensive back or anything outside of a line position, it's always so crazy to me the guys who can backpedal and have the athleticism to turn their hips and get back in phase and then go make plays on the ball. And he just does it so consistently. And I'm really happy for him that he has lived up to the hype because I remember when he was 18, starting at cornerback at LSU, people were calling him Baby Revis.

And I was like, whew, that's tough. And now we're here and he's one of the highest played players in the league. It's absolutely a shutdown. I went back and I watched their game against the Chargers in the playoffs. And man, he was just dominant. He wiped them out. Wiped them out. Versus the run against the pass. He was just all over the place. So, like...

It's crazy to me that he's CB2. There's someone out there better than him. But, man, I love Derek Stingley's game. It's just really an appreciation for the guys who can lock down a man-to-man. I think that's so special. Can I say one thing on Stingley real quick? I mean, just because I was also just watching this defense because I was charting A.D. Mitchell recently. And...

it's just, it's that that's, that's the best room that like to, to encapsulate what we're talking about here with Derek singly, that I find all of those perimeter players for the Colts, you know, whether it's Mitchell Pierce Pittman, like not downs. Cause he's, he's the slot guy. Like they're all degrees of fascinating to me,

And then you just watch Derek Stingley kick their ass for four quarters and make the quarterback already makes life hard on himself, Anthony Richardson. But now the job is even harder for a guy like him because this guy is not only just always in these guys' hip pocket. A.D. Mitchell is a guy who's kind of, I'm going to say, loose with the details to be nice about it. He's a little loose with the details. It's just like, oh, wow, you're loose with details against a cornerback like this. You are going to get zero points.

zero separation zero sort of margin for error there so um yeah and and at the catch point stuff too like i mean quentin johnson again a guy i know struggles at the catch point but that was a you were you were making that point charles like he was just it literally quite literally nothing quite literally nothing getting done there yeah it's something about something to be said too it's like

You know, you bring up Eddie Mitchell. That's a great example. When guys are loose with their route breaks, and this is why we talk about it so much, unless you're a freak athlete, it's so hard to get away with it because you have tells like a pitcher, like having tells on what pitch you're about to throw. So if you start rising up as you're about to break, yeah, a corner in the big 10 or the big 12 or, you know, ACC is going to go like, can't make a play on it.

But Derek Stingley and these top tier guys, they go, oh, you're rising up. I'm breaking on it. And then the quarterback goes, oh, shoot. So it might not even a target happens because the quarterbacks see that closing and they go, I can't throw this open. You know, I can't throw this to the outside. It's already swallowed up. So like that's why those route details matter so much because you're you're giving away so much. If you have the rising up, if you have the oh, I have a pitter patter before I break on every route, those types of things. So it's a great point to bring up, though. And that's why it's cool to watch.

To watch a guy like Stingley. And I mean, Sauce Gardner, I know that the Jets defense kind of fell off last year. Sauce Gardner is a very good, made my top 20 list or, you know, top 18 or whatever. But it's just, it's funny. Like he, Stingley and Sauce came in the same class, how good Sauce was looking. And then now Stingley's catching up and it's like cool to have so many of these, these dudes at corner right now. Like it's, it's felt, we had Ramsey,

some other guys out there, but it was just kind of like, now it's like, Oh no, these are like you, Charles is your first point. This is a lockdown man corner. Lock your, lock your ass down for 60 snaps. And that's,

We haven't had that in a while. It's pretty cool to talk about those types of guys. So now I just regretting that I don't have in my top 10 because it was pretty easy for me to gush about him. Anyways, Matt, you have Kyle Hamilton at number four. Charles, you had him at number nine. Another guy that's breaking my heart, but my defensive line edge sizes biases have creeped into this even with a 225 pound safety slot. But Matt,

Why did you have Kyle Hamilton in your top five? I shouldn't say why. It's a pretty damn good defender. But explain your ranking here. First of all, I mean, just...

really unique player uh uniquely built he's got those like pterodactyl arms uh where again he can just close down lanes especially when he is that nickel defender or the slot or whatever um but then really like his move from the slot to to safety was kind of like the cascading effect of what saved baltimore's defense this year and that's only possible if you can be an ace at

really at both positions. So now they have Malachi Starks. It's going to be really interesting to see kind of like how they work those guys kind of in tandem or where Hamilton plays because he was so impactful as a safety. And again, this is something people that watch film talk about a lot. It's hard to sometimes measure the impact

of a safety because how many plays are they super involved with? Well, Hamilton's involved in a lot of plays, man. And it's because he plays all over the place, but also because he's a smart defender. He's consistently in the right places. And again, just the overall frame and arm length of him just makes him something of a truly unique advantage. So he's another defensive player that I just love watching offenses go against. And I think he gives people real headaches.

and Charles, you have a number nine. Continue the Cal Hamilton love because it's warranted for everything Matt just said there. Matt stole what I was going to say. I mean, he saved their defense last year. And I, it's just, I always just get my mind blown watching him play sometimes because it's just crazy to see someone that big, that fluid, that smart, and actually like finish plays. Um,

And I think when you just look at what he's meant to that defense, whether it's in a slot like when Marcus Williams is at his best or last year when they have been moving back to cover deep and covering the middle of the field, he was able to do all of this. So this list is tough. I think you need to give yourself some slack. It's not like quarterbacks, right? There's only 32 of those guys.

There's how many defensive players are starting in the NFL? 11 times 32. Yeah, plus all the guys. That's the hard thing about it. This isn't receivers or quarterbacks. It's defenders. That makes it really, really difficult. Dude, I was torn over putting Will Anderson on this list or not. Yeah, same. Christian Gonzalez is another guy to make it. Christian Gonzalez is not going to come up, but he's another player that I think

shoot like maybe this year he could be involved in this list. Trent McDuffie, Brian Branch, Devin Witherspoon. There's a lot of guys. There's some slot guys. I'm like, man, I didn't. How am I keeping you off? I think Devin Witherspoon is a guy that's going to like, I mean, he's awesome. He's got to stay on the field. He could. I love him when he's on the field. I consider him like a top 12 ish defender and

He's like 18th actually when I started doing this list because I was like, well, I like that guy. I like that guy. I like that. There's a lot of these good slot players too. And what you guys are saying about Hamilton though, and I –

I hate that I kept him off, but because he's just such a skeleton key, a Swiss army knife, problem solver plays in the slot and cover receivers can blitz, then can go and play deep and be his own defender and be actually exceptional on the backend as well. It's just really cool to watch him unfold. So, and they can do a lot on the back end. They're so exotic on the backend because of Kyle Hamilton, because he can understand and do all these things. He's one of the smartest players in the NFL at any position. Actually,

him fred warner like that's another guy that's one of the smartest players at any position so i i god i'm just like i don't know why i do this to myself i also this whole time i've been trying to figure out looking up uh not trying to figure out but looking up derrick stingley stats i'm just a little too slow to it but finally got to it uh of all corners and slot corners last year 300 more coverage snaps you know there's a good amount here he's second in success rate allowed

So really only, only one third of targets for him towards him were a successful target. Uh, he has, he only allowed 4.9 yards per target, like stingways fricking good. He allowed a 46.7% completion percentage.

Like, you know, that's yeah, that's a pretty good. That's a guy that should be in your top 10. Right, guys. But no, Hamilton, Stingley, really good players. I want to go through to hear about Chris Jones as well. You guys already said it, but like.

I mean, Matt went like your one liner is like, I don't need to expand on this. Chris Jones, though, is a to me just a true game wrecker. Turns it up a little bit as the weather gets colder. You know, he picks and chooses the spots against the run. And then he but then playoff Chris Jones is one of the best players in the league. You know, so like it's he's earned that right. But when he turns it on, he's unblockable and he could just do so much. So that's why I kind of include him in the top five Fred Warner stuff.

Not many guys can do what he does. He's he's allows the 49ers to play that certain way that they do. We've talked a lot about it. I have about Michael Williams and everything. But Fred Warner does so much to erase the middle, like Matt said, that they can do soft boxes. They can have him carry. Watch Fred Warner play a high low. He'll take away the high and the low as the quarterback is. He he progresses quicker than the quarterback.

Cause he'll be like, Oh, took it away. Quarterback should be going here. I'm going to go there. And then you can see the quarterback on like younger quarterbacks go, Oh shoot. Well,

Like, you know, he can do those things. I watched him against Kenny Pickett two years ago and poor Pickett had no idea what to do. Cause I know exactly what you're talking about. Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So just want to gush about those guys. Cause they're worth gushing about love the sting. We love, love the Cal Hampton love as well, but let's get to the podium. The top three, Matt, who's on your podium, top three defenders for 2025. Yeah.

Number three, Micah Parsons. Number two, Miles Garrett. Number one, Pat Sertan. Love it. Charles, your top three. I wish I could just put these guys all at one, but I went three, Pat Sertan, two, Miles Garrett, one, Micah Parsons. Oh, I had the exact same. Three, Pat Sertan, two, Miles Garrett, one, Micah Parsons. All right. Let's start with you, Matt. Why is Pat Sertan the second PS2, your number one defender for 2025?

I mean, yeah, he's reigning defensive player of the year. Do I need this need to say more? Yeah. Right. You guys say more, but no, like playing cornerback is so, so hard. And this is something I've gotten an appreciation for, obviously over the last 12 years, like

These dudes, I think they have the toughest job in the NFL. Especially nowadays where number one receivers travel all over the place, you just don't get a lot of guys like Pastor Tan who tracks the number one wide receiver who maybe doesn't go into the slot all the time, but when he does, he can be just as...

you know, much of a force, a racing player as he is on the outside. So I think he is just, he's in a, like he's to me the best corner in the league. And like, there's a teardrop down. Like I think as much as I love singly, we talked about him, like the rest of the guys there, whether it's Stingley or McDuffie or Gonzalez or, or sauce Gardner. Like I think that group just, just,

like in the order that I just had it there, could rotate any year. And I just feel like Sertan cemented there at that top spot. And like, not to make this a point about Travis Hunter, but all throughout the draft process, you know, you post clips of like, oh, look, here's Torrey Horton, a nice comeback route on Travis Hunter. You know, here's Kyle Williams getting a nice route on Travis Hunter. And, you know, Alec Iommar, he had a good game against Travis Hunter, whatever. You know, every now and again, you get some reply. Well, like, why is, why do people love Travis?

I love Travis Hunter as a corner prospect if every receiver in this class has a good rep against him. Because playing cornerback is freaking hard, bro. But you know who you very rarely show a good rep against somebody? It's Pat Sertan. And if it is, it's just...

it's a tough situation, you know, or something like that. Like that, that's to me just why he was, I love Garrett and I love Parsons, but I felt pretty convicted with putting Sertan at number one. I think we all love Sertan. I think, do we all vote for him for defense player of the year? Like on our, our word show? I think so. Yep. I think he was, I think he was like one of our few anonymous picks too. Yeah.

Which is crazy, which is crazy because it was a crowded field this year. And again, it just speaks to what a good player this guy is. Yeah, and I pulled up some of those stats from that show too because I remember the one stat that kind of is sticking out to me of good corner play is yak allowed because that means you're close to the guy that caught the ball and you can bring him down or he's not even going to get to that point. But even just looking at Sertan's stats, he only allowed 1.9 yards after the catch per reception, which was the best among all DBs last year.

Tied for 8th best since 2016. He allowed the lowest amount of yards per snap because he's never targeted.

He's only targeted 10.9% of all snaps, which is lowest among outside corners. 0.6 yards per snap allowed. Lowest mark in next-gen stats database among all corners since 2016. The lowest. And the other guys that are near him, AJ Terrell in 2021, Chris Harris in 2016, Jalen Johnson in 2023, and Patrick Peterson in 2018. He's in man coverage on 40% of the snaps.

Johnson's 21%. Patrick Pearson, his year was 23%. Like, so he's, this is lockdown. This is like, this is what it looks like. This is Revis Island. This is what these dudes look like. Size. He's unbelievable.

unbelievable tackler only one missed tackle last year 45 or 46 tackle attempts lowest missed tackle rate among any defender in the entire NFL and he's a corner so yeah totally get why he's your number one guy Charles any more love for Patrick Sertan the second or do you want to move on to Micah Parsons your number one pick

I think, I think Pat Sertani, like when you go back to draft season and you hear draft analysts and media people and coaches talking about how they stress like size and athleticism, like someone like Pat Sertani is, and like the yak stat, like that's why, because we need to finish plays in the open field. We need to be big and strong enough to do that. And just looking back,

at his combine. It was honestly crazier than I remember. 6'2", 208, 1.57, 10 yard, 4'4", 140, 40 inch vertical, almost 11 feet on the broad jump. How long is Long Arms too, right? Yeah, Long Arms too, 32 and a half. So that's like offensive five minutes. Yeah, it's literally the ideal point. His pedigree was coached by Nick Saban, and he was the second corner selected. Figure that one out. Figure that one out. J.C. Horn is a fine player, he's a good player, but like still even in that process, it was like

Don't overthink this. This guy is going to be a dude. But you had Micah Parsons at number one. So did I. But why did you have Parsons at one? Maybe even go on to Miles Garrett. Maybe why did you give him the nod over Miles Garrett, too? I know it's hard. I mean, these guys are all unbelievable. People have listened to the show. Probably I've heard these things a bunch, but.

after Micah came back from injury last year, dude, he was feral, like absolutely feral. I, I, and for someone whose brain, like, like his has always turned on, like it was, it was insane to watch him go. Um,

Because clearly he wanted to get to the playoffs, even though that was basically out of reach by the time he got back. And every single snap, he was dedicating his entire life force to try and get a win for the Cowboys. And what that looks like is someone who is basically unblockable and has quarterbacks running for their lives every single snap. The game against Cincinnati, where him and Joe Burrow were going back and forth. But the thing is...

Micah can get in the backfield that many times to affect him. Yeah. And Joe, Joe survived. Like, you know, it was, it was two heavyweight boxes going back and forth. But the fact that Micah had like 10 opportunities to sack Joe Burrow is, is, is something within itself. So, uh, I, I think this year, uh,

If he can pick up back where he left off, I think this could potentially be a career year for him. And I just don't think he really has any holes in his game as an edge rusher. I mean, I don't think Passifan has any holes in his game. I don't really think Miles Garrett has any holes in his game either. So that's why I said before, I wish I could have copped out and put them all at number one. But just for the fervor that Micah showed last year and the desperation to win, I think it unlocked something really sinister in his game that I really enjoyed watching.

sinister dude he was like crying like yelling at his teammates after loss yeah oh it was unbelievable yeah he was a one-man team yeah he truly was so after week nine he led the league he tied he was tied for the league overall in pressure rate 19.1 according to next gen stats uh after week 10 when he came back from injury after week 10 19.5 pressure rate he had 55 qb pressures

Second was Trey Hendrickson, also on my short list. Sorry to make the top 10, but had 46, 55 compared to 46. He had 11 sacks from week 10 to week 18.

He had 11 sacks in one half of a season. I don't know if anyone needs to know this, but 11 times 2 is 22. So basically at a 20-sack rate, he had 27 quick QB pressures in the last second half of the season. He had 8 pressures when he was double teamed. Next highest was 4. Next highest was 4. Yep. Next highest was 4. All the other guys were defensive tackles.

double on double team pressures. It's he's a force of nature. So I totally agree with you, Charles here. And on top of it, he's not, he's not the best run defender. It's more, it's more, he's kind of can be boom bust, but the booms are gigantic booms. And the thing is he doesn't get, and this is my difference with like a Nick Bosa and maybe what Micah is Nick Bosa knows he's blocked in the run game. He just kind of goes, okay.

you know, okay, I'm going to wait for third and seven and we'll be okay. Micah goes, gets blocked. He's like, no, no, no, no, no, this is not happening. He's like my toddler. I'd tell him no. He's like, no, this is no, no, no, you're not doing this to me. He's fighting it every which way. And I love, you know, he plays with his hair on fire. He's like, he's like inspiring to watch. Like he inspires you to do better.

because he plays so hard and plays so fast. So he was my number one guy because he's just a force of nature. And that's crazy considering Myles Garrett is the other guy in this list. But maybe Matt, Myles Garrett, love here too. Let's just continue this. Myles Garrett though, why was he make your top three pretty definitively and number two for me and Charles as well?

Well, first of all, just one last thing on Michael Parsons, like anybody that criticizes him for being like online too much or like doing a podcast, like, well, is he really putting the work in? Like, I mean, shut the hell up. Like, yeah, watch him play for two seconds. Like he's he's somebody we're just like, yeah, the tape is your resume. Also, like if you ever watch him on any of these shows where he's like doing like draft analysis.

he's like a complete football junkie like he just like he knows all these all these guys and like real deal like has obviously watched the tape not just like opened up a stat sheet and has some platitudes about you know a guy who's like big or something like he really knows these uh um like i remember like ricky pierce all got drafted he had like all these notes about ricky pierce all it's like like some random him and stroud are like legit junkies on this stuff i've seen so many random clips of stroud talking about random receivers i'm like

What the hell? You don't have to be that guy to be a great football player. And there's a lot of great football players who aren't that way. But again, just like if anybody ever questioned his commitment to it because he tweets a lot or has a podcast, give me a break. Miles Garrett, yeah, though. I mean, he's just the prototype like

like, I feel like you'd want to put him high on this list if you just saw him in person. I mean, and if you've ever, if you haven't ever seen him in person, it is like a sight to behold his, his biceps are like as big as my head and I got a big ass head here. So, um, yeah, like he's an unbelievable physical specimen. He takes over games. Um, again, he just really is like the prototype of this position. He's another guy that

he's not like a net negative or even like, I would say average against the run. Like he will Hawk running backs down. He gives a ton of effort as well. So somebody, yeah, somebody that is built that way has that type of athleticism and then also plays with a lot of effort. I think is, is just, yeah, that's why he's probably a hall of famer someday.

Garrett's cool to me in the sense that when he's like, I'm unblockable, it happens. It's over. Fourth quarter, Miles Garrett is one of the greatest things you'll ever watch in sports. It's really cool because he's a very intelligent guy as well. It's really cool to watch him know when he's about to get singled up. And he's kind of like, oh, you guys are going to do this? All right. Yeah.

Game over. Like he is the closer. Like he is. Oh, doors open. You're single. It's like he's different, obviously. But Von Miller is like this as well. He. Okay. All right. I know I'm getting chipped out here. This sucks. I'm getting chipped again. This sucks.

Oh, there's no running back to my side. There's no tight end to my side. Done. Game over. Door shut. Sack. Two seconds. Done. Play over. And I love that when the game, it's a true game wrecker. The offense to the other side of the ball made a mistake in their design or their execution and the play's over. And that's what Myles Garrett threatens to do every single snap. I mean, he pressure rate, good against the run, plays every snap, like all those types of things. It's like just so definitively a top player. Just want the rest of the team to

get their together. It'd be nice to get more of those like closing situations, right? Because you've got to wait, you got to wait a while to get to those moments. But Hey, I also would not have the, uh, the, the fortitude to turn down $40 million a year. I'm okay with what,

Yeah, I'm okay with what happened here. He can recruit whatever quarterback he wants, everyone that they draft. It's all good. But no, this was great. Remember when the Brown, like Andrew Siciliano had that interview with him when he's like, oh, I know the plan at quarterback. Don't worry. What do you think? They told me Dylan Gabriel's the plan. And he's like, hell yeah. Sign me up. Dylan Gabriel, $40 million a year. I don't care who it is. We're going to double dip at quarterback. And it's not going to be around. It's going to be around three and around five.

And actually, we're going to trade for another one, too. That's exactly how they sold them. To recap the top 10, Matt had Jalen Carter, Aidan Hutchison, Derek Stingley, Nick Bosa, Fred Warner, Chris Jones, Kyle Hilton, Micah Parsons, Miles Garrett, and Patrick Sertan. The second, Charles had Jalen Carter, Kyle Hilton, Nick Bosa, Chris Jones, Dexter Lawrence, Derek Stingley,

Stingley, Fred Warner, Patrick Sertan, Miles Garrett, and Micah Parsons. And me, myself, Nate Tice, Nick Bosa, TJ Watt, the guy that feels weird to say that name now, Dexter Lawrence, Max Crosby, Jalen Carter, Fred Warner, Chris Jones, Patrick Sertan, Miles Garrett, and Micah Parsons. That was a lot of fun, guys. Thank you for watching.

for dipping into the dark side on the defense. Actually, Charles is used to the defensive line talk. He's like, yeah. Let's go. Want to talk about receiver releases a little bit, Charles? Let's talk about some seven-step dropback concepts. I got PTO calling my name, I think. That's it.

No, but thank you all for joining us. We are closing it out today. We'll be back next week, continuing these ranking shows while I'm away. Then also Charles and Matt holding down the fort while I deal with get to enjoy. I should say child number two. I'm sure I'm not sleeping by the time you guys are listening to this. I'm sure I'm sure I'm a zombie at this point in time, but by the time this hits your ears, but I am Nate Tice. You can find me at Nate underscore Tyson Twitter and Nate Tice on blue sky. That's Charles McDonald.

Where can they find you, Charles? And what are you working on? Actually, no, not what you're working on because this is happening in a month. I'm going to figure that out later. Maybe. Maybe. You're working on life. I don't know. Might go to the lake today. Who knows? Yeah, I know, right? This will be June something, so you might be out there. But that's 4verts, Mr. 4verts. You can find them wherever you have your social media sites. And that's Matt Harmon, Matt Harmon underscore BYB on Twitter, and just Matt Harmon on Blue Sky. I finally figured that one out. I'll remember it on the top of my head finally, but...

Don't know what you're working on June. Probably some charting. Are you charting? Like what are you charting by the time in June? Do you do that? Yeah, I got year three, year four receivers coming out in June. So yeah. Oh, okay. A lot of interesting players. I'm working on a landscaping project outside. Actually, that's my main focus. Outside is my focus.

That's a good answer right there. I know changing my golf grip will probably be my focus this summer, but I also make sure to send those mailbag questions to football 301 mailbag at Yahoo sports.com or leave us that five-star review on Apple podcasts. We seriously appreciate all the reviews that you guys leave. So keep on doing that. Subscribe to us, follow us, rate us, like I said, or.

and watch us on YouTube on the Yahoo Sports YouTube channel. Thank you to everyone behind the scenes for making us look and sound good. Thank you to everyone for listening. See you guys next time.