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September 25, 2024 46 mins

Peter opens the show with a deep appreciation for the epic Jayden Daniels performance on Monday night in Cincinnati. Peter paints the picture of why this could be a new day in Washington, with the perfect GM, HC, OC, and QB coming together at the right time. He, then, brings in NFL Network’s lead NFL Draft analyst, Daniel Jeremiah, to go back in time and review his January scouting reports on Daniels. DJ explains a VR/AI technology that Jayden had access to at LSU that is helping him today in Washington, as well as what 55 starts at the college level has done for the Commanders’ rookie QB. The two wrap the podcast with a quick snapshot of some of the top college football prospects playing today, ahead of the 2025 NFL Draft.

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Episode Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:07):
The Season with Peter Schraeger is a production of the
NFL in partnership with iHeartRadio. What's Up, everybody, Welcome to
another episode of the Season.

Speaker 2 (00:26):
With Peter Schreeker.

Speaker 1 (00:27):
I am Peter Schreker, your host, and I am still
smiling after what was an incredible viewing experience Monday evening.
I got to devote this whole episode to Jayden Daniels.
And if you're not a Commander's fan, or if you're
a diehard Eagles, Cowboys and Giants fan and you think
you're gonna vomit listening to this, I'll just tell you

(00:48):
turn it off, find another podcast, go listen to something else,
because I'm gonna geek out over Jaden. I loved, loved,
loved watching him play at LSU last year, and I'll
be honest, I don't have a long library of his
Arizona State days.

Speaker 2 (01:04):
I don't go way back with him.

Speaker 1 (01:05):
I fell in love with him last year when I
started watching LSU games on Saturday, especially down the stretch
of the season, and he made this incredible push to
the Heisman. I then spent most of the pre draft
process saying, yes, Caleb, but what about Jaden Daniels, Yes, Caleb,
but what about Jaden Daniels.

Speaker 2 (01:23):
There is no wrong.

Speaker 1 (01:24):
Answer yet, It's too soon, But I will say anyone
who was big on Jaden before the draft looks pretty
smart right now, because three weeks into his rookie season,
he looks as good and as polished and as ready
as any rookie quarterback that I remember, even CJ. Stroud
last year. I remember he lost his first game, had
a good bounce back game. It took him a couple

(01:45):
of weeks to feel as comfortable and look as confident
as Jaden Daniels has through three weeks. And Monday Night
it was everything on display Monday Night Football. You had
a rookie quarterback playing on the road in a hostile
environment under the lights on National TV and not ESPN,

(02:06):
that TV American broadcast company, National TV. That game was
on ABC for a national audience. That was the broadcast network.
And this Bengals team, which is a Super Bowl contender,
and everybody's eyes going to the season is zero to two, starving,
hungry and looking to finally get its first win of

(02:28):
the season, and Jaden Daniels came in there against lou
Ana Rumo's defense, and coach lou Is one of the
most respected and well regarded defensive coordinators in the league,
and Daniels came in and sliced that defense up, going
twenty one of twenty three, throwing for two hundred and
fifty four yards, throwing two touchdowns, running the ball for

(02:52):
forty yards, and running in a touchdown. This guy had
six offensive possessions and his team scored five touchdowns and
had one field goal and did not punt the entire game.
He is the first quarterback with a ninety plus completion percentage,

(03:13):
two hundred and fifty plus passing yards, two passing touchdowns,
and a rushing touchdown.

Speaker 2 (03:18):
In any NFL game. Ever.

Speaker 1 (03:21):
He's also the first player, not just a rookie since
nineteen fifty to do all of this in the in
the in one game, complete ninety percent of his passes,
throw for two fifty and more yards, throw for two touchdowns,
run for a touchdown, and have more touchdowns than in completes.

Speaker 2 (03:38):
It's it's a statistical anomaly what he did.

Speaker 1 (03:40):
But then you go through the context of the story
and that final key scoring drive. They're up five points
and it's third and seven and they're on the road
and Burrow just threw this, this dagger of a touchdown
to Jamar Chase to cut the game to five. And
Burrow's been there, done there. Burrow's hungry, Chase is hungry.

(04:00):
Chase is going off in this game. And they're up
five and it's third and seven and they get on
the field and the play call comes in and it's
all screwed up. Everyone's in the wrong place. You can
see rookie Luke McCaffrey is looking like a chicken with
his head cut off. You got Jamison Crowder on the
top of the screen, and they call time out. Now
at this particular moment, rookie quarterback on the road, five

(04:24):
point game, I think it's usually in your best interest
to either say, hey, let's go and get a seven
yard gain and try to get that first down. Make
it easy, a simple play, or maybe we pick up
a few yards and we either go for a long
field goal or we punt the ball and make them
go the length of the field. Kingsbury calls a play

(04:46):
and it's gopher broke for this dude. Jayden Daniels as
a rookie in his third game under the lights on
Primetime TV to cock back and throw that touchdown pass
to Terry McLaurin in the back of the end ze
when they needed seven yards. He goes twenty seven yards

(05:08):
into hit McLaurin, who gets his knee in. It's the
stuff that tell you a star is born and that
legends are being made in real time. I don't think
this is hyperbole. I don't think I'm going way over
my skis. That might have been the greatest regular season
rookie performance I've ever seen in a game. And Daniels

(05:29):
on top of that, is calling for plays from out
of bounds. He's telling guys where to go. It looks
like i Q wise, he's way ahead of where most
rookies are in his third game. I also think it's
the perfect situation. I can do a four hour podcast
on the Washington Commanders offseason and all the ups and downs.

(05:49):
You have to realize Ben Johnson was likely going to
be the head coach if we were to call this
early in the process. They met with him, they liked him.
Ben Johnson pulls his name from contention and then goes
and says, I'm gonna go and return to Detroit. We're
gonna try to run this thing back, Fine, that's Ben
Johnson's say, Washington, though they didn't offer the job to Johnson.

(06:09):
They pivot and they say, Okay, well he's out of
the conversation. Let's look somewhere else. They hire dan Quinn.
Dan Quinn joins Adam Peters. Adam Peters is a first
year at GM who himself has been through a million
interviews and met with a million teams, coming from the
forty nine ers and before that the Broncos and the
Patriots where he's won Super Bowls. You've got Peters, You've

(06:32):
got Quinn. Now you look at the offensive coordinator position.
Guys Cliff Kingsbury interviewed with the Eagles, wasn't offered the job,
interviewed with the Bears, where he coached Caleb in college,
wasn't offered the job. Interviewed with the Raiders, discussed the job,
terms were set, terms were discussed, and then kind of

(06:55):
fell apart at the last second. And then that very
same day where it fell apart with the Raiders, dan
Quinn calls and says, should we talk about this Washington gig. Eventually,
King's who has been an NFL head coach, who has
coached at the college level, both Patrick Mahomes and Caleb Williams,
and in the NFL level has been with Kyler Murray,
a mobile quarterback. Kingsbury goes to Washington. He and Adam

(07:20):
Peters quickly hit it off. He and Dan Quinn quickly
hit it off.

Speaker 2 (07:23):
And it's one of.

Speaker 1 (07:24):
Those deals where we'll keep our cards close to the vest.
But like they were all in on Jayden Daniels all summer. Now,
if Caleb was available, would Caleb in the pick?

Speaker 2 (07:32):
Maybe?

Speaker 1 (07:33):
I don't know, but it wasn't going to be mayor
Daniels as everyone was reporting it was Daniels. Jaden gets
there and Cliff basically puts an offense in that is
around this quarterback and his talents and what he can do.
It was the perfect marriage of GM coach, offensive coordinator,

(07:54):
then this vessel, this kid, this quarterback to make it
all work. You surround that with what they did in
free agency. And they didn't go and try to sign
some thirty million dollar receiver. They didn't do something crazy
and bring in a bunch of rookie wide receivers to
go along with them. No, they said, let's stick with
Terry McLaurin. And then Let's give him zach Ertz to

(08:16):
work with, who's been there, done that. Let's give him
Austin Eckler in the backfield, who's been there, done that,
and let's try to build an offense that includes both
veterans and rookies. Look, I don't know if the Commander's
win another game this season.

Speaker 2 (08:28):
I don't.

Speaker 1 (08:29):
Maybe they go, you know, two and fifteen and we
say that was a crazy win they had.

Speaker 2 (08:34):
But I do know this.

Speaker 1 (08:35):
What I saw on Monday night was a star and
what I saw on Monday night was an offense that
I really enjoy watching. I mentioned they didn't punt on
Monday Night. The Commanders have not punted since Week one.
They didn't punt against the Giants either. Two straight games
no punts, a ton of points, two wins, and a
new superstar in Our Lives, The Jayden Daniels era is

(08:58):
here and I am here for it. Our guest today
on the podcast is the great Damiel Jerrha. We are
going to do a deep dive. We're gonna talk more
on Jaden, but we're also going to talk about the
other rookie quarterbacks, some of the rookie wide receivers and
then we're gonna do a little sneak peek at next
year's draft and maybe get into a little Schador Sanders,

(09:19):
maybe little Travis Hunter, maybe a little Carson Beck, maybe
little Jackson Dart. Yes you're not familiar with those names,
We're gonna get into all of them with my guy DJ,
Daniel Jeremiah moved to six.

Speaker 2 (09:31):
Right to this. Our guest is a dear friend of mine.

Speaker 1 (09:40):
Our yearly joint mock drafts on this podcast are the
highest rated and most listened to podcasts that we do
each season on this podcast, and I think he's truly
one of my favorite people, and it's also one of
the most plugged in and knowledgeable when it comes to
these college prospects, but also the rookie class. With no

(10:00):
further ado, my dear friend from the NFL Network, mister
Daniel Jeremiah DJ, what's up, buddy.

Speaker 3 (10:06):
It's so great to see Pete. But I got to say, man,
I think I had that shirt in high school. That
is phenomenal. What is the material? What are we working with?

Speaker 2 (10:13):
It's like a swede, like a flannel, like it's just comfortable.

Speaker 3 (10:17):
I just want to cut a cup of hot chocolate
and just want to cozy up to a fire with
that shirt on.

Speaker 2 (10:22):
No doubt, no doubt.

Speaker 1 (10:24):
As you live in sunny LA and we're already the
seasons already changing here in New York, and the season's
good segue check this out. This season has changed in Washington.
In my monologue, I start off and did a whole
spiel on how Jaden Daniels was the perfect player for
a team that needed them at the right time, with

(10:44):
the perfect coach, perfect offensive coordinator, and it's all just
like the stars aligning in Washington right now. But you
were hot on Jaden Daniels way back in like October
of last year. You were texting me like, did you
watch Daniels this week? And then throughout the draft process
you were a big Jaden Daniels fan. And then we
go through it all and he's the number two picks A.
He was an undrafted player. Everyone liked him. Looking at

(11:07):
it now, did you ever envision it being this fast
and this great and this sensational right out of the gates?

Speaker 3 (11:14):
Well, I'm not in that game. I mean I thought
probably more like what we saw in the first two games,
which was really good, really good. But what we saw
against Cincinnati was like not not like rookie good, not
first round pick good, but like good good, like regardless
ninety one percent. I mean like it was ridiculous and
it was just the poise. It was fascinated when I

(11:37):
ended up pulling up my reports, like I want to, like,
can we go through it? So? When did you write this?

Speaker 2 (11:42):
You wrote this in March last year?

Speaker 3 (11:44):
This was This was in January.

Speaker 2 (11:46):
Okay, January, right before Senior Bowl. Right at that time.
You've got to write snippets of all the top prospects.

Speaker 1 (11:53):
Let's go through the archives. Go, I guess nine months ago,
what did you have on Jaden Daniels?

Speaker 2 (12:00):
Go all the good, all the bad. I want to
hear it.

Speaker 3 (12:02):
Okay, here we go. Daniels is a tall, lean quarterback
with exceptional accuracy, decision making, and speed. Very poised and
comfortable in the pocket saw that the other night. Likes
to use a rhythm bounce at the top of his
drop before settling his feet into the ground and smoothly
transferring his weight to throw. Extremely quick release, beautiful throwing motion.

(12:22):
Throws with anticipation, touch, and accuracy. He flashes the ability
to manipulate safeties with his eyes to create separation downfield
when he gets pressured, he doesn't hesitate to explode out
of the pocket, has elite suddenness. He's more of a
linear speed runner than a break you down, make mistype
ball carrier. He does need to do a better job
protecting himself, though, as he took some huge shots in

(12:44):
the games I studied. Overall, Daniels took a massive leap
in twenty twenty three and now offers both a high
floor and a high ceiling.

Speaker 1 (12:53):
Ooh yeah, I I haven't seen the other part of it.

Speaker 3 (12:59):
You know.

Speaker 1 (12:59):
It's I have not seen the negative yet because I
agree with you, he's done.

Speaker 3 (13:04):
A better job protected himself. He's on a much er
job protecting himself.

Speaker 1 (13:07):
Like he's not built like Lamar, he's not built like Tua.
He's not big enough like Josh Allen to take these hits,
and yet he's evaded these hits really well. And these
run option designs that they're doing have been outstanding. I
look at what it is out of the gates. Talk
about fifty five starts in college versus maybe Anthony Richardson

(13:28):
who had thirteen at University of Florida, and what the
difference is and you could see.

Speaker 3 (13:31):
It, right, Yeah, you can see it. You can see
it even like with bo Nix the other day. I mean,
who started sixty two games in college? So this is
the This is the lesson that I think I'm trying
to put into practice, and I think people around the
league in the media are starting to pay attention to.
Is that this takes time. Like you can't microwave these
dudes and have them just come out ready to go.

(13:53):
So it's it's just an accumulation of reps. I talk
about the catalog, right, You've got to build the catalog
of plays, of seeing coverages of seeing combinations, and just
you're constantly storing that in your memory bank. So when
you look around the league and now we see you know,
Gino doing his thing, Sam Baker even justin fields, how
much better he looks in Pittsburgh than he looked pously

(14:15):
in Chicago. Yeah, that's all these guys. So did wait
did so what happened?

Speaker 1 (14:20):
Then?

Speaker 3 (14:20):
Did they all of a sudden regain all the talent
that they had coming out? Like No, They've always had
the talent, they just haven't had that catalog of experience
and back in previous you know, decades, you know, Traykman
was allowed to struggle early on and get the tar
kicked out of him and then kind of grow and
then and then eventually it pays off. Peyton Manning is
allowed to throw a zillion interceptions his first year and
we're not going to freak out and know that he's

(14:42):
just gaining more experience. But to have the the huge
number of starts in college is such an advantage man,
because it's a different game, but it's still reps. You're
still reacting to coverages, you're still seeing things. So I
there's no the guys that have had a lot of
success early and c. J. Stroud's like on his own
island from what he did last year, which was so
unique because he hadn't played a ton at Ohio State.

(15:04):
But Herbert comes into the league have and started a
ton of games. There's you know, Dak comes in even
though he wasn't a high pick, he had played a
ton of football Assissippi State, like a lot of these
guys that have had early success.

Speaker 2 (15:15):
DJ brock, Brock Purty played, So.

Speaker 3 (15:21):
I think there's definitely something to that, and I think
it's also a cautionary like, hey, we don't need to
throw the other guys out. Let's let the other guys
get the number of starts and get the experience they need.
And unfortunately for them, they're having to learn at the
highest level. Uh, with those reps and with those experiences.

Speaker 1 (15:35):
Yeah, and I don't know where the urgency came from,
but it did happen at some point, And maybe it's
the new salary cap where you get them five years
at this cheap price. So it's like, let's get the
most out of them as we can. We can't just
stash them. But when we grew up, I remember Michael
Vick backed up Chris Chandler. I remember Steve McNair backed
up Chris Chandler. And these were top guys.

Speaker 3 (15:52):
And rivers behind Drew Brees, no doubt, no doubt, and
Phil Simms backed up Scott.

Speaker 1 (15:58):
Brunner, like this is what was what was done. It
was just like understood, like you don't throw a guy
in right away. And yet now I look at guys
like Bryce and Richardson and it's, yeah, it's tough. I
don't know if I'm concerned about Caleb and if it's
too soon, but that offensive line and that offense doesn't

(16:19):
like to be so sturdy as it is in Washington.
What have you thought on Caleb as we were all
over heels for Caleb Williams going into this thing and
it hasn't been one hundred percent perfect.

Speaker 3 (16:29):
Yeah, I thought going through that process and I had
Caleb over Jayden coming out, and the thought process was
and I said this through the whole spring, which is,
if this is a race, Jayden's going to start ahead
of Caleb. He's just he's further on in his development
at this point in time than where Caleb is. But Caleb,
I think has more in him to eventually have a

(16:50):
higher ceiling. You know, whether he gets there or not,
we'll have to wait and see. And that's why Jayden
I think was a safer pick because of where his
entry point was. But Caleb, I look at these young
guys and I'm like, I get alarmed if I can't
pull out the five to eight plays a game where
I go, okay, that's the good stuff, like and with Caleb,
I've seen that, especially this last.

Speaker 2 (17:13):
Three hundred something yards, yeah.

Speaker 3 (17:14):
Three hundred and sixty three yards. I think with some
big third downs and fourth downs like that. They they
did some good things there. Now he doesn't have all
the pieces around him that everybody thought he was going
to have. The offensive line is not done well. They
cannot run the ball at all. There's other issues there.
But I think he's I've seen better from him as
we go along, and I'm seeing the good stuff in there,

(17:35):
and maybe in some smaller doses. The Bryce thing is
the one that's concerned me because and I saw him
live a couple of weeks ago against the Chargers and
then studying that, I'm like, man, I'm studying these games
and I'm trying to find those plays, those five to
eight plays, and I'm not seeing them, of those flashes
even that they aren't there. And you know that that
could be an environment thing from what happened last year.

(17:56):
I'm not saying it's irreparable, but it was. There's still
healing that needs to take place there. And maybe that's
part of this, this this idea right here to let
him sit for a little bit.

Speaker 2 (18:05):
You just in general, you're a nice guy.

Speaker 1 (18:08):
You're also really polished at TV, and you also see
the whole league. You're not one who's privy to like
hot takes and initial like, you know, screaming reactions. I
can go that way, and last week on air, I
felt like I was, you know, caping for the Carolina
Panthers franchise and defending this organization that I have no

(18:29):
ties to. But I'm like canals, he doesn't want to
do this in the third week of the season. Guys,
he doesn't.

Speaker 2 (18:35):
There's there's no there's no ulterior motive for them benching
Bryce Young.

Speaker 1 (18:39):
This is not what they want. This is absolutely a
move out of need and desperation in that.

Speaker 3 (18:44):
They couldn't complete a bubble screen. That was the exit.
That's where I had to get off the highway on
that one when they couldn't complete the bubble screen.

Speaker 1 (18:52):
I know a lot of people in our industry don't watch,
and I'm not trying to take shafts, but they don't
watch week to week, and they're certainly not watching Carolina
Panthers LA Chargers, and they're certainly not watching, you know,
the Carolina Panthers lose by fifty in the first of
the season and just get completely blown out.

Speaker 2 (19:08):
But I do watch it.

Speaker 1 (19:10):
I do talk to folks, and it's like Andy Dalton,
whether we like Bryce or not, because he's a great kid.
Andy Dalton gives has a better chance to win, and
they're fifty two other guys in the locker room and
we got to compete at some point. It can't just
be let's keep trotting out Bryce because it's it's embarrassing.
If he's benched, they go out there, they win, and
it's it's funny. We're now doing this on a Wednesday,
very little Miacopa's in the media about how ridiculous and

(19:31):
stupid the Panthers were for benching Bryce.

Speaker 3 (19:32):
You know, yeah, I didn't. I wasn't on the train
saying it was the wrong decision there. I left that
stadium thinking it's going to be hard to maintain the
locker room and move forward presently with Bryce starting right now.
It just it was so bad. It was so bad
the first two weeks. And this is somebody who is
the biggest Bryce young fan coming into the draft, and
I still, you know, I still have hope that it
could work out for him. If not, there somewhere else,

(19:55):
But again, there just hasn't been those you need those
positive nuggets to take out of those games, and they're
warn't any. I mean, it was futile. And the other
thing I said, which Panther fans came at me hard
this week, which is a vocal crew. By the way,
I don't know if they are, they're a very vocal
vocal because I said, it's one of the worst rosters
that I've seen. And that's not the part. That's not

(20:17):
the fault of of Dan Morgan. That's not the fault
there of coach Canalis. Like they're new together in this
new regime, and there's been an exodus of talent out
of that building over the last few years, star level
talent that is left. And I'm just watching them and
I'm going, I don't know. I mean, they can't stop anybody.
The first two games run or pass. They had three
explosive passes in the first two games combined. I think

(20:39):
they had nine with Andy Dalton the other day. So
from what i'd seen the first two weeks, I'm like, guys,
I'm not. Everybody's like you need to apologize. I'm like, well,
I can't see the first two weeks. I didn't watch
those games, like they couldn't do anything. And now this
is another point. This was about two things. This was
about Andy Dalton. Give him his flowers because he threw

(21:00):
on time his backfoot was in the ground, the ball
was gone, so any issues they might have had up front,
he took care of those by just getting the ball
out of his hand. He was excellent. And the other thing,
I'll give Canalis a lot of credit with someone who
I think i've met once, I don't know, I've heard
great things about him. But this was a culture challenge.
This was a test of where this team's going to be.

(21:21):
You've played terrible for two weeks, You've already switched out
the quarterback. How do you respond? And I think for
them to come out and really kind of get after
the Raiders the way they did, I think that's a
tip of the cap to the culture that he's great
in there.

Speaker 1 (21:33):
All I needed to see was the reaction in the
locker room. Tepper comes in and the owner, whether he's
everyone loves him or not.

Speaker 2 (21:39):
And I don't think many do in the media, and
I don't think many do at home.

Speaker 1 (21:42):
He gives the game ball to Canalis and the place explodes,
and it's all about the players, and they're the one
celebrating and celebrating the head coach.

Speaker 2 (21:49):
So to me, look, and I know we're all outraged.

Speaker 1 (21:54):
We protect these young quarterbacks but like, I had to
take that stand last week and I did it on
my podcast, it on the show and say they know
better than we do, and they don't want to do this.
Guys like they don't want to do this. This, this
doesn't benefit them to do this. They're going out there
on a limb to save the season. All right, back
to Jaden real quick. Yeah, when you were talking to
folks about Jaden going into the sin his path is

(22:14):
interesting Arizona State. But then transfers to Brian Kelly, give
us sort of the history on Jaden if you can
empty the bag a little bit on the football and
then on his path that led him to the NFL,
because I think we can all use a refresher course
because this guy's a sensation right now.

Speaker 2 (22:30):
And it's like, wait, well where did he come from?

Speaker 3 (22:32):
Yeah? So, first of all, Southern California quarterback. I'm maybe
one hundred and sixty pounds, you know, soaking wet, come
out of high school, but was a highly recruited and
highly regarded recruit coming out through brazillion Yards in Southern California.
He goes to Arizona State, It's a huge get for them.
Early on in his time there he beats Herbert in

(22:52):
Oregon in a huge game. Big upset hits Ayuk, who
was his go to guy on that Arizona State team,
for a big play in that game, but he kind
of flashed on the scene. Well then it starts to
crumble at Arizona State. There's recruiting violations come down, there's
going to be the coaching change. HERM Edwards is out,
so he kind of gets a little bit lost in

(23:13):
the shuffle there. He ends up then transferring to LSU,
and once he gets to LSU, you see the first
year salad and then the second year he explodes. It
felt very much like Joe Burrow from that standpoint of
just seeing settling and then exploding. And that's what he did.
And one of the cool things about it, and this
was written about in the run up to the draft,

(23:34):
but something that I did a lot of homework on
is they have a legend on the l LSU campus
named Jack Marucci. If the name sounds familiar to folks,
if you've heard of Marucci bats, if you've got kids
that play baseball, that's his He He was the trainer,
the athletic trainer at LSU. He wanted to play with
football in the backyard, and he's like, you know, instead

(23:54):
of buying a wood bat, maybe I'll just make my own.
The guy makes his makes his own wood bat, and
so LSU player is a great baseball program there. He
starts making his own bats literally out of his out
of his garage, just for fun for football lo and
Behold likes LSU baseball players start mess around that start
using it. When one of these LSU players ends up
getting in the major leagues and he goes he's with

(24:14):
the Cardinals and goes, hey, you got to bring one
of those bats. I want to show pooholes. So he
ends up pooles ends up swinging this bat. He likes it.
Long story short, he builds a billion dollar industry as
a trainer at LSU is the largest bat manufacturer, overtaking
like Louisville Slugger. Like he's anyways, amazing guy. He's a genius.
So he's also very into tech and cutting edge things,

(24:38):
so he gets into this. He finds a flight simulator
company out of Germany that puts on these headsets that
it's like VR on steroids. It's VR with an AI
component to it. And then he develops the software. They're
able to dump the opposing stadiums in the sec of
everybody that they're going to play, so you can look
around and it looks like you're in there, where the

(24:59):
shot clock or where the play clock is, everything's identical.
Then you're able to dump your entire offensive playbook in there.
Then you're then you're able to take the team you're playing.
So you've got Mississippi State this week. They can take
all the tendencies. Okay, when you go three by one,
three receivers on one side, one on the other, they're in.
They're in this coverage seventy percent of the time. So

(25:21):
they put they dump all this information in and then
you can then he can then get reps during the week,
Jayden Daniels was doing so Jade Saniels basically like coming
under in like, Okay, this is the play that I've called,
so I know the play. Okay, we snapped the ball. Okay,
at the snap of the ball, what they do their
safeties rotate, So I'm seeing all this and then I
can know where I want to go with the football.

(25:42):
You're not like physically going through anything. You're just you're
mentally repping these things. So this is something that he
got into heavy. And then Jack had told me that
through this process, he started to say, okay, can we
crank the speed up? So, okay, now I've got to
want to play faster. He wants it faster. So they
let's try one point one, Like if you think about

(26:03):
listening to a podcast, Now let's go one point two.
By the end of the year, he was at one
point five. So he's getting say, let's just throw the
number out there. So in a game you're going to
have offensively in college, you have seventy five snaps. He's
played those seventy five snaps, run all those plays, seen
all those coverages in that environment maybe a thousand times
during the week. And oh, by the way, he's seen

(26:24):
him at one point six speed, so when you get
to the game, it looks like it's completely slowed down.
So this has been a key, and he's been he's
been adamant about how this has helped him. So fast
forward in the draft process, teams knew, whoever drafts Jayden
is going to be able to take this tech with him,

(26:45):
They're going to be able to take this this VR
stuff with them. So and then other teams had went
down there, like New England had gone down there LSU
and met and studied all this stuff. So I think
there's I think there's a handful of teams that have
it in the NFL right now. They're restrictive on who
has it, but Washington is definitely one of them. And
he still incorporates this. So if you're watching Jade Daniels,
it looks like he's cool, calm and collected in the pocket,

(27:05):
like it's slow motion. Well it is in slow motion
because he's been playing this thing at a faster speed
a hoy long.

Speaker 1 (27:13):
He's had Trey Hendrickson breathing on him, He's had Dexter
Lawrence bred He's already seen it in one point five.
That's fascinating. I also you cover this and you know
the key characters like Cameron Taylor Brick came out and
was like, it's a college offense that they run.

Speaker 2 (27:31):
Like talk about.

Speaker 1 (27:33):
Cliff's offense because I can tell you as a as
a person who talks to Cliff often that he's like, no,
this kid is fearless, this kid is aggressive. This kid
makes all the smart decisions. And during the summer he
was the guy and it's so cliche, but he's first
in last out And I do my breakout players list
and I put Jad in Daniel's number one. Everyone's like, duh,
he's a number two overall pick. I'm like, no, no, no,

(27:54):
I think he's gonna take over the league. Like I
think he's that sensational and Cliff's been raving about him.
Why was this the perfect fit from a football standpoint,
as you for someone with a front office personnel that like, oh,
you have an offensive coordinator who can actually build an
offense around this guy. Because they're both kind of cutting
edge with how they play and how they think.

Speaker 3 (28:11):
Well, I think people think of Cliff as like Texas
Tech Cliff, and it's like, first of all, Cliff's been
the head coach in the NFL, Cliff played in the NFL.
Cliff has plenty of bona fides when it comes to
credentials of NFL football and not taking some hokey high
school offense and rolling it out there at the NFL level.
There's some complexity to it, but he's creative. So when
you have somebody that's creative and someone who knows how

(28:33):
to maximize the skills as a player, that he has.
That's a great combination and your experience is the best teacher.
The guy's coach, Mahomes, the guy's coach Kyler Murray. He
knows how to utilize a skill set that's pretty special
that what Jayden has. And you know, if you just
want Jayden to just sit there and just let's just
play drop back football the whole time, I think defensive

(28:54):
coordinators would send you a thank you note. They're figuring
out ways to stress stress teams and using him especially
in third downs, being able to incorporate him as a runner,
and then really working with him on protecting himself in
that way. You're going to see it. You're going to
see it as we go throughout the year. Like if
you watch the Cowboy Game of the Day, Derek Henry

(29:14):
has an unbelievable game that Raven's got Deterrek Henry going,
I'm like, you know how many times you have to
block the backside end when Lamar Jackson's your quarterback zero
because you have to account for him. It's going to
be a multiplier effect for everybody else in that run game.
And Jade's not going to have to carry it fifteen
times to have a major impact on the run game
because your tackle and tight end is going to just
be like, no oh, I don't worry about blocking him.
He's got to stay home because he could pull it.

Speaker 2 (29:35):
Absolutely.

Speaker 1 (29:36):
It's it's the threat of the run that's almost worse
than the run itself. I also would say that this kid,
you don't see that at a rookie third game, screaming
at the sidelines. Let's get to play in like he's
got a he's got a thing about it.

Speaker 3 (29:49):
What's interesting about that. It's interesting about that is with
young quarterbacks, and this is some of the things people
don't don't realize of, like, gosh, I don't know why
this guy's not why is this not working. Here's one
thing I can tell you a story I won't tell
who it is, of a rookie quarterback who had a
very was in a very verbose offense. So the language
is long. So the trickle down effect was he's new

(30:13):
to the NFL. You're new to and this is a
long play calls, so you're trying to hear the play
call on your helmet. It's taking you a minute to
process that then spit it out. Now I get to
the line of scrimmage. My headset's cut off because I
haven't got up there in enough time for still have
a voice in my ear. Think about McVeigh, what he
would do with golf right to be able to help
him and get in his headset. Well, that's out because

(30:33):
I'm late getting to the line of scrimmage. I don't
even have time to really survey the defense, and I've
got can't have the cards.

Speaker 2 (30:39):
In the NFL on the sideline they don't have yet.

Speaker 3 (30:41):
So that all of a sudden, you think about like
guys feeling rushed and hurried and not feeling comfortable employsed.
Some of that can be Well, the freaking play call
is so dang long that they can't get that out,
and it's like that doesn't show up on a box
score of the challenges that some of the young quarterbacks face.

Speaker 1 (30:58):
Yeah, all right, we did quarterbacks. I was gonna talk
Boone Nicks a little bit, Drake May. We don't have to.
Let's move on real quick. Because we were for the draft.
We all knew there were three wide receivers and maybe
four if you wanted to consider Brian Thomas. He was
in the conversation living but we all knew there'd be
three in the top fifteen, and all three of them
have had big games already in the NFL. And Marvin Harrison,

(31:21):
Milik Neighbors, and of course Roma Dunes. They had his
breakout game in Week three early on. Though Neighbors leads
the NFL in targets, he's second in catches, and he's
first in receiving touchdowns. This could be a breakout start
in a way that maybe we didn't even anticipate. As
much as we loved him coming out of college. Your
initial thoughts on Milik Neighbors in New York and could
this guy be that next next dude.

Speaker 3 (31:45):
I'll tell you first of all, this was a fantasy
football strategy that paid off for me this year, Shrikes.
So my starting quarterback in fantasy football is Jaden Daniels.
My receivers are Mileak Neighbors, Marvin Harrison, and DK Metcalf,
and we're having a heck of a start. My Tidy
d brought powers went, I went reused. There was everybody's like,
you can't take I'm like, no, no, no, look at this,

(32:05):
look at these And I loved Dons. I love a Dunesay.
He was my second receiver in the draft. One of
my favorite players, and you saw him go off last week.
But there's a lot of mouths there in Chicago. But
like if you look at neighbors, it is he is
the number one. There is a gap, there is a valley,
and then there is another valley, and then there's another gap,
and then there's who they can throw to next. He
is the guy, point blank. Marvin is Is is going

(32:28):
to be the one early with Arizona. He's their most
talented guy. So these are guys that went in the
door as number one wideouts, which is hard to do.
But Malik is Malik is different than those guys. When
you watch him on NFL tape, He's got just so
much twitch and so much juice. Man, Like the change
of direction, stuff's insane.

Speaker 2 (32:47):
But that touchdown catch, I felt like he was six
foot ten.

Speaker 3 (32:50):
I know, he got up and he can go up
and get it, get your feet down and then just
the but even just in and out. Watch him get
in out of cuts, watch him just throw him a
hitch route and watch him wheel out the back door.
He can go from static to top speed like that,
like it is. It is dynamic. But I mean, look,
Marvin i've seen Marvin. Last week was the best he's looked,

(33:10):
even though the numbers were better the week before. You're
starting to see, Okay, I'm starting to see some of
the nuanced stuff that I saw in college. He's starting
to get a little more comfortable. We know the size,
the physicality people were. Do you talk about in an
overreaction society? We had cherry picking, well, we had people
cherry pick picking his mph numbers from the first week
of the GPS numbers, and I'm like, guys, he was

(33:31):
at Ohio Stadium with twenty two miles per hour like this,
He's fine, He's not a slow poke. He's gonna be okay.
But all three of those guys are going to be
outstanding and a Dunesday's super, super instinctive, super tough. It
was good to see him get going last week. But
Bowers has been has come out the gates hot as well.
So those are all kind of the marquee guys. We
felt like we watched those guys in college for a

(33:52):
long time, and I think the transition is a little
easier at the receiver position than maybe it was ten
fifteen years ago.

Speaker 1 (34:00):
All Right, I'm gonna let you go. But before we
do so, and it saysn't do you any advantage putting
your name on anything because you're not.

Speaker 2 (34:05):
But just give us a couple names.

Speaker 1 (34:08):
Now, Look, anyone can go and google online a mock draft,
but it's not the mock draft until we're done with
college football.

Speaker 2 (34:15):
We usually have to be done with the bulls season.

Speaker 1 (34:17):
Then we get to like senior ball, and then you'll
put out your top fifty list and I'm like, all right,
the Bible's out. Now we're gonna go look at this,
and now we can go from there. Are there some
names if you're an NFL fan who happens to casually
watch college or a college fan that loves it but
doesn't necessarily have the eye for NFL talent, give me
some names that you would watch on Saturdays that might

(34:38):
show up in the first round of next year's draft.

Speaker 3 (34:41):
Well, look, I'll give you just a couple of quarterbacks.
One that everybody knows and is talking about, another one
that everybody is going to talk about more as we
go through the process. Let's start with Jackson Dart from
Old Miss Jackson d Dart. Jackson Dart, you want to
talk about it? First of all, it's a phenomenal quarterback name.

Speaker 1 (34:59):
You get born as Jackson Dart, Like you got two jobs.
You can either be a firefighter or you're gonna be
a quarterback. That's like you're only two gigs. That's all
it is.

Speaker 3 (35:06):
Yeah, one hundred percent. Like if you're also, if your
name happens to be like Cannon, I think you're you
can't play receivers. But he his story is gonna be
one that's gonna be fun to dig into as we
get to the draft. He was at USC coaching, change happens,
Lincoln comes, Caleb comes, Jackson's like, well, I'm not sitting
around here for this, so he he bails. He had

(35:28):
opportunity to go to Oklahoma or to Old miss That
was his decision.

Speaker 2 (35:33):
What did Lane come in with. What was the pitch?

Speaker 3 (35:35):
Well, I think the pitch is I'm gonna recruit I'm
already recruiting really well and I'm going to continue to
recruit well and with the with transfer portal just getting
going at this time, an il just getting going at
this time. Football matters in Oxford, Mississippi. UH they are
committed to it. They have a very aggressive NIL program
and Lane is an outstanding developer of quarterbacks and an

(35:57):
excellent play caller. So he ended up winning the day
there he gets him and now in this this is
third year, he's just gotten better and better and better,
and now all of a sudden, you look up. He's
he's got a live arm. He's incredibly tough as a runner,
like he's got a ton of production as a runner.
Is Everything I hear about him at the school is about,
you know, leadership and how I mean I think there's

(36:19):
number three in the country. They're going to be in
the playoff this year. You live at their schedule, the
SEC they'll be in the playoff, you'll see him. He's
got the he's got the paint kind of over the
eye thing that's going on, like a brave heart type
vibe going on. Is he a great throw I would
say good. I would say getting better every year. Armstrength, fine,
accuracy has gotten much better this year. And they haven't

(36:40):
played many talented teams yet, so we'll see as they
get into some of the SEC play. But he's he's
really he's really intriguing. And the other one, I'm telling you,
we're gonna this is going to be the the face
of this draft, it's we're going to be talking about
Shooter Sanders and there's going to bed. If you're going
to be people, there's going to be people.

Speaker 1 (36:57):
What do you think they'll give me an initial thought?
Because I've heard people say not a first round pick.
That others tell me, no, that guy's a top five pick.

Speaker 3 (37:03):
So I did him over the summer and I thought,
like twenty five to thirty five hype type, you know,
like Okay, Bordline and what happens anytime we're having this conversation,
like last year at the beginning of the process, bo
Nicks would have been twenty five to thirty five. Those
guys all they all, they're all gonna move up as
we go through the process. But I think there's people

(37:25):
in the media that are not going to like him,
just you know, for his dad and everything that the
attention that Colorado has gotten wherever anybody feels about that
there and then there's there's gonna be some people in
the league, maybe some more of the old school people
that are gonna feel the same way. But I'm telling you,
I talk to an assistant general manager the other day
that had just seen him play live, and it's like
people gonna say whatever they want to say about that kid.

(37:47):
He is tough as crap, and I said that when
I watched him over the summer. He hangs in there.
He takes a beating. Now he holds the ball a
little too much, takes too many sacks. But he can
throw the ball at all three levels. He's got a
beautiful motion. He can drive the ball, he can layer
the ball. He's you know, they're playing Baylor. He completes
a Hail Mary at the buzzer, no down on the
end of winning that game in overtime. So there's something there.

(38:08):
There's substance there. Like some people that's there's all you know,
all sizzle, no steak, all hat and no cattle, whatever
analogy you want to use. The dude can throw. He
can really really throw the ball.

Speaker 1 (38:17):
I like what you say about going to be toughness
because the toughness is important to me, especially when you're
making to the leap. And he takes a beating at Colorado,
like I'm watching, he evades a lot of it. But
I watched those games. I watched the Colorado State game.
Then I watched this game against Baylor, and he's under
duress and He's making tough, tough passes and he's completing them,
and he's doing them to just guys, not just Travis Hunter.
He's throwing the ball around the yard to a bunch

(38:39):
of different guys. I think he's really good too, NFL wise, though,
I'm not at that point yet where I can grade him.
But you do this for a living. You have him
in the first round, maybe even top ten.

Speaker 3 (38:49):
Well, I it's so early in the process. I haven't
dug into this all yet. I've watched the tape from
the summer from last year, and I've seen him just
TV scouting, so I'm reluctant to put that on him.
But i just know, you know, if you're looking at
a quarterback, can this guy be an NFL quarterback? Can
this guy every throw? Absolutely? There's no question there. And

(39:10):
it's just because of who he is. He's gonna be
the face of the draft. It's going to be the
talk of the town. So that's just something to get
ready for it.

Speaker 1 (39:18):
Let me ask you one last player and then we'll
get out of here. Travis Hunter. He plays about one
hundred snaps. I was talking with Charles Woodson on Saturday,
and I'm like, we are watching. It was after the
Michigan game, and I'm like, you know, this Hunter, he
plays every snap he's good.

Speaker 2 (39:32):
And Woodson's like.

Speaker 1 (39:33):
I played twenty maybe thirty snaps of offense during the year.
He plays that every game Like there this this is
a real unicorn.

Speaker 2 (39:43):
This kid.

Speaker 3 (39:44):
Yeah. I did him again over the summer and I
actually had a lot of I was surprised how much
pushback I got because from the from the media side,
the team side, actually everything I heard was was identical.
I wrote him up as a receiver. Okay, is real.
He is really skinny. He's real thin, but he is
so good with the ball in his hands. He's so
explosive and smooth and slithery. I compared him Garrett Wilson,

(40:07):
That's who he reminded me of. And go play above,
play above the rim, do all those things. I think
Garrett's fast, a little faster than him, but he's that
type of instinctive feel just a football player that way
at corner and some of it because he's playing a
million snaps. But you can watch a Stanford game last year.
He got beat up pretty good in that game at corner.

(40:28):
So I want I know, and yeah, I just want him.
I would write him up as a receiver. And if
I'm Travis Hunter, and I'm sure whenever he decides on
an agent, and whenever that goes down, I'm gonna do
a couple of things. I'm gonna say, Okay, can I
see the top ten salaries for the top ten corners
in the league? Now show me the top ten salaries
of the top ten wide receivers in the mart. One
of these list is not like the other. Travis, Yep, yep.

Speaker 1 (40:51):
I got to go to a random game. It's actually
a long story. It's kind of cute. My son fell
in love with Michigan last year during their run. My
wife went there. I had never been to the Big House.
Of course, your program's been to the Big House. I
had never been to the Big House. You went to
Appalachian State for the listeners. Uh. I've wanted to pick
a weekend where it would probably be a win. I

(41:13):
also wanted to pick a weekend whereas an early game
because I had to fly to LA afterwards. We went
to the Arkansas State game and took my wife, took
a couple of my son's friends, and we had an
absolute blast. Big House was great, and I spoke to
people at the Michigan program and before the game, I'm
talking to the folks on the sideline.

Speaker 2 (41:30):
I'm like, who do I watch? Are like?

Speaker 1 (41:31):
Will Johnson's the guy, yeah, big I fell in love with.
He's got two pick six's and I think you know
he's wearing that Charles Woodson number two. Will Johnson. Is
he on boards yet? Because I he's a lock. He's
a locked, top five lock like that high he's the top.

Speaker 3 (41:52):
I would say top fifteen is a conservative. Yes. At
this point in the process. They've got They've got a
bunch of us man.

Speaker 2 (41:59):
They do. They got the big gend THET.

Speaker 3 (42:03):
They got another d tackle as well. They're good. That
was a breaky you went to the SC game because
I was watching that in the hotel and what a
great game in credible.

Speaker 2 (42:12):
Game and they just watching that game.

Speaker 3 (42:15):
I get on the I get on the elevator and
it's it's Ben Herbert, the Straint coach. Uh. All the
Michigan guys. Oh they were exhausted. I think they were exhausted.

Speaker 1 (42:26):
So funny see that's Harbos crew. And then I was
getting a text. I got a text from Mike McDonald
who's the head coach in Seattle. And he's a Michigan
guy too. Those Michigan guys, they're all over the NFL
game they did. All right, I'm gonna let you go
right now, Daniel. I so appreciate it. Where can we
find you on Sundays? Because I will click the Oudyssey
app or the iHeart Happy are And then during the week,

(42:48):
of course, you and Bucky do the move the stick stuff.

Speaker 2 (42:50):
So where can we find you?

Speaker 3 (42:51):
Yeah, on Sundays? If this is way too much effort
for people, But if the Chargers are at home, I'll
be in studio uh for game day morning, So I
pop in there and do some hits on that and
then call, then walk across the street call the games
for Charges Radio with Matt money Smith. So yeah, if
you're driving around, you're flipping through the flip into the stations,
you'll stumble across my voice a little bit on there
calling Charger game. So and then then in the sixth podcast,

(43:12):
we're five days a week, Shrags, We're five days a week,
five days a week, five days a week. Buddy, they're
making this work over here, man.

Speaker 2 (43:18):
Trust me, I know. God bless you, my friend. You're
the best.

Speaker 1 (43:22):
Daniel Jeremiah, awesome as always, thank you.

Speaker 2 (43:24):
For joining the season with Peter Schreger.

Speaker 3 (43:26):
Good to see bro.

Speaker 2 (43:33):
That was incredible.

Speaker 1 (43:35):
We love getting in touch with Daniel Jeremiah now in
the process. But also to look back on his stuff,
that scouting report on Jaden Daniels could not have been
more spot on. If anything, he might have raised some
red flags that have not come to fruition yet. Also
the Shador Sanders thing, this is going to be all
we talk about January, February, March, right into April. I'm

(43:56):
telling you this now, everybody get ready. And I like
how Daniel kind of straddles it here, like I think
he could be twenty five that or higher or go up.

Speaker 2 (44:04):
Like that's where we're at.

Speaker 1 (44:06):
And I think it's going to be the biggest name
and the topic of conversation throughout the draft process. That's
why we love it. And it's almost here, believe it
or not. A lot of teams are already thinking quarterback
after just three weeks of football this season. Every week
on this program we do a shout out to our sponsor,
Uber Eats, and this is time for delivering results presented

(44:27):
by Ubers.

Speaker 3 (44:27):
It Eats.

Speaker 2 (44:28):
I give out a Player of the Week award.

Speaker 1 (44:30):
It goes without saying, Jaden Daniels is my winner of
the award. Daniels went twenty one of twenty three ninety
one percent completion percentage, went on the road into a
hostile environment, and took care of a hungry, hungry Cincinnati
Bengals defense every single time he got on the field.
That was six possessions, five touchdowns, one field goal. Jaden

(44:51):
Daniels just a rookie, and yet he is the winner
of the Delivering Results Award, presented by Uber Eats, where
you can get almost almost anything for game day. It's
the official on demand delivery partner of the NFL. You
can order now that was presented by Uber eats. It
almost almost anything for a game day, great week ahead,
great games. I might be attending one. I'm in La

(45:16):
on Sunday Chiefs Chargers. I gotta do the Fox pregame.
Can I skid that all over to the stadium. I
would like to go as a fan. I think I'm
gonna buy a ticket just on like one of the sites.
I don't want to say a site that we're not
partners with on this podcast. I'm not sure if you
like their partners on every podcast all these different sites,
but I might just buy a ticket. If you see
me at so far, say what's up. I always like

(45:38):
to see my homes in person, and I have never
seen Justin Herbert in person. Sadly I won't be seeing
Joe Alt. Sounds like he is out. It sounds like
Rashaun Slater is out. But Herbert might be a go.
I think I'm going to attend that one. And then
there is a beauty of a Sunday nighter between the
Ravens and the Bills. Can't wait for that as well.
Another great week of football. Another guest that we love,

(46:00):
Daniel Jeremiah.

Speaker 2 (46:01):
Tune in next week. We'll have plenty more on the
Season with Peter Shirk.

Speaker 1 (46:15):
The Season with Peter Schrager is a production of the
NFL and partnership with iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio,
visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get
your podcasts.
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Host

Peter Schrager

Peter Schrager

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