Mailbag, Part III: Hope for Bryce Young, Lions' Goff/St. Brown Decisions, offensive trends, Bobby Slowik
Another full round of your excellent questions. Also: Should the Packers trade into the top 10 for an offensive tackle? What makes a great ST unit?
Huge thank you to everyone for the inquisitive questions. Here’s Part I and Part II, icymi.
Inside our final installment this round of the Mailbag:
Why Bryce Young was doomed to fail as a rookie and has a real shot to rebound in a big way this season.
The offensive trends coming. (And why teams know they still must pass to win.)
A signature offseason for the Detroit Lions. How will Brad Holmes navigate contract extensions to Jared Goff and Amon-Ra St. Brown?
Bobby Slowik was the Answer Man at OC in Houston.
Green Bay should seriously consider trading into the top 10 for a left tackle.
The Special Teams Advantage.
Let’s get to it.
Thanks, everyone.
Tyler:
You must know someone who can answer this.
Chiefs secondary coach David Merritt has overseen and coached FIVE Super Bowl winning secondaries. All of whom were major contributors to each ring.
Merritt checks all the boxes. Former player. Twenty five years coaching and playing under greats such as Shula, Buddy Ryan, Coughlin, Reid. FIVE SUPER BOWL RINGS. So why isn’t David Merritt on ANYONE’s wavelength for a DC job? Why does Andy Reid continually push someone who obviously is not qualified (if he was Bieniemy would have been a HC by now) but not a guy who again, has FIVE SUPER BOWL RINGS and is much more accomplished and well-liked???
Love your work.
Tom
My initial reaction: Zero clue. Admittedly, I knew essentially nothing about David Merritt beyond what you stated. He won two rings with the New York Giants as the secondary coach and three with the Chiefs.
All groups have been impressive, too. He’s won with vets. Developed youth. Trent McDuffie blossomed into a star in Year 2. Seems strange that an assistant coach with this pedigree isn’t being discussed for coordinator openings. During Super Bowl week this year, Merritt told Newsday about a brief chat he had with Giants owner John Mara. (“I said it’s getting close to the time for me to come home. And he kind of looked at me and winked.” He later added that returning to the Giants would be “a dream come true.”) Shane Brown was hired as the DC to replace Wink Martindale this offseason. Maybe Merritt finds his way back in New Jersey eventually.
I reached out to one of Merritt’s former colleagues who remains close to the coach to get an answer. This person cited Merritt as one of the “top 5” people he has ever worked with and added that some coaches are unfairly pigeon-holed as position coaches. Dumb, yet true. A subset of damn good coaches spend 10, 15, 20+ years doing the same job with hardly a sniff of interest around the NFL. As much as we’d love to think all GMs know what they’re doing, many do not. That’s part of it. I’m surprised it took Joe Whitt Jr. this long to get a DC opportunity. Back on the Packers beat, he always struck me as both an Grade-A teacher and communicator. Whitt developed undrafted gems like Sam Shields and helped future Hall of Famer Charles Woodson evolve. Commanders got a good one.
Also, there’s another subset of assistants who are better politicians than coaches and work the media game to perfection. They link up with the right agent and gain momentum. Toward the end of each season, keep an eye out for Assistants to Watch-branded posts from talking heads. It’s comical how many names are listed as the “hot new hires.” Late-December, early-January reeks of back-scratching season.
Merritt is probably one of those coaches who couldn’t care less about public perception.
Were any eyebrows raised by those around the league when Carolina promoted assistant GM Dan Morgan to President of Football Operations/GM considering he was part of the disaster that took place in Carolina? As a fan, it’s hard to understand why anybody from that front office was retained considering how badly the Panthers have whiffed in the draft & all personnel matters since 2021. Will Canales & Morgan be able to handle all things football-related without interference from Dave “the drink-tosser” Tepper & his wife?
Tim
Always good to hear from our resident Panthers diehard. Thanks for the question, Tim, and please tell me the LaMelo Ball-Brandon Miller NBA takeover is coming in 2025. When Scott Fitterer was fired after three seasons as GM, my assumption was the same: Tepper was cleaning house because Tepper needed to clean house. They obviously fired head coach Frank Reich after 11 games. This organization discovered new rock bottoms week to week to week last season.
Tepper likely knows his franchise is completely tied to 2023 first overall pick Bryce Young.
Year 1 went terribly with C.J. Stroud simultaneously rising to stardom.
So, why Dan Morgan? The gut feeling here is that Tepper wants someone in charge who truly believes in Young and Morgan is that person. The former Pro Bowl linebacker does bring experience from competent organizations. Morgan spent 2010- ’17 in the Seahawks front office and 2018- -20 with the Bills. He’s seen teams build around two very different franchise quarterbacks. Up close, he saw how to build a perennial winner around a short, improvising quarterback. There’s no way around it. The Panthers must own the Young pick and I’m not ready to give up on him yet. He was so smooth, so dominant, so fun to watch at ‘Bama — his lack of size wasn’t a detriment against the best athletes in college football. A reminder.
Looking closely at what went wrong in 2023 should give you hope that things will go right in 2024. Young is extremely smart — remember that S2? — and the Panthers asked him to handle far more at the line of scrimmage than most all rookies in terms of protections and checks. This backfired. Young started playing too robotically… all within a scheme that was painfully stale and stagnant in comparison to what Bobby Slowik was calling for Stroud in Houston. A wretched combination.
When Young was able to do less thinking and play fast in two-minute drills, he excelled.
Size is a concern. I thought ex-Saints scout Josh Lucas made an excellent point last season in noting how those New Orleans teams invested heavily in offensive guards (rather than tackles) so the shorter Drew Brees could cleanly step up into the pocket and deliver throws. Expect Carolina to follow a similar personnel blueprint. Of course, this is an offense that also needs true WR1 and WR2 options and doesn’t own a first-round pick. Not ideal. Patience is required. But there is justified hope for a turnaround.
Expect a modernized offense with new head coach Dave Canales. He helped revitalize the careers of Geno Smith and Baker Mayfield. The bet here is that, unlike Reich, he’ll create an offense that attacks specific weaknesses in the defense instead of simply calling plays and hoping for the best. A big difference.
Most importantly, he’ll make sure Young plays freely without overthinking.
We chatted at length for our Bucs season preview story. While the context is different now, this quote resonates as Canales takes over as an NFL head coach:
“My main gratitude is to Pete Carroll. Really giving me an attitude to how to approach football. It should be fun. The best way we know how to make football fun to these guys is presenting it to them and spare no expense from a coaching standpoint to make it really clear so they can play focused and they can play fast. When they play fast, they have so much fun. That’s when you see the characters, the personalities really come to life. It’s when they know what they’re doing. That is when they can create. Creativity comes from security and security comes from confidence: Knowing what you’re doing.
“That’s really what I’m trying to create here, is keeping myself from trying to do too much. Keeping it simple so we can coach it well. So they can retain it, play fast and have a lot of fun. Because if they’re worried about a million different plays and they’re stressed out and bogged down. They’re going to play slow and they’re going to not have fun. They’re going to be stressed. That’s been my focus this summer. I’m combing through—what can I take off, what can I push off for a couple weeks, what can I work back in later on. Different things like that. That’s been my main focus. The simplicity of it, so they can play fast and have fun.”
Ty, what kind of food is in a locker room pre- and post-game? You see anybody bring in their own junk food: a Ho-Ho or bag of Doritos? Ever see a player drink a beer after a normal game or smoke a cigarette?
Istanbul Jake
You lost me at Ho-Ho’s. That was THE go-to lunch treat through grade school. So many ways to consume a Ho Ho, too. I liked unraveling each scroll to fully enjoy the scrumtrulescent white cream.
OK, let’s get back on track. Top of my head, nothing fun recently. Many teams set up a table outside of the locker room with bags of food to go. We’ve seen players celebrate with a stogie after big games. Joe Burrow and the Cincinnati Bengals even made Cigar Aficionado after winning the AFC North in 2022. Usually, players head right out after talking to us. Imagine most would prefer to wine and dine with family and friends in town than anything. Road teams, meanwhile, have to catch a bus and fly home. I do remember the Houston Texans fueling media members with beer in the press box after a Packers-Texans game. That should be mandatory.
Watching defenses curb scoring while acclimating to a passing league this past season, when does the power run game return to off-set the lighter personnel needed to cover space?
That experiment failed under Mike Vrabel in Nashville for various reasons, but with QB contracts out of control a team with strong OL play is inevitably going to attempt big-boy football, and I would think with success. The Shanahan system is less power and more misdirection. Baltimore relies on a running QB that is an excellent thrower of the football in his own right. I just think that less practice time allowed since the 2011 CBA limiting the development of the rapport necessary for middling QBs to connect with their WRs will lead to a change to dominating OLs charging forward, that is if newly drafted college O-Lineman can acclimate to such a scheme change.
Kevin
Strong topic, Kevin. This is something we’ve wrestled with the last three seasons because — as 2021 grinded on — it appeared teams were open to embracing such a philosophy shift. Defenses were skewing finesse to combat the athletic quarterback which meant lighter boxes, 220-pound linebackers and plenty of two-deep shells. To your point, that’s begging offenses to drop the hammer. Offensive linemen enjoy moving forward. Not backward. And considering QB contracts are becoming astronomical, I get it. Why not?
Doubt we see a team swing aggressively this direction, though.
A few thoughts come to mind.
First, the Atlanta Falcons gave this a shot last season and it didn’t work out. Arthur Smith believed they could prosper with Desmond Ridder, a 74th overall pick, at quarterback and his perceived strength (ball security) became a fatal flaw. Didn’t matter that the team made Chris Lindstrom the highest-paid guard in NFL history or that they drafted Bijan Robinson eighth overall to pair with human bowling ball, Tyler Allgeier. Atlanta went 7-10 a third straight season. I was fully on-board with the logic, and so was Happy Hour guest Peter King. Turns out teams shopping for the Mountain Lightning and Dr. Thunder off-brand quarterbacks will always fall short. This is another reason why I think Atlanta will try to make Kirk Cousins’ reps an offer he can’t refuse this coming week in Indianapolis.
Quarterbacks still need to complete tight-window throws on third and 8, a breed that’s in short supply.
Kurt Warner didn’t hold back on the X with his dismay watching college film. The Hall of Famer said it’s been hard for him to even watch these incoming QBs. “Very few play on schedule,” he continued, “the pass concepts are a mess most of the time, they run the same play over & over, a million bubble screens, can’t find many concepts that translate to next level.”
He may be correct, but teams will swing away again in the top 5. Scouting collegiate prospects is always a projection.
Beyond the forever need for NFL offenses to orbit around the quarterback, I think there’s a strong analytics argument against this approach. Gashing a defense at five yards per carry may sound good in the part of brain that still views football 1990s glasses. But imagine if your favorite team was completing passes in four- and seven- and three- and 11-yard chunks. That’d be considered a lame popgun offense. This is still a big-play league. and teams want to run as many plays as they possibly can.
Another factor: Red-zone defense is coached exceptionally well. Teams know how to leverage receivers against the boundaries. Even the best player on the planet struggled inside the 20 during the regular season. After scoring touchdowns on 71 percent of their red-zone trips in 2022, the Chiefs fell to 51 percent in 2023 (19th in the NFL)… before then heating up at the perfect time in the playoffs. A team may decide to run and run and run to glory, but the rebuttal’s simple: Go right ahead. Opponents will let you waste time between the 20s and then clamp down in the red zone where your quarterback must make a play.
Which is all why we’ll still see a team roll the dice on a player like LSU’s Jayden Daniels, even if the film has Warner shaking his head.
My question is about money. QB Jared Goff, LT Taylor Decker, and WR Amon-Ra St. Brown are all entering contract years and LG Jonah Jackson is a free agent. Who gets extended and who gets let go? (Lions have $63.7 million in cap space, per overthecap.com)
Tim
Everyone here at Go Long HQ is thinking of you, pal. Thank you for sharing all emotions all season long inside our Gameday Chat. A fun ride. A bitter end. And I’d imagine that sour NFC Championship aftertaste will linger for years. The good news? The Detroit Lions haven’t encountered an offseason like this one since… since… I don’t know when. They’ve got money to spend and plenty of players who deserve contract extensions. Sure beats the days of overpaying for guys like Rick Wagner, Jesse James and — I’m sorry to do this — Scott Mitchell.
GM Brad Holmes and head coach Dan Campbell will start exactly where they should: Quarterback.
So, what’s the magic number for Jared Goff? He’s fresh off leading the Lions to their first conference title game in three decades, completing 67.3 percent of his passes for 4,575 yards with 30 touchdowns. He’s scheduled to make $27,950,064 in 2024. By all accounts, both parties want to get an extension done. After knocking off Matthew Stafford in the playoffs, there won’t be much debate on a contract floor. Goff’s deal should exceed the one Stafford signed in 2022 with the L.A. Rams, four years, $160 million ($40M per year). That’d tie him with New York’s Daniel Jones and Dallas’ Dak Prescott as the 10th-highest paid QB in the league.
So then the question becomes how all of the monster contracts at QB last offseason affect Goff. To recap, here’s how those dominoes fell:
Jalen Hurts, Philadelphia: $51M per year.
Lamar Jackson, Baltimore: $52M per year.
Justin Herbert, Los Angeles: $52.5M per year.
Joe Burrow, Cincinnati: $55M per year.
While it may seem like Goff has been in the NFL forever, he’s only 29 years old. His argument to enter this tier is a strong one: The Lions were previously a punchline for most of 70 years. He delivered a division title, two playoff wins and nearly a trip to the Super Bowl. He’s been to a Super Bowl before. He has a 66-50-1 record as a starter, despite quarterbacking through two total rebuilds. What exactly has Herbert accomplished to date? In his only playoff appearance, the Chargers blew a 27-0 lead. It makes sense for a deal to be struck soon with Goff’s $5 million roster bonus due March 14. This sum could then be lumped into whatever signing bonus Goff receives in an extension and stretched out over the life of the contract.
I’d be surprised if the Lions didn’t enter the $50 mill stratosphere, especially given the higher-than-expected $255.4 million salary cap. Goff proved again he is worth the money, even if such a deal prevents the Lions from signing a piece on defense. Unless the Lions know something about Hendon Hooker we do not and choose to play hardball, this shouldn’t devolve into a nasty tug of war.
Attention then shifts to Amon-Ra St. Brown. Entering the final year of his ridiculously-cheap rookie deal, he’s due for a raise. St. Brown isn’t built like Davante Adams ($28M/year) or A.J. Brown ($25M/year). Nor is he breakaway-explosive like Tyreek Hill ($30M/year). But he may be the most reliable chains-mover in the NFL. Earlier, we discussed the pitfalls of trying to move the ball down the field in five-yard chunks. St. Brown basically doubles this number as the lifeblood of Detroit’s passing game. He caught 119 passes for 1,515 yards with 10 scores, grading in PFF’s top 5 at wide receiver.
He’s not the prototypical X wide receiver torching corners deep along the boundary, which the Lions may try using to their advantage in negotiations.
But St. Brown’s sheer determination still makes him a threat to score 70-yard touchdowns. He can line up everywhere. Spit-balling, of course. But a three-year deal in the $25M/year range seems justified.
Most importantly, Holmes and Campbell have a strong sense of their locker room. They know St. Brown is the player who sets the tone — for everybody — and you reward those players. When we spent some time around the Lions last summer, Kalif Raymond was the last player at the JUGS machine.
Afterward, Raymond quickly credited St. Brown as the receiver who’s usually last to exit the practice field. A beast who’s on a different level.
“He is a guy that — all the things I learned about going through adversity, all the discipline I learned about doing through adversity? — that dude came into the league with it. Because he is the hardest worker that I have… oh my goodness. To the point where, I could tell you right now I catch 200 passes a day. You’d be like, ‘That sounds good.’ But when you think about 200 and you start counting, ‘1… 2… 3.” Two-hundred is a long ways away. A lot of people say it and a lot of people do 200 maybe on Monday and maybe 200 on Friday. But it’s not consistent. If you see him on the practice field and he’s coming off the practice field at any time, he has caught 202 passes on the JUGS machine. And it’s for real. I’ve never seen him miss. He does core after every workout. A lot of guys leave. He’s going to do his core, and I’ve never seen him miss a beat. That dude right there, the success he’s having? There are two guys I’m outrageously confident in whenever the ball’s in the air. It’s A.J. Brown and Amon-Ra St. Brown. Because of the way those guys work. I’ve seen 202 passes. So, when it comes to the game? He did 202 reps in one day. We have three practices during the week so that means he caught 606 passes before you saw the pass that he caught on Sunday.
“That guy is every day. Every day. Every day.”
“If you want to see examples of what this team is built around? It’s that guy. He’s a workhorse, man. When we’re into lifts? That dude is putting up the most weight. He’s naturally strong. But you can tell when he’s lifting: ‘Hey, man, you lift when nobody’s watching. You catch JUGS when nobody’s watching. Nobody has to be here for you to do this.’ That’s the kind of guy Dan and Brad are looking for. The dude is a monster off the field before he even steps on the field. Him having success doesn’t surprise you.”
There are worst ways to spent millions of dollars.
The Lions started this whole rebuild by emphasizing the offensive line. They might not have excess dough to pay Jonah Jackson what he’s worth but they’ve navigated through injuries up front before and should be able to find a replacement. Hank Fraley is one of the best line coaches in football. Of course, the 6-foot-5, 335-pound rhino in the room is how much the Lions should pay the right tackle Campbell has declared the team’s best player: Penei Sewell. He’s entering the fourth year of his rookie deal and picking up his fifth-year option in 2025 is an easy decision. If the Lions are looking to gain an extra mill or two of wiggle room, they could sign Sewell to a long-term contract and then structure his (mega) deal in a way that gives them short-term flexibility. As mentioned in Part II, expect more teams to keep pushing bills into the future.
If there’s any team that should go for it right now, it’s the Detroit Lions.
They’ll be squeezed up tight against the salary cap soon but Goff, St. Brown and Sewell are the core of this offense. Sign them long term and then figure everything else out.
What will the new Packers defense look like next year, how do the current players fit, and what new types will need to be found?
Norm
To be continued, Norm.
The so-called Shanahan offense is all the rage, so naturally we should expect the league to figure out countermeasures as more teams adopt it. When this happens, which coaches from the Shanahan tree will be most and least likely to successfully adapt their offenses to the countermeasures?
Dave
Mike McDaniel and the Miami Dolphins face a critical Year 3. We’ve drooled over this unit’s innovation, and for good reason. Tua Tagovailoa led the NFL in passing. Tyreek Hill was an OPOY candidate. That 70-point game vs. Denver was straight out of NBA Jam. But, again, the Fins faded down the stretch. Injuries didn’t help, but Tagovailoa was unable to create offense outside of structure. Defenses took away his first read and everything got murky. McDaniel won’t be busting out a white board to break down how Miami’s offense plans to evolve but I’m looking forward to hearing from him at the Combine next week in Indy.
When the Dolphins were at their best last season, they fed off of an effective rushing attack.
Take this away, more problems.
So, let’s give the edge to Bobby Slowik and the Houston Texans. This coach and this 22-year-old rookie quarterback, C.J. Stroud, were able to consistently find answers. Injuries wrecked the entire offensive line from Week 1. The run game sputtered for stretches. Rookie standout Tank Dell broke his fibula. All on a team that went 11-38-1 the previous three seasons. But the Texans still found a way to win the AFC South at 10-7 and then blow out a Jim Schwartz-led Browns defense that finished No. 1 in efficiency, defensive EPA (expected points allowed) and three-and-outs forced.
Stroud lit Cleveland up in the 45-14 rout: 16 of 21 for 274 yards, three touchdowns, no interceptions.
Slowik has a knack for locating the sweet spots in a secondary, Stroud’s a quick decision-maker and Nico Collins’ star continues to rise. Receivers this big aren’t supposed to run this fast. On that trip to Houston last season, vet wideout Robert Woods described Slowik’s offense as one full of cheat codes. The young OC uses the entire field. He knows the “rules” each of the 11 defenders must follow — then challenges those rules. If a linebacker is in a hook zone, he’ll make that linebacker second-guess his depth.
Receivers don’t just run the route tree, 1 through 9. They’re feeding off each other. One route’s designed to free up another.
Here’s Woods:
“It’s not just like, ‘OK, this is an iso route. It is, ‘Alright, me and this receiver are going to combo and make this guy play honest and then if that doesn’t work, now this backside concept is coming in. Work together. That’s the biggest thing. We’re all out there trying to execute the same goal vs. ‘Alright, this is the play, and it’s you and only you with no other answer.’ With this offense, there’s always an answer to how they want to play us. If they’re overplaying him, throw this. There’s always something to open.”
Tagovailoa has been deadly operating within such a scheme, too. When the pocket’s clean — and his run game’s clicking — nobody’s better in the NFL. But the NFL is an exercise in attrition and adaptation. As a season slogs into December and January, most teams are banged up. The Texans are trending the right direction.
Hi Tyler,
First off, Go Long is my first foray into paid subscription sports content, and it’s been absolutely worth it. The content is amazing, and I love that as a subscriber-driven organization that you have the editorial freedom to say things that sound fresh and different. The NFL is a huge corporation, yet you guys don't seem beholden to it like other writers on payrolls of the name brand organizations.
As a lifelong Packer fan, I can't help but focus there...
In the Not For Long league, should the Packers go all in on a big Super Bowl push for 2024 by pushing more cap into the future, trading future draft capital, etc? So much of being competitive in the NFL seems oriented around QB contracts (Mahomes being the exception that proves the rule), and Love will only be relatively “cheap” for another year. The expensive positions the Packers need are offensive tackle, pass rusher, and cornerback. Safety, off-ball linebacker, and running back are the easier problems to fix.
Offensive tackle: There are not enough to go around in the league - literally every team needs another OT, which is why elite prospects are drafted right behind the QBs. Being shorthanded at OT can crash an entire team, and the Packers barely stitched it together last year. Converting Bakhtiari's March 2023 roster bonus turned out horrifically (he would have been worth giving the Jets a draft pick to take). While working with Bakhtiari to push MORE money into the future could significantly help in the short-term window given his $39/19M cap hit, it seems the organization wants to finally cut its losses. While many reports have the draft being deep, the Packers’ postseason run pushed them out of recent range for a first round OT with prototypical arm length (that seems to be the critical attribute for the position?). Packaging the first three picks likely would put them into range for where elite OTs are typically drafted (roughly top 7?) — is that the sort of gamble that’s worth it for a young tackle and a team looking to make a Super Bowl run? Look around — elite teams have elite OTs. On the other hand, giving up second-round picks requires hard thinking on “low value positions” below.
Leif
Absolutely, Leif. I probably should have included your excellent post alongside Kate in Part II.
One way to “go for it” is to trade up for one of the premier offensive tackles in the draft. Rasheed Walker helped prevent potential disaster at left tackle last season but the Packers can’t bank on this seventh-rounder being Chad Clifton. While it may pain Brian Gutekunst to part with precious draft capital, you know Jordan Love is your quarterback. You know the young receivers will continue to grow. Locking in a long-term answer at left tackle — keeping Zach Tom entrenched on the right side — sure would give Matt LaFleur peace of mind as a playcaller in 2024 and beyond. Walker could then settle into a swing-tackle role.
How bold the Packers should be in their pursuit of the tackle they desire is up for debate.
This will sound foreign to all who’ve followed the Packers, but I think working their way into the top 10 is worth the cost of business. If the Packers fall in love with one of the top three tackles in the draft — Notre Dame’s Joe Alt, Alabama’s JC Latham or Penn State’s Olumuyiwa Fashanu — and that player begins to trickle down to 5…6… 7… Gutekunst should make a move. A lack of aggressiveness hurt the Packers at various points during Aaron Rodgers’ prime years. Gutekunst put his career on the line for Love. Now, it’s time to do everything he can to maximize one of the best young quarterbacks in the sport.
Hey Tyler,
TLDR: How do the Packers fix their special teams, once and for all? (Besides building a time machine and going back to just after the 2018 season and giving Darren Rizzi whatever he wanted to come to Green Bay).
Nick
Your entire post was excellent, Nick. Substack sticks a word limit on emails so appreciate your “TLDR” version at the top.
My answer is short and sweet: Emphasize special teams. It’s one thing to talk big and bad at the podium about special teams being a third of the game. It’s another to actually acquire players — via draft and free agency — strictly as core special teams players. For ages, the Packers have tried jamming back-ups into ST roles. The sort of players who treat this facet of the game as more of an annoyance. Jarrett Bush was the great exception. Not sure I’ve covered anybody who did more with their God-given abilities as this maniac running sprints with a weighted vest on after hot training camp practices.
Upon retiring last week, New England’s Matthew Slater received endless flowers from teammates and opponents and even Bill Belichick has stated Slater deserves to be in Canton.
Unselfish players in this mold help you on the field. Slater’s 159 special-teams tackles rank third all-time. But pros like this set a precedent for everyone up and down the roster on Monday through Saturday, too. Anyone who’s ever spoken to Slater can sense his immense passion to the grind and the grime of the sport — he epitomized everything Belichick was preaching and made it easier for others to follow the coach’s “do your job” orders. There’s no way to quantify Slater’s locker-room impact, but I’ve got to think the way he worked became contagious through his three Super Bowl runs.
Tis NFL Draft Season. Everyone with access to YouTube is hyper-analyzing prospects and puking out mock drafts. Film helps. More coaches are even blowing off the Combine. But conversations with prospects can mean just as much as anything seen on a screen. The difference between winning and losing is often finding players dedicated to this extreme.
Special teams serve as the perfect home for this breed.
Special teams, as Packers fans know, can decide a season.
Take it from Belichick: “He is a once in a lifetime person, and the best core special teams player in NFL history. His daily, weekly, and yearly work ethic, paved the way for his unsurpassed performance. Matthew is the finest example of what an intense competitor and human being should be.”
ICYMI this week:
For the person that asked about Merritt, he's waiting for his two kids to graduate hs before moving around: https://twitter.com/J810Anderson/status/1749971521328587133