Kap & J. Hood
9/3: NFL Check-In with Albert Breer
[MUSIC PLAYING] Follow Chicago's home for sports on Twitch at ESPN 1,000 Chicago. Captain J. Hood are back on Chicago's home for sports. ESPN Chicago. Hello, football on ESPN 1,000. Hello, Bert. Albert Breer. Hey, Bert, senior NFL writer for SI.com. Joins Captain J. Hood. Bertz, what? You're at Bertz. On ESPN 1,000. What do you mean I'm at? We see that's the game. I just tag you, and you're in until you tag somebody else. Albert Breer. No, no, I'm not playing a game. I'm reading, earning, and I'm not fit. OK. On Chicago's home for sports. What Bertz is it? Now time for Albert Breer. Money Morning Quarterback, SI.com. That's where you go as we have our conversation, and Albert is on the hotline. Carx, turn on the hotline. Rattle, rattle, thunder, bladder, boop, boop, boop, boop. Don't worry about the Carx name. Good morning, Albert. How are you? Good morning, guys. How are you? Well, thank you. We are awesome. It's football game week. Prep started yesterday. I was watching you with Rich Eisen. And when you said they gave Caleb the playbook and started the install in March, and Eisen's Reddit. What? That has them, I think, primed to get off to a quicker start, than maybe a rookie quarterback usually does. Is that fair? Yeah. You know what's weird about that? I said that to Rich at the end of July. And I don't know, like, someone in Chicago must have picked it up, because all of a sudden, like, I got all of these, like, likes, like, all these notifications on my phone about this many people liked the post on Instagram or whatever. So somehow, someone got a hold of it, as if I had said it yesterday. Right, I was like, I thought, Albert, said that, like, when camp opens. Long story. Yeah, at the end of July, yeah, that's right. That's all right, someone repurposed it. That's OK. It's obviously all still the truth. And also a factor in what's gone on here, you know? And I think the Bears, again, deserve credit for accelerating the process. And part of that was forced, right? Like, so, you know, I think Ryan Polls and Mati Eber Flus wanted to get ahead of this. And wanted to be in a position where they'd be able to move Justin Field at the beginning of 3-H. Now, she didn't exactly play out that way. But because they had accelerated the process, because they did their vetting of Kayla Williams really early, they, like, came to a quicker decision that, yeah, this is the guy. This guy's different than everybody else. And, you know, once they came to that conclusion, now all of a sudden, OK, like, how do we a lot of our time? And the right way to do it for them was, well, like, if we're planning on starting him, and we're not-- you know, we're not this-- you know, like, we're not this sort of, you know, like, startup here. We've been here for three years. And so we're not going to bring in, you know, a middle-of-the-road guy to hold the fort for half a season. Like, we need to have, like, a really good starting quarterback right away. It made sense to accelerate the process with him. And so, you know, again, like, pretty many didn't hear it. Like, and I think I've been over a few times on your show, right? But they put in the terminology and the-- on the formations and the cadence and, you know, and some of that stuff. And the-- I'm trying to remember all of it, but, like, they put in that stuff. And I wrote a whole story on it in August, too, on the site, in the Zoom meetings. And then, you know, they worked on him getting in and out of a huddle at the 30-visit. And so, like, by the time they got around to bring him in the building for the Rookie of Many Camp in May, he already had a pretty good baseline of what the offense was going to look like. So, the onboarding was very aggressive and began much earlier than guys from our rookie quarterbacks. Albert, we were looking at the NFC and just trying to figure out how the Bears can get into the playoffs. Do you see the Bears being one of the top seven teams in the NFC? I think it's possible. You know, I think they're lucky to be in the NFC. It's funny, I'm doing this quarterback poll where I-- yeah, I reached out to over 100 guys. You know, GM's head coaches, offensive coordinators, quarterback coaches, personnel directors, and just ask them who they think the top five quarterbacks are going to be at the end of the year. And a lot of comments I caught, like, after a guy's went through this exercise, he's like, oh, wow, they're all AFC. You know, like, a lot of guys had all five of their quarterbacks in the AFC. And I think it sort of illustrates the imbalance and power there is in the league right now, where, you know, you have Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes and Joe Burrow and Lamar Jackson, and now Aaron Rodgers, you know, Justin Herbert. I'm probably missing somebody here, right? Like, because there are so many of them. It's a gauntlet, C.J. Stroud, you know, like, it's a gauntlet in the AFC. You know, in the NFC, it's a little easier to sneak into the playoffs as a six or seven seed. So, you know, there are a bunch of teams. The Bears are one of them that I think have a chance to come up and surprise people and get into the brackets, you know, the Bears be one, the Cardinals, the Seahawks. I think there are other teams out there that could surprise some people, make it in the NFC. A part of that, again, is due to the fact that a lot of the strength of the league is in the other conference. - In terms of looking at the Tennessee Titans, they're rolling in here. The Bears are four and a half point favorites. I'm not asking the handicap the game from a gambling perspective. But take us through your thoughts on what the Titans are rolling in here. - So, like, obviously, they've reset a lot of things. And I think they're in the midst of a pretty extensive rebuild right now. So, well, what does that mean? Well, you know, the Mike Rebel teams made the playoffs a few times, got to an AFC title game, and in time aged out. So, like, some of the guys they had there that were, you know, really kind of the tone centers for the entire program, Taylor LeWann, Derek Henry, Kevin Beyer, those guys are gone now, right? So, they're building around a different group of players and they're young in a lot of spots. So, you know, like, you know, Peter Skoronski and J.C. Latham on the offensive line, first year guy, second year guy, right? You know, the receiver group, they bring in Calvin Ridley as sort of a stopgap, 'cause I believe he's either 29 or 30 years old. So, he's a little older, right? They, on the defensive side, they're gonna be relying on young players all over the place, yes. They have Simmons in the middle of that defense, and Jeffrey Simmons is one of the best players in all football, but they're very young everywhere else. So, I think that's the first thing you notice, is that this is a team going to a very extensive rebuild, probably where the Bears were a couple of years ago. The other thing that you need to know is they are trying to get an answer on their young quarterback, right? So, part of that is, you know, is going and bringing in a Ripley, and bringing back the Andre Hopkins, and, you know, signing Tony Pollard over from Dallas, like where, they say, okay, we're rebuilding, but we also need to figure out if Will Levis is the guy, because if he's not, and we have a high pick next year, then we're gonna have to probably, we're probably gonna have to take one. So, and even in that way, I guess they're sort of where the Bears were, right? When the Bears had to find out with Justin Fields. - Right. - But I think, you know, people in Chicago will probably see some parallels where the Titans are now, where the Bears have been the last couple of years. - Albert Breyer joins us every Tuesday. We talk Bears in the NFL, right here, on cap and Jhood. - Follow Chicago's Home for Sports on Twitter at ESPN1000. Cap and Jhood are back. - On ESPN Chicago, Chicago's Home for Sports. - Albert Breyer is with us every Tuesday at 835, right here on the cap and Jhood Morning Show, on ESPN1000 and streaming on the ESPN Chicago app. Albert, are you gonna love this? You just wrote recently about Aaron Rodgers how he opens up to rehabbing his injury. This is, by the way, go to SI.com and read Albert. He just wrote about this a week ago. - My partner here to my right, loves the Jets out of the AFC. - I have the Jets going to the Super Bowl. It's ridiculous. - Okay. I don't have the stomach to do that, but I think they're in the running and I would tell you right now where the Jets are, reminds me of where the fucking years were in 2020. And what I mean by that is they've got the older quarterback who's a superstar, has been a superstar. And, you know, you're not maybe like 100% sure what you're gonna get from him, but they don't need him to be Superman. And like when I went and saw that team, I just, I really like how aggressively the attacks fixing the offensive line and going and bringing you to the entire and Smith and Morgan, Moses, and Olaf Hashanu, you know, and then John Simpson over from Baltimore. And then the defensive line looks terrifying with, you know, seven former first round picks up there. I just don't see a hole on their roster. There's not like this, not anything where you look at it and say like, okay, like they need to fix that. Like, is there a good? So, you know, I think at baseline, like even with like B plus B like players from Aaron Rodgers, they should be a playoff team in the AFC. And that's saying plenty. 'Cause the AFC, like we said earlier, is gonna be tough. We'd tough to make the playoffs out of that conference. You know, but I think they got the potential to go much further than just that. It just, it looks to me, it has a look to me of, you know, again, the team that Tom Brady had in Tampa, where they don't even need him to be Superman. But if he is Superman, again, they've got a chance to look the whole thing. - In terms of looking at our division, Green Bay obviously has a really good young quarterback. They're paying $56 million to, how good is their roster around him? - All right, thank you. - I really like the Packers roster. Now, I, you know, I think part of what you're gonna be looking for from the Packers is some improvement on the scheme defensively. And, you know, what I think is gonna be a tell is like what they're getting out of Kenny Clark and Rashan Gary and Devontay Wyatt, all those guys up front, right? Like, so they got a bunch of high draft picks, well-paid guys on their front, where, you know, they felt like they weren't getting quite enough out of those guys. So now, Jeff Halfley comes over from Boston College and is gonna be putting in a much more aggressive scheme, one that's more like the San Francisco scheme, where guys are gonna be getting upfield and into the backfield, right? So, like, are they able to get more out of, like, what I think is a pretty talented defensive baseline, you know, that way, and bringing over Xavier McKinney from the Giants should help as well. You know, and what I like about where they are offensively guys is just they have a bunch of players who are gonna grow up together with Jordan Love, right? And it's Romeo Dobbs and it's Christian Watson and it's, you know, it's Dontavian Wicks and Jayden Reed and Luke Musgrave. And they just, like, I don't know if there's a superstar in the group, but they've got really good balance among all those players. They've done a good job developing offensive lineman. And then Josh Jacobs comes in as a guy, kind of the head of the snake. And, you know, it was interesting to me, seeing some of the stuff out there on Jacobs this week, where, you know, Chiefs had made a real runner them. And, you know, I just think it's, like, I just think there are another one where you look at it and it's like, I don't know, if they can shore up, like, the interior, they're offensive line. I don't know if there's a real, like, glaring hole on the roster. So, you know, again, like, they look like a team that I think should be able to challenge the lines of the NSC. And I actually think, you know, I think the North is probably the strongest division in the NSC right now. And one of the two or three strongest divisions in football, just because of the depth. And, you know, what the Bears can be. And how I think Minnesota is going to be able to navigate so much challenges ahead of them, too. - What's hot on your phone right now, something you haven't told anyone else? - Oh, geez, well, I've been kind of, like, I've been kind of buried in this quarterback poll, honey. So, I'll give you guys in Chicago a little something. Got a couple of ballots with Kayla, like, so I do this every year that you guys know this, right? So, way after the cut down before the season, so everybody has a full context for the offseason night. I send out ballots and I say, give me your top five quarterbacks at the end of the year, right? Like, not the top five right now. Who you think the top five quarterbacks are going to be at the end of the year. And I'm looking at my grid right now, and my home is going to be a number one. Oh, like, runway number one, obviously. I'd burrow Alan, Jackson, those guys will probably, those guys will be two, three, four, I think, in some order. And then Sprout is actually, Sprout might actually wind up being number five. Kayla Williams landed on a couple of ballots. (laughs) - Wow! - So, there you go. Kayla Williams has gotten on a couple of ballots, so, I can say he's the only rookie that's shown up on any ballots. And he's gotten on a couple of them. I'm not saying he's going to get, I'm not saying he's shown up on 10 ballots or anything like that, but I have, I think it's like, I think I have 59 in right now. And he's shown up on a couple of them. So, you know, like in this day and age, and what there is in the league right now, at quarterback, the fact that he's shown up on a couple of them, I think is a good sign for what people are seeing on tape and how, you know, like how they see a situation around and then Chicago too. - And this is executives and scouts in the league, coaches? - Yeah, basically what I try to do, Kayla, I try to, I try to like, it's got to be somebody who in some way touches the quarterback, right? So, it's a head coach offensive coordinator, head coach offensive coordinator, quarterback coach or people who evaluate them. So, WGM, pro scouting director, assistant general manager, director of player person. Now, I send them out just to people who I think in some way are charged with evaluating quarterbacks, right? So, it's a wide range of people, but whoever it is is a relatively high level person who in one way or another, you know, has evaluating quarterbacks on his plate. - Albert as always, we appreciate the time. Thanks for coming on the show. - All right, thanks guys. Have a good one. - Have a good week. (upbeat music) ♪ Rattle, rattle, thunder, batter, boom, boom, boom ♪ ♪ Don't worry, call the correct snake ♪ - Yeah, I have a career for our money morning quarterback and SI.com every Tuesday on The Captain J. Good Morning Show. - Thank you.