Another Sports Podcast
Jeremy Swayman, NFL preview, Patriots
All right, so I'm back at it at recording these. I'm gonna try again to make this a thing. I really hope that you guys enjoy it. It's just gonna be sort of a way for me to have fun and just sort of talk about what I enjoy sports. So let's just start out with, before we get to the big subject of the week, which is obviously football. Let's start and talk about this Bruins situation with their goaltender Jeremy Swamin, who remains unsigned before they head into camp. Today, the, or actually the past couple days, the Bruins have been back in the facility that captains practice. Some players have been speaking to the media. Most notably Brad Marsh on the other day. Today, I should say, where he mentioned that he's not going to talk about his contract situation as he's entering the final year of his deal. Sort of kind of putting the kabosh on any sort of drama. Meanwhile, the goaltender won't stop talking about his contract. He is a restricted free agent, if you are unaware, unsigned, can't be signed for the next, he is restricted for the next two years. So they have him under control for two years. It came out last week that from Rich Keefe of WEI, he reported, I guess you want to put in quotations, a rumor that he heard that Swamin was looking for a $10 million a year contract, which would put him basically third, I think, in the league, in terms of goaltenders being paid. And then it came out today on the Spit and Checklist podcast through Barstool. Ryan Whitney said that he heard that the Bruins had offered Jeremy Swamin a four-year $6.2 million contract. So the two sides couldn't be further apart, it seems like. It's definitely a bit of a tricky situation that the Bruins have painted themselves into a corner on. They traded Linus Olmark earlier in the offseason before the draft, reacquiring their own first round draft pick from the Ottawa Senators. And they did that before they signed Jeremy Swamin, or maybe even before they really even had contract discussions with them. And it's sort of now in retrospect, and I was obviously one of the people that wanted them to trade. Linus Olmark wanted them to get something for him as he was entering the last, his last year of his deal. And Swamin had clearly outperformed him last year and led the team in the playoffs, played well in the first round against Toronto, and was really the main reason why you want to use the biggest difference maker. He really carried the team on his back, even in that Florida series. So obviously I think Swamin is the better guy, but in retrospect you sort of look at it and go, well, you kind of threw all your leverage out when you traded the only the other option to start a net who was a guy that was on an affordable contract. He was at $5 million for this one year. What he gave you a buffer to figure out what you were going to do a goaltender in the future. Obviously Olmark is a little bit older, and Swamin is 25. Sorry, I just dropped something. Geez, that was loud. But it would have gave you some time to figure out that whole goalie situation, which frankly, I don't want to pay a goaltender $8 million, $9 million a year, which they're gonna end up doing. He's not gonna get 10. He's crazy for asking for 10. Obviously that could have been where he started at. That 6.2 could have been where the Bruins started at, and obviously they're gonna come someplace in the middle. The deal is gonna get done. That's not sort of the problem. It's more willing, is he gonna miss training camp? Is he gonna miss time with the team? He has until December 1st to sign a contract so he can play this year, which so obviously he needs to get a deal done before that point in time. But I think the Bruins are gonna end up caving. That's sort of the issue, is that they overrate and overvalue their goaltenders, and again, they sort of painted themselves into this corner when they were in a really good leverage situation. They had another guy. They had another start in goaltender who won the Vesna, and they traded him away before they had figured out what they were gonna do with Jeremy Swamin. It just goes to show sometimes they just mis-manage their own roster. A lot of times they mis-manage their own roster. Another thing is why would you want to spend all this money on a goaltender when you got all this money invested in defense? They just gave Nikita Zadoroff a big contract. He's making six, not really that big, but you know he's making six million dollars a year. You got McVoy's making 9.75 or 9 and a half somewhere in that vicinity. Lindholm makes six and a half. Carlo I think is in the four and a half, five million dollar range, so you got all this money tied up in defense. You've clearly invested a lot of resources, a lot of draft picks, free agency, into your defense. Why would you go and spend eight million, nine million dollars on a goalie when you don't have a second line right wing? Especially with the Bruins' track record of drafting and developing goalies, they have this Brandon Bussey guy who's been with the team for a little while now. I'm gonna look up what his numbers were. I actually don't think he was that great in provenance last year, but they seem to like him enough that they've signed him to an entry-level deal, and they won't get him on the roster for some reason. He's a big guy too, he's six foot six, but yeah they have clearly shown the ability to draft, develop, and you know roll on to the next goalie. It's pretty much been you know Thomas, and then it went to Rask, and then now they found Jeremy Swamin and Leon Solmark who they signed in free agency, but when we look at Bussey's numbers, so he had a 913 save percentage last year, so it wasn't that great. Nothing really to write home about, but obviously not terrible, he's not terrible. But yeah, they seem to not want to roll him out there. They when they traded Omar, they got this Jonas Carpisalo guy who's been throwing around the league a little bit now, was not good in Ottawa last year, and he's gonna be the backup, and they're paying him $3 million on their cap hit. So if they signed Swamin to an $8 million year, they're gonna have an $8 million year contract, they're gonna have $11 million tied up in the goaltender position after they just spend all this money on defense, and it just doesn't really make all that much sense. You had a guy that was making five, why didn't you just keep him? If you didn't want to pay Jeremy Swamin, which it seems like they're dragging their feet on, definitely something to consider. And not to mention he's kind of annoying too, because he won't stop talking about his contract, and his agents obviously keep leaking stuff to the media. So that whole situation sounds like it's a bit of a mess. I'm not too worried about it though, as far as it getting done, I just know that when the contract comes out, it's gonna piss me off. That's all. I just know that once the deal is finalized, it's gonna be too much money, probably too much term, and I just don't like tying up all that money in the goaltender. I just don't. Okay, so obviously we'll move on to the bigger story, which is football. Back this past week with college football, I'll give a little tidbit on that. I did go to the Florida Gators of Miami Hurricanes game on Saturday just to experience that sort of southern college football field, which I never had before. It was definitely a cool experience in the swamp, which the game was a little bit better. Florida just got stopped, but all in all, it was a fun time. I'm glad I did it. I did not go through a single metal detector, which was interesting, but it's an 80,000 C stadium, and there's no metal detector. But all in all, it was a good day, no one ended up getting hurt, so I guess that's not really a problem. Locally, Boston College gets a big win on Monday night. They go down to Florida State, who is found away to be 0 and 2 after week 1, after they lost to George Tech over in Ireland the week prior. So after being ranked 10th, going into the year, they're now 0 and 2, so and they're already out of the top 25 in the latest poll. So big win for BC. Not usually big on BC sports, but Bill O'Brien being hired over there, I'm an O'Brien guy like I might always found him to be an entertaining character, I guess. So I'm rooting for him over there in Boston College, and hopefully he can at least add some juice to that program. BC hasn't been relevant in football since Matt Ryan, and even then, I mean, it was a little flash in the pan. If they could build something, you know, that'd be really cool just to have that sort of atmosphere around here. We haven't really had any big college football games around here, so just that they can be competitive. I think that would be a giant win. They don't even have to really make the playoff or win national championships. It's just just if they can be a team that's, you know, hosting consequential games in the college football season. That that'd be enough for me as far and for a lot of people, I think, because this is always going to be a professional sports down. It's never going to be a college football city, though I will say as we're moving on to the NFL, with the way the Patriots are, BC might be, might be the football team to watch if you want to watch some quality football. Obviously, week one of the NFL kicks off tomorrow. The defending champion Kansas City Chiefs, back-to-back defending champion Kansas City Chiefs, I should say. They're taken on the Baltimore Ravens rematch of last year's AFC Championship game, and definitely the buzz for football is back. I was a little worried. It didn't really feel like it was that much buzz maybe a month ago. Kind of feels like it was sneaking up on us, and I feel like compared to last year, the buzz isn't necessarily the same. Maybe it's because there just wasn't that many big moves. There was a lot of big moves made the previous two-off seasons. Didn't really feel like it was that crazy this year. I also think that the Chiefs have kind of a little bit bored people or crushed some dreams of a lot of fan bases with the back-to-back Super Bowl wins. I think there's just a lot of people that just don't feel like anyone has caught up to the Chiefs. It doesn't really feel like anyone really made major steps during the off-season to close that gap between the Kansas City Chiefs and the rest of the league. But no one's three-peded in the NFL, so there's got to be a reason for that. It's tough. It's tough to win back to back. It took 20 years basically for there to be a back-to-back champion. The last time it was done was the 03-04 Patriots, so Kansas City was finally able to do that last year. Chiefs are still vulnerable in some spots. They don't have the greatest weapons. It's going to be hard for them to fall off when you have the best quarterback in the league and the best quarterback. It was a generation in Patrick Mahomes and you have still have Travis Kelsey. They have a really good defense and the best defensive coordinator in football for a long time. Steve Stief's Bagnolo and Andy Reid calling the place on offense. They're gonna obviously be there at the end. That feels obvious. You can pretty much pencil them into the AFC Championship game. I don't think of barring a catastrophic injury to, you know, Mahomes or Kelsey. It's hard not to see the Kansas City Chiefs in the AFC Championship game. But sort of, is there anybody in the league, especially in the AFC that can catch them? And, you know, the AFC does, there is a gap there for that second best team in the AFC. It doesn't really feel like there is a definitive answer this year. Most years it's been the Bills. The past few years, most years it's been, some years it's been the Bengals and some years it's been the Baltimore Ravens. The Bills feel like they've fallen off a little bit. I think people are writing them off a little bit too soon. I don't know why I got a little bit of a gut feeling that they've been the popular pick for everybody to say that they're gonna disappoint. They're not gonna do this. They might not make the playoffs. They might just be a wildcard team. A lot of people seem to really be bearing the Bills. And whenever that happens, I usually feel like there's a, you know, a reminder. Afoot, but who knows? That's gonna be a tough division with Miami and the Jets. That'll probably be end up being the most watched, I feel like. You know, Miami has never really shown their ability to win big games down stretch and the Jets. I feel like people are discrediting the Jets just because they are the Jets. But they do have, you know, one of the best quarterbacks of his generation, Aaron Rodgers, and they do have a lot of talent all over the field. So, you know, you have to, just because they're in an app, in an organization, and for sure this is gonna be a short window for them before it all comes crumbling apart, which it's definitely going to come crumbling apart at some point shortly, too. You still have to give them the benefit of the doubt of they have the talent, they have the quarterback in theory. They could, they could make a run. Are they gonna be good enough to beat Kansas City? Yeah, probably not, but I definitely could see them winning the division. And, yeah, Cincinnati's another team that, Cincinnati's my team that I think is when they're healthy, they're the biggest threats to the Bills. Now, they are a little bit of a House of Cards. They have been feuding with their best wide receiver who is holding in kind of for some reason. I mean, he's not in a contract year. It's a little bit of a tricky situation, but he hasn't been practicing with the team. It's been a whole story. It's definitely something to watch this weekend to see how, if he even plays against the Patriots, but if Cincinnati can keep their head on straight and stay in the quarterbacks and stay healthy, that team is my team that I think is going to be the best to beat Kansas City this year and knock them off in the AFC. I'm not as big on Baltimore as a lot of people seem to be. I just don't really know, they don't really have that much star power outside of the quarterback. Obviously, John Harbaugh, I got that right, right? Yeah, John Harbaugh, good coach. I don't know, they just don't do it for me. I just see them as I think that if everyone else is healthy, I don't really think that they're as good as the other teams are in that conference. But I am a big believer in that. I think that Lamar Jackson is too great to never win a championship and he's had a few cracks at it now. I think eventually he's going to break through. It could be this year, I guess. It could be this year, it could be anybody's year. But I don't think that this Ravens team is all that inspiring. I know they got Derek Henry, which to me, whatever, I feel like he's not going to be the same player that he was in his heyday in Tennessee. He'll still be a threat in the red zone, but I don't know. I don't I don't see him being the force that he was in Tennessee. He's had the foot injuries. He kind of sounded like he was going to retire and then now he's gone over to Baltimore. So I don't know, he might be cooked. But yeah, I feel like it's going to be tough treading in the AFC. It's hard to find a team that's better than Kansas City. They really need someone's going to need Kansas City to fall in their face in a big moment to knock them off. They're going to be there at the end. They're going to be whether it's the AFC Championship game, the Super Bowl. They're going to be in the game and late in the game, they're going to have the chance to win the game and it's going to be a matter of if they turn the ball over or they end up driving down field scoring at the game when he touchdown. You just know that that's how their season's going to end. It's going to end with Patrick Mahomes with a chance to either go to the Super Bowl or win the Super Bowl and it's just a matter of which which team is second basically in the AFC. In the NFC, I do think that it's wide open. Every obviously everyone seems to think that the 49ers are still the team to beat in the NFC but a lot of bad vibes going on with that team. They had a giant contract dispute with their one who was their best wide receiver last year, Brandon Iyuk, finally ends up coming to agreement on a deal last week and then obviously their star left tackle Trent Williams, another one just signed this week. Christian McCaffrey missing practice with a calf injury and fucked a really messed up story. Their first round draft that gets shot outside of a fan event. Yeah I don't know, just bad juju, bad vibes going on with that team and they've been knocking out the door for a while and they haven't been able to cash in. It feels like they're probably gonna take a backslide. I do think their division is a little bit better than it was last year too. I think the Rams are better. I think Arizona could be better this year now that Kyler Murray's a year removed from his ACL surgery. Elsewhere in the NFC a lot of people it's gonna be boomer bust for the Eagles I feel like. They got all this talent on offense. To me it feels like it's too many cooks in the kitchen, too many mouths of feet and obviously there's some beef there with the coach and the quarterback and people questioning how good the quarterback even really is. I think it doesn't sound like it's gonna be a great situation and then obviously in that same division you got the Cowboys who are always gonna be you know they seem to even no matter if they're good or not they're always some level of dysfunction going on. They are gonna have the looming threat of Bill Belichick over their season all year as Mike McCarthy is in the final year of his deal if I believe he's a lame duck coach at the moment and he needs to desperately win playoff games or he's going to get shitcanned over there in Dallas. A lot of people are on Green Bay but you know Green Bay kind of came out of nowhere last year and you kind of wonder about teams like that. Jordan Love obviously had a great year. It is first year as a starter. Kenny Carey that over. The Lions, another team that everyone's big on but I don't know you know another team that feels like they were a flash and they were building for a little while there. It wasn't like it just came out of nowhere. It was definitely there was a slow creep into it but I don't know when when teams have big jumps in success you kind of wonder if it's legit or if it was just sort of a flash in the pan. Trending to leaning towards because of the Lions and I know I just made the same point with the Jets but the Lions don't have the quarterback that the Jets have nor do they really have as much talent as the Jets do. They have a good offense but I don't know the Lions could could fall off as well. I feel like the NFC is wide open. I feel like it could be any team in the NFC. There's a good amount of them you could pick from. There's gonna be teams in the NFC that at the end of the year I feel like that you're gonna be like wow where they come from and then there's also gonna be teams that be like well what happened to them. Yeah it should be should definitely be interesting. Meanwhile here in New England things probably aren't gonna be very interesting for at least the first month or so of the season. The Patriots obviously named Jacobi Reset their starter for beginning of the year which is fine by me. I'm okay with sitting Drake May the third overall pick for a little bit so he can learn behind a veteran quarterback. It's not even really a percent per se. I just don't really want to throw a rookie in their first game all the pressure with a bad team. It feels like setting them up for failure. It feels like setting them up for to be Mac Jones so I appreciate that they're being patient. Obviously the messaging seems to be all over the place. They got a rookie head coach in Jerrod Mayo and he's sort of acting like a rookie head coach to the media. Yeah it's definitely tricky what's going on there in Foxborough. The offensive line is a complete train wreck. They don't really have a left tackle. The receivers seem to be trending upward. They haven't had any weapons the past few years but they draft Jalen Polk in the second round this past year and he sort of has popped in the in training camp. The Javon Baker kid not so much but at least they seem to have identified a wide receiver in the first two rounds. Finally and DiMario Douglas I guess has had a good train camp so as far as the weapons go probably might be better than it was last year. The Kendrick Bourne I know is gonna be missing the beginning of the year on PUP but yeah it's the offensive line. It really is the offensive line and it's just hard to imagine them really doing anything if they can't protect the quarterback and obviously it seems like Jacobi Brissette is gonna be the sacrificial lamb to go out there. It's really an interesting situation because I can't really think of another time. There's obviously been quarterbacks that were drafted before they were put in to start or well that didn't start immediately after they were drafted but I can't really think of another time where there was a quarterback that's drafted and then he is sitting behind a guy who it's just a giant open secret that he's going to be benched at some point in the year. Like that's gonna be an interesting dynamic especially early on or if they start losing games if they lose the Cincinnati on Sunday and then if they follow that up with another loss to Seattle at home if you start piling up losses how are you supposed how is the Jacobi Brissette supposed to gain any respect from his teammates. That's sort of I mean any anyone with the brain is gonna look at him and be like you know buddy you're not really the starting quarterback you're just a placeholder because the management doesn't feel like we're good enough that this guy can start and it feels like it's gonna be a massive situation and I don't feel like really anyone's talking about that that I can't think of another time there was a quarterback that it was just open that I mean maybe the the only other thing I can think of is maybe Tyrod Taylor and Justin Herbert but I feel like it was pretty open that Justin Herbert was gonna sit that first year and it ended up being in you know maybe it was not an accident but Tyrod Taylor ends up getting a punctured lung from a from a paint shot and Justin Herbert gets put into the game it gets put into the season that's the only one I can really think of where there was a guy sitting a veteran guy sitting there that's was basically just a no-one placeholder where it was just a giant open secret that he was gonna get benched during the season and that's pretty much where it is unless Chicago we were set plays out of his mind and leads the team to multiple victories that they shouldn't have won there's just it it feels like it's inevitable that Drake May is gonna get in the team knows it everybody knows it it's just a matter of is it it's gonna be interesting to when do you do it is it a planned thing is it you just wait and see cuz you know the second that Chacolie Brissette who's not who's not very good he's not that good he's gonna they're gonna have times on offense where they can't move the ball and immediately every fan on Twitter on X on anything is gonna be in the stands is gonna be calling for Drake May to get put in there and I know that a lot of fans feel that they should be patient but when you're being forced to watch Chacolie Brissette on a weekly basis we'll see how patient people actually are I know that I'm not looking forward to it I know how good Chacolie Brissette is he's a good backup quarterback that's pretty much what he is if you have a quarterback that goes down and you need to put and you need to put a backup quarterback in Chacolie Brissette's one of the best guys that you can have do that situation once you name a guy like that the starter it's usually not that pretty and I feel like it's gonna be a lot of what it was last year which is the offense isn't gonna go anywhere he's gonna be people say you know he notoriously doesn't really throw interceptions but he's been bad in training camp so if he's throwing interceptions he's not leading the offense down the field at all it's not gonna take long for people to want Drake Mayan and I think I wonder what dynamic that's going to cause I I truly do I don't I don't think it you can look at that and say that there's not gonna be some sort of weird situation going on there it sounds good in theory but the practice the actual execution of it is gonna be interesting to see as the season goes on because you know what's to say Sunday Chacolie Brissette goes out there and throws three interceptions and the team loses 31 to 6 you just know that everyone calling any radio station the next day is gonna be like I can't watch this for another month or two please put Drake Mayan you just know that's what's gonna happen so I don't know it'll be interesting to see how the team deals with that it'll be interesting to see both upper management and the coaches and the players because again if you're a player on the team how can you look at Chacolie Brissette and I know he got named a captain which you know kind of shows it probably could have been a pity vote but it's like how could any vote on the team look at him and be like yeah this is this is the guy we're gonna rally behind it's it's it's really interesting but yep that's all I had for you guys thanks for listening and take care