Grant and Danny
Full Show- Thursday, August 29th, 2024
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Whether you love true crime or comedy, celebrity interviews or news, you call the shots on what's in your podcast queue, and guess what? Now you can call them on your auto insurance too, with the name of your price tool from Progressive. It works just the way it sounds. You tell Progressive how much you want to pay for car insurance, and they'll show you coverage options that fit your budget. Get your quote today at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates, price and coverage match limited by state law. Dear Autumn Leaves, you won't be covering roads alone this season. Toyota's lineup of cool, colorful vehicles is ready to ride by your side. Take on fall in a trail tackling Tacoma, or go for the powerful tundra. Head to toyota.com for more info, or visit your local Toyota dealership today. Toyota, let's go places! 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The sharpest rides, affordable, sexy, sharp. Hey NFL fans, you can start the season with a big return on Fandal, America's number one sports book. So when you get a hunch in the middle of the game, you can check out the latest stats, view live play-by-play, and so much more on the same page where you place your bets. You'll get started with $200 in bonus bets, guaranteed, when you place your first $5 bet. That's Fandal.com/sportsfan. Never waste a hunch and make every moment more with Fandal, an official sports book partner of the NFL. Must be 21 plus and present in Colorado. First online real money weights are only $10 first deposit required. Bonus issued is now a throwable bonus bets that expire seven days after receipt. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fandal.com. Gambling problem, call 1-800-522-4700. Good Thursday afternoon and welcome into Grant and Danny. It's August 29th, 2024. We have an excellent show planned for you today, including general manager of the commanders, Adam Peters, on this program, a little over two hours from now at 4.15. So make sure you're listening at that time. We'll get to ask Adam Peters, all of the things we've been wondering about. Many of you guys have been wondering about. We're also going to preview the college football season today with Danny Canell, who stops through at three o'clock in one hour and Ben standing of the athletic. Does a really cool annual piece where he puts out questions to agents for a survey all over the NFL and the first of a couple of pieces that he's going to write on the responses he got, dropped in the athletic today. We'll talk to him about that and the commanders coming up at 6 o'clock right here on the fan. We'll also be giving away tickets to seed Kevin Hart. He has a show at D.A.R. Constitution Hall in town. Those tickets today available for you. Right at 6 o'clock when Ben Standing joins us on Grant and Danny here on the fan. Danny, how are you? Dude, this is a big one. I like it. He just listed a whole bunch of things that are pretty awesome, right? It's happening. We are now in the season is starting. The rosters are formed and barring something unforeseen. We are go time Dylan Cruz had a nuke last night. We'll get to it in a second. Just all of a sudden, all of a sudden we went to the darkest, my friend. We did it post pandemic. Everybody's losing some teams are rebuilding. Some teams refuse to rebuild whatever a lot of losing a lot of bad. All of a sudden the arrows are starting to trend up for the local squadrons and I like it. Yeah, I was actually talking to someone on like a business call about this today. And they're like, how are things going with the show? How are things going at the station? I said, it's a really fun time to be talking about sports in D.C. And if you look at it from a 10,000 foot helicopter view, that has not necessarily been the case over the last couple of years. There was optimism and excitement that Dan Snyder might sell. And then a big party that we threw literally and figuratively last summer when he did sell. But really prior to getting a high enough pick to draft a quarterback with the potential of a Jaden Daniels, getting a new owner and building a front office was awesome. But until you have the chance to be good at quarterback, you really don't have anything. The commanders now have that for the first time. The nationals have been in what has been a long, not fun rebuild. You can see the light at the end of the tunnel with James Wood playing like a star and now Dylan Cruz getting to the big leagues over the last couple of nights. Two excellent young future impact major league players. The capitals had an awesome off season. We're closing in on hockey a little over a month from now. We'll be on the precipice of the NHL season and preseason hockey will be even played at capital and arena at that time. But they made a ton of moves and really tried to, I think, push some chips back in to make sure that they're competing into the playoffs and maybe for one more run with Alex Ovechkin, which we'll be talking about over the coming several weeks. The wizards are terrible. Yeah. Listen, people are going to make their jokes and that's fine. They're not going to be any good. They're going to be horrendous, but maybe they get Cooper flag. Well, but it looks right out of my mouth, at least it's for a purpose now. At least it's not Ernie Grunfeld selling the future to win one more game or just sort of middling pathetic, trying to build from the middle nonsense. They're actually playing the game. There's, you can be bad as long as it's for a purpose and there's a purpose here. I love it. So everybody's doing kind of the things that I've always wanted done when it comes to trying to get good. It's happening. Football's going to carry us in this first segment in most segments and most of the day with Adam Peters coming on the show and so much going on around the NFL. But we'd be remiss if we didn't start with Dylan Cruz hitting his first missile at the major league level last night for for his first 11 in his first three games. The Nat's getting a series win against the Yankees. Danny, I needed a cigarette and I don't smoke after the first couple innings of baseball last night. James Wood with two hits and three stolen bases and an RBI knock and Cruz had already homered and Jacob Young was running wild on the base paths. All the rookies, all the kids were beaten up on the New Yorkers as the Nat's took a series from the Yankees. Sorry about it. It was a lot of fun and it all got started in the lead off spot kicking off the game with Dylan Cruz in just his third career game and the pitch swung on it high in the year to left field for Dougal going back. Still back to the warning track to the wall and it is gone. Goodbye. Bang soon goes Dylan Cruz with a majestic soaring fly ball that just kept on going. Head of the back of the Yankees bullpen and left center field. A game lead off home run his first to the Major League's. I got a text from a buddy who's in baseball who's as plugged in and just studies it as close as anybody that I know. And he said it perfectly last night. I'm sitting in my house. It's like close to 11 o'clock. He said, dude, he's like, I love Dylan Cruz. He's been studying, you know, since I was you. But he said, he's going to do something every single night that's going to help your team win. And that's the early. That's the summary. It's only been three games, but I mean, you could go back to when LSU won a national title or what he did in minor league club houses. Maybe there's no elite trait. Maybe he's not going to hit 40 homers or still 50 bases or win a gold glove in center field, where I think he's really good, by the way. But he does everything well. And it's not like what we would call 50s in the scouting industry of a 2080 scouting scale. 50 is average, 60 is plus, 70 is elite, you know, 80 is world class Hall of Fame type stuff. Everything is 60. It's like he's really good at everything. Yep. He's a really good hitter. He's got really solid power. He's a really good defensive player. He's really good with his arm strength that he's been clocked almost 95 already from right field. Made a great running catch in right the other night. He's already showing it. Now there could be an 0 for 14 or a 1 for 20 coming. It's not like he was dominating a double layer triple A, but you and I make this case all the time. Just like progress isn't linear. Numbers are not just bound to go down at a certain rate at each level. The fact that pictures throw it over the plate more in the big leagues helps some guys, right? The fact that he's really good against velocity. He's seeing more of it. Maybe is going to be a benefit to him in some way. We'll see. But through three games, two wins, first hit on Tuesday night in a multi hit game, first homer last night in a multi hit game back to back four for his first 11. Artie has a steal. Artie has a really nice play in right. You're seeing it, man. This is what we all were hoping for when he was drafted number two over. Yeah, that's why we're here. It's to me, it's the whole point. Last night it's on. It's on display. No, Suj Abrams in the lineup, but Mackenzie Gore was filthy. I thought he was really good again. They win the game. I always love beating the Yankees. I like when they lose. I like when the nats win. That's fine. My big takeaways. I've got like six or seven things that I would like to see. I saw most of them last night and you also get a W out of it. But you mentioned with Dylan Cruz that that's the perfect summation. You go to the ballpark and he's going to do something that helps. It could be in an 0 for 3 with a couple of punch outs game, right? There's going to be something that he does that's productive. That's just a good baseball player. And I know I sound like Scott McCone talking about a ball bar or a football player. That's a baseball player. Sorry. Sorry about it. There's going to be something that he does whether there was a play the other night. Not just the really nice running catch that you've mentioned up against the wall, but H what would be tricky for someone that doesn't play that outfield spot. He's on right field. It's an opposite spins or right-hander hitting a ball that slices, you know, kind of cuts past you. If you haven't done that route a whole lot, it's weird. So you go back turning over your right shoulder, they're going to run back that way. And then it's going to spin behind you. Guys have been corkscrewed and turned around and dropped ballsman. He made it look like the most effortless, easy, simple Cadillac big league catch. And I went, he made a really hard thing, which is going to do a lot of, look like it's the simplest task of the world like he's playing catch out out in the backyard with his dad. And you go, that's what this is, right? The really hard made to look easy or attainable or just normal. This isn't, and he's not normal. If the nats are off today, they'll be back in action right here on the fan tomorrow. The Cubs are coming to town and all of a sudden the cubbies are hot, trying to make a playoff rush, got a chance to be a wild card team. So if you're going out to Nat's Park, probably a good time to remind you that we got some gear that you might want down the stretch of the season here. James Wood, Dylan Cruz, both in the lineup. Upgrade your gear, the latest from the fans merch store. We've got a Cruz Wood 2024 election style shirt. We've got your, we've got wood hoodies if you want those for the fall. And fittingly after last night, Cruz missile t-shirts as well. Go to 106 seven the fanshop.com if you want to get your hands on that gear. Before we get back to football, and again, it's Grant and Danny home of Adam Peter's exclusively today as he joins us at 4 15 right here on the fan. Make sure to spread the word to your buddies, please. I'm going to have to get over this. And I need your help, Danny. Okay. I want Darris to help me. All right. Clary, feel free to tell me you're doing too much. You're annoying me. I can't deal with the strike zone for James Wood anymore. I can't do it. I am so bothered by it. I'm now so obsessed over it that in this imperfect thing, where occasionally a ball is going to get called a strike. Like my blood pressure raises. I can feel the anxiety picking back up and my anger and like, if you're around me, I become insufferable. It's absurd that the pitches that get called strikes against this guy. And I tweeted about this a couple of weeks ago and a bunch of people sent me some research and some pieces that have been written about this as it pertains to Aaron Judge, who's the only other guy like basically James Wood in the sport, six, seven plus. And judge for years has dealt with this where balls below the strikes don't get called strikes because it's an actual problem that the umpires cannot adjust their eyes quick enough and figure out. There aren't that many Richie Saxons or you know, six foot seven foot monsters, yeah. There was a six pitch at bat. James Wood struck out. He did not lift the bat off his shoulder, which in and of itself is hilarious. But that's it. If you know James Wood, you know, that's possible. He is here to get his pitch and he will not swing at stuff that's off the plate. He was ahead and account five O and took a strike in the middle of the plate and he struck out, which is to say five balls, one strike. He should have been at first two times and not like close like, oh, that could have gone either way. Like five straight pitches that were not really close to the strike zone. And he's ahead five O and what was actually a three, two count. And then he took a third strike and I'm losing my mind and my just steam coming from my ears. I need to get over it because it's just happens. But what I really need is an electronic strike zone because it's absolutely absurd. He's going to be so much better even when he gets that because I don't know anyone who gets screwed out of more pitches over the last month or so in baseball than that guy. So your version of that or let me rephrase my version of that thing you can't get over. Yeah. They won last night. What's the headline? That base running thing, the base running nonsense at the major league level. Trying to steal and getting thrown out. I can live with that even even, you know, get thrown out of third. It's a cardinal rule with this group that doesn't hit a lot of home runs and it's tough to get base hits. Being a third base with two outs, that's worth it to me. You've maybe forced some action from the pitcher or maybe take certain pitches off. Maybe you get a wild pitcher or passball or something. I don't getting thrown out stealing. I'm fine with right. If you're stealing and you get picked off, I can even live with that. It's the pick offs. It's whatever this Benny Hill music nonsense is where they do stuff. Little leakers, little leakers would get yelled at for like, oh my God. This is the major leagues. This is my thing. I'm I'm screaming again. It's in a win. They end up not knitting the run. Although you probably could have used an insurance run or two there, but nobody seems to have either anywhere with all to fix it or it's this like slippery slope or one guy does something that everyone has to feel like they do something because there's pressure. I don't know what the fix is. I just know I was benched for less millions of times before I learned my lesson to cut doing that crap to cut it out. It's so embarrassing. It was the worst base running play I've ever seen in my life, not in exaggeration. In the big leagues, I guess I should say, although I'm not sure I've seen anything worse at a youth baseball park, just an utter shabingus and a complete debacle. All right, let's we'll wrap up the baseball conversation here, but let's play this clip from last night because this was just a disaster on the base paths in a win in a fun series. But it's entertaining almost to hear the call because the put out was like seven, eight, two, six, four, three, nine, two, one, six, seven, if you're scoring at home. It's a passcode and the pitch swinging a drive hit well to deep center field. Judge going back way back to the warming track, it's over his hand and one hop off the wall. Gallo held up now rounding third. Now he's gonna have to keep coming. He's gonna be caught in a rundown. Now Gallo getting back to third. They have Yepas in a rundown between second and third. Now Gallo breaks for the play. He's in a rundown and Yepas is running back towards second. They're gonna tag Gallo out and Yepas caught between second and third. But it has to go back to second and Tina caught between first and second is tagged out. Yepas ends up on second base. That's a disaster. That's the synced jags punch to the stomach there is perfect. By the way, what a call by Charlie. Let's play horse race or baseball play an insider baseball. Like there's plenty of things over the course of the game that I would feel okay about calling right now. That's one of those you need the reps for. There's just no way to call that without stepping all over yourself and sounding like a fool. Have you haven't been doing it since day one? Like Charlie Slow says that was a very, very good call and a great ending to that call with jags saying it was a disaster. But yeah, absolutely wild. On to the NFL. Jacobi Praset named the starting quarterback for the New England Patriots. Drake May will sit. Do you think we see Drake May in September or would you say October or later? If they play. Yeah, week four is what I have in mind. Now what's that based on just a weird gut feel because I think they're going to struggle at the gate and that'll be like the exciting thing. So I think it's like week four, week five somewhere in there. They open with the Bengals a week from Sunday. Then they are hosting Seattle. They are at the Jets. Week four would be in San Francisco. I'll say they do not date against the Niners. And then they host the dolphins and the Texans back to back. I think they play them late October, skip ahead to like week seven. When they go to Jacksonville, you can drop them in against Jacksonville, the Jets, the Titans, the Bears, the Rams in that stretch. Just a weird situation where because they're inexperienced head coach has been pretty forthcoming with answers, maybe more so than you'd even like to be. He has said Drake May outperformed. Jacobi Brissette and that they were competing for the job. So you've acknowledged there was a competition that the guy that was better didn't win the competition. You have said this. What was the point of the competition? And everyone says, oh, I understand what he's saying. He's saying that Drake may outplayed him, but they're taking everything into account, including body of work and your career. Well, then it wasn't a real competition. If it was a real competition and you're acknowledging that the young guy was better, you'd start the young guy. I actually still think it's a fine thing for them to do because their line is terrible and they need to sort it out. And you might as well spend a month doing that before Drake May takes the field. So all is fine that ends well here if Jacobi Brissette can play decent football. But just a strange last month, they named Brissette, basically the starter going into camp. Then they opened up the competition because May looked better. Then they said, May had a better preseason in what was an open competition. And now they're naming the other guy the starter anyway. They're round of air called and gave you a thumbs up. Yeah, but they thought they had it sorted because their evaluation of Drake May was great prospect, poverty, it's a bit of work. I think he showed up on campus and energetically improved some of the things they were worried about or showed that he's actually probably more ready to go right now than maybe they thought. So it sort of changed their eye line a little bit, but I think they went with the original plan. College football started unofficially week zero, they call it this past weekend. But for all intents and purposes kicks off tonight with week one, Danny Canell is going to join us to break down the whole college slate this weekend and all the big storylines going into the season at three. If you haven't heard Danny on the show talking college ball in the past, make sure you're listening. He is tremendous, just fantastic talking about the game at that level. But some really good games tonight, including one that I'm particularly interested in, Dion Sanders and Colorado hosting North Dakota State, one of the top teams at the non D one level. That's an eight o'clock kick. It'll be televised on ESPN this evening. A number 11 Missouri is hosting a game tonight. Number 24 NC State as a tilt at their place as well, actually been to that stadium weirdly enough for a caps outdoor game against the hurricanes. Carter Finley, I think it's called in Raleigh, North Carolina, but it should be a fun night of college football, including with Colorado taking center stage for the first of many times this season with Dion and company being such a lightning rod for all things content. I can't help it. I don't want to tune in. I don't want to reward that kind of behavior, but I'm fascinated by what Colorado is and is doing. And I guess maybe that's the point, right? Like how, how brash and abrasive and how, you know, Dion doing things that I don't necessarily prove of, barring people from asking questions or whatever. If they've offered critical takes about him, this program, otherwise, don't know this story. There's a guy that they don't like how he writes about Dion Sanders in the program. He's got nicknames for Dion. He pokes fun at guys and it seems like it's taking personal shots, maybe as a way to describe it, although it could be a bridge too far, but nothing that is like completely unheard of, right? It's not like he's doing something awful. He just clearly doesn't like the way they're running the program. And they have told him that he cannot be a part of the press conferences and cover the team. Yeah, I generally can't stand the college football coach bully. I hated when urban Meyer used to do it. He would berate people for not being cheerleaders for his dumb Florida program where people were right now. We now know we're committing crimes. Like all the time under his his employer as players in his, in his charge. So stuff like that I never approve of, but I'm morbidly fascinated to see what Colorado is. Yesterday when we were on the air, Noah Brown signed with the commanders didn't really get a chance to touch the folks and get their thoughts on the move though. So we could do that moving ahead this hour next. How much do you think Noah Brown, the brand new wide receiver coming over from the Houston Texans is going to impact the commanders? Let's get into that next on Grant and Danny here on the fan. Hey NFL fans, you can start the season with a big return on Fandal America's number one sports book. So when you get a hunch in the middle of the game, you can check out the latest stats, view live play by play and so much more on the same page where you place your bets. You'll get started with $200 in bonus bets guaranteed when you place your first $5 bet. That's Fandal.com/sportsfan. Never waste a hunch and make every moment more with Fandal, an official sports book partner of the NFL. Must be 21 plus and present in Colorado. First online real money waits are only $10 first deposit required. Bonus issued is now a throwable bonus bet set expired seven days after receipt. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fandal.com gambling problem call 1-800-522-4700. Doors take us to summers away or winter adventures and afternoon getaways. Your dedicated Fidelity advisor can help you open those doors by working with you on a comprehensive plan to help you reach your wealth's full potential because doors were meant to be opened. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Whether you love true crime or comedy, celebrity interviews or news, you call the shots on what's in your podcast queue. And guess what? Now you can call them on your auto insurance too with the name of your price tool from Progressive. It works just the way it sounds. You tell Progressive how much you want to pay for car insurance and they'll show you coverage options that fit your budget. Get your quote today at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive casualty insurance company and affiliates price and coverage match limited by state law. The seasons may be changing, but the deals at the sharpest rides are unbeatable as ever. Hey, what's going on? It's your girl Tasha McKia and I need you to join the sharpest rides for their fall into savings events where they're offering incredible prices on their massive inventory. That's right, everything is on sale now. Shot from sleek sedans to rugged SUVs and sporty convertibles. The sharpest rides has the perfect ride to match your fall adventures. Plus with their exclusive financing options, getting behind the wheel of your dream car has never been easier. Log on and shop online at the sharpest rides.com right from the palm of your hands. Or check other massive inventory in person at the sharpest rides located 2250 South Sea home street in Inglewood. Either way, you will fall into savings. Don't miss out. Head on over to the sharpest rides.com today and explore the deals that make every season better. And tell them that your girl Tasha McKia sent you the sharpest rides affordable, sexy, sharp. Dear autumn leaves, you won't be covering roads alone this season. Toyota's lineup of cool colorful vehicles is ready to ride by your side. Take on fall in a trail tackling Tacoma or go for the powerful tundra. Head to toyota.com for more info or visit your local Toyota dealership today. Toyota, let's go places. Before we get into Noah Brown, the newest commanders will welcome you back on G and D a reminder for 15 today, Adam Peters, GM of the commanders right here on this show and one other housekeeping reminder. Tuesday night, this coming Tuesday, we will have our grant and Danny fantasy football listener league draft. It's just a great opportunity to get together with some friends of the show and some listeners who check out the program day in and day out. Anybody can come though and hang out with us. We're going to be at a restaurant at a bar and you can come take part in the festivities with us, even if you don't make the league, if you don't want to be in the league. We're just talking football, just hanging out in some wings. Exactly. It's going to be a blast. So if you want to be in the league, it is not too late. We should let everybody know that. We are closing down. There's something to tag you in on this. I have made you officially the bad guy this year. We're closing out any opportunity to get into the league tonight, right? That'll be correct. By the end of tonight, we'll we'll just go ahead and call it midnight. Midnight tonight, your last opportunity to be able to submit your form for the grand danny trivia contest that we're doing. That'll be located on our Facebook page, the grand danny Facebook page, as well as you guys's individual Twitter accounts. Pin tweet. Top of my account right now at Grand H. Paulson. I'm sure the same for Danny at funny Danny. If you want to be in the listener league, I have a link for you right there. You can go to facebook.com/grantondanny and dare you put together a little quiz on interesting tidbits from the show over the last year that if you listen enough, you'll do very well on the top 10. Make the league, I believe. That'll be correct. The top 10 will make the league. We will do the scoring tomorrow and we will announce those winners tomorrow afternoon on the show. That's awesome. That's fun, man. So get in by midnight tonight. Take the quiz. Make your attempt at getting into the league. But regardless, if you're in or you're not, you can plan on Tuesday night being with us and the big draft to hang out. It's a good hang. Come kick it. It's going to be a good time. Good opportunity to heckle too, right? Because if you're not drafting, you're not making any wrong picks. So as we walk up there with the sticker and slap it on the big board, even if you think it's a great pick, you don't have to say so, you could say it's bad. You say you're stupid and you're, you're fat, Danny and you're, you smell and your haircut's weird. You know what I mean? Like whatever you want to do, you can do. Highline R and R is where we're drafting on Tuesday night. Love that spot. It's on Crystal Drive in Arlington, Virginia over in the Crystal City area. And we will be there throughout the evening on Tuesday for our fantasy draft. So those are the details. Can't say we didn't try to help you get into the league. But now on to Noah Brown, the wide receiver cut by the Texans, signed by the commanders who at one point last season got an opportunity with a bunch of injuries and shined in a good offense with CJ Stroud, feeding him the football. He had a two game stretch last year where he was the best wide receiver in the league statistically went six for 153 and then seven grabs for a buck 72 and a touchdown against the bucks and bangles respectively. The rest of the season, he was largely not much of a factor, but he is flashed. He has shown that he is big. And that's the key. I think to him coming to DC Danny, the size, right? He's going to provide something that is lacking in the receiver room. He could take the lid off the defense. And you and I both think he's going to play very quickly. I do too. Now how fast he fully gets up to speed and he's integrated into everything. I don't know the answer. I don't, I don't know how hard it is. I don't know if he's got a photographic memory and it's encyclopedic within 24 hours or if it takes him like a normal human being, a little while to learn the brand new language, where to line up and how learn the quarterback that he's going to be playing with, skiing, design, what's asked of the beach and every play. It's probably not fair to say, all right, on Sunday, you're going to get 10 targets. Let's see what happens. That's, that's a tough ask for anybody. But I think this is their second best wide receiver. I don't know if that's inflammatory to people, but I don't think much of that room outside of Terry McCorn. And I think opposite him, this is the perfect, you know, there, there are obviously more marquee players, bigger stars as number two receivers. But this is the kind by design of player. I would try to have opposite McCorn. I would have the big deep threat, the guy that scares you to take the top off the defense to let Terry work where I would want him to work, which is that 20 yards in hand. That's where I think he's really, really good as a technician. That's what I want. I want the deep threat. Look no further than a guy that averaged. What was it? 17 plus yards per catch last year? Please and thank you. I don't think it should be controversial at all to say he's their second best wide receiver. I mean, we're a long ways removed from him being a seventh round pick. I don't think that's how he's necessarily viewed anymore. He broke out in Dallas. Remember, this isn't a one trick pony. Yeah, two different stops. Really a one hit wonder, I guess, is what I was looking for where he just suddenly emerged for a couple of games with the Texans. He actually was better the year before, again, climbing a depth chart where he wasn't supposed to be a big deal in Dallas and making over 40 catches for over 550 yards. Then on a new team and a new offense that to your point, he had to learn pretty quickly with Houston. He was able to emerge and have some huge games. If you look at PFF grading, not gospel, but just part of what I would say is an insight that I want added to every puzzle that we're going to put together here on the show. Terry McLaurin's grade last year as a player on offense was 75.1. Noah Browns was 74.3. Terry McLaurin's receiving grade last year was 74.5, which is really, really good. Noah Browns was 75, slightly higher graded. Now, they don't take sample size into account. I'm not suggesting he's a better player than Terry McLaurin. The army Brown, if he played 11 plays last year and played them all very well and ran good routes and made a couple nice blocks would grade out very high as well. My point is just to say it doesn't really matter what metric you're looking at. He should grade out higher than a guy in Diami Brown who caught 12 balls last season, or Alamo de Zacchaeus, who despite having an excellent camp and a terrific preseason, and I feel very good about what he's going to provide in the slot and around the line of scrimmage, Noah Browns been more successful, more of a factor in the league the last couple of years than Alamo de Zacchaeus. So I don't think she could any heat for that take at all. That does not seem hot to me. That's not even warm. That's just a, that's just a take. Well, people who are so reverential towards, you know, front offices and they decide that a guy before he's even played NFL down, like a Luke McCaffrey or, you know, because they've seen Byron Pringle or now Diami Brown is going to break out, of which I'm not going to hold my breath on. No, no, no, those are the guys. So if you're, if you're one of those in filling the blank executive we trust, automatically, whatever pill they hand you, you just swallow, maybe you might be offended by that. So I guess maybe that's who I'm referring to when I say that that was my, my semi-hot take. But this is how I would design it, right? If I'm able to sort of, you know, take the names off it, I'm doing Madden, create a player, I would go, I'd have one receiver that's quicker work, you know, again, kind of works that 20 yards and in, great hands, tough as nails, does everything asked of him, like MacLaurin, and then I'd have the deep threat, right? Now, ideally that guy's got some size as a deep threat as well. And that's what Noah Brown is. So history's been filled with a number of players that have had lesser roles in stacked rooms, right? Think Pierre Garçon in Indianapolis, for example, you're, you're the number three with Reggie Wayne and some other studs there. Or, you know, a guy that's a running back in some places that he goes to another venue and gets it, it gets a better shot. Or a guy that's a part-time starter goes somewhere else and thrives. History's littered with guys where you come from pretty good places with pretty good rooms. You're, you're, you're capable, but you're just a victim of numbers. You go somewhere else with a larger role and you can thrive. I'm not saying he's a pro baller. I'm not saying he's going to, you know, catch 1200 yards worth of balls. What I am saying is I think he's going to help a lot. Totally. A couple other numbers that I just think are interesting. And I'm only using MacLaurin as the comparison because he's the guy here that we know is really, really good. MacLaurin last year after the catch struggled a little bit to the point where when we talk to Dan Quinn, we royally, we have not talked today on this show, but when the media talked to Dan Quinn in town, one of the things he said that MacLaurin was really working on all off-season going into camp was the ability to make plays after the catch, to extend plays, to break tackles, to do something after he caught the football. Last year yards after catch per reception for Terry MacLaurin, 4.5 on average. Noah Brown, 6.7. That's two plus yards. It does not sound like a big deal. From an average standpoint, that is massive. Massive deal. Now that speaks to the scheme and the offense and probably how wide open he was and how much separation he got, maybe even ball placement from a quarterback, shroud being better than how, obviously, there's a lot of things that go into that, but that's not nothing. I mean, this is a guy that was a rumbling big presence after the catch despite his size. You mentioned 17.2 per reception, MacLaurin last year, 12.7. Different offense, not as prolific, but he can take the lid off a little bit. Now flip side of this in area where he struggled, I thought it'd add. Last year, MacLaurin was graded with four drops via PFF in 128 targets in a 79 catch season. Four drops, 128 targets on just 54 targets. Noah Brown dropped five passes last year. They played together at Ohio State. These two guys, they know each other well. They're both Buckeyes. One was drafted in the third round. It looks like should have been drafted probably in the first or second round. In Terry MacLaurin's case, probably the first round. Noah Brown was a seventh round pick. So I'm not pretending like he's coming in here to be AJ Green or something. Right. That's not what he is, but there's some things I really like. So next, let's do this. Over or under on projections for him. Let's set him at 49 and a half catches and 499 and a half yards. Using his last couple seasons plus the projected role here will come up with basically a 50 catch, 500 yard, standard wide receiver two and a not great offense kind of numbers. Would you go over or under that? We'll do that next. And we want to hear from you guys, your thoughts on Noah Brown and the commanders. Grant and Danny on the fan. Dear Autumn Leaves, you won't be covering roads alone this season. Toyota's lineup of cool colorful vehicles is ready to ride by your side. Take on fall in a trail tackling Tacoma, or go for the powerful tundra. Head to toyota.com for more info or visit your local Toyota dealership today. Toyota, let's go places. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Whether you love true crime or comedy, celebrity interviews or news, you call the shots on what's in your podcast queue. And guess what? Now you can call them on your auto insurance too, with the name of your price tool from Progressive. It works just the way it sounds. You tell Progressive how much you want to pay for car insurance, and they'll show you coverage options that fit your budget. Get your quote today at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates price and coverage match limited by state law. Doors take us to summers away, or winter adventures, and afternoon getaways. Your dedicated fidelity advisor can help you open those doors by working with you on a comprehensive plan to help you reach your wealth's full potential, because doors were meant to be opened. Visit fidelity.com/wealth investment minimums apply Fidelity brokerage services LLC member NYSE SIPC. Hey NFL fans, you can start the season with a big return on Fandal, America's number one sports book. So when you get a hunch in the middle of the game, you can check out the latest stats, view live play-by-play, and so much more on the same page where you place your bets. You'll get started with $200 in bonus bets guaranteed when you place your first $5 bet. That's Fandool.com/sportsfan. Never waste a hunch and make every moment more with Fandool, an official sports book partner of the NFL. It must be $21 plus in present in Colorado. First online real moneyweights are only $10 first deposit required. Bonus issues now withdrawable bonus bets that expire seven days after receipt. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fandool.com. Gambling problem, call 1-800-522-4700. The seasons may be changing, but the deals at the sharpest rides are unbeatable as ever. Hey, what's going on? It's your girl Tasha McKia, and I need you to join the sharpest rides for their fall into savings event, where they're offering incredible prices on their massive inventory. That's right, everything is on sale now. Shop from sleek sedans to rugged SUVs and sporty convertibles. The sharpest rides has the perfect ride to match your fall adventures. Plus, with their exclusive financing options, getting behind the wheel of your dream car has never been easier. Log on and shop online at the sharpestrides.com right from the palm of your hands. Or check other massive inventory in person at the sharpest rides, located 2250 South Sea Home Street in Inglewood. Either way, you will fall into savings. Don't miss out. Head on over to the sharpestrides.com today and explore the deals that make every season better. And tell them that your girl Tasha McKia sent you the sharpest rides, affordable, sexy, sharp. We did it. We got back to football season, people. I'm going to drive out, hit the beltway toward Tyson's corner to Marshall High School. Watch the little high school football tonight. Here we go. Love a high school game. Not too far from old rainy, do you? Yeah. Oh, really? Yeah, it's not bad. Welcome to bring the boys out to see the Annandale Adams. Exeter to off field bellway. Yeah, the hot dog wrapped in foil. Big fan of popcorn, a little butter. Is that Marshall? Is where you headed? Marshall, the Annandale Adams are on the road tonight against Statesman. Got to go watch that match up. Got to see it. Or some are saying the biggest match up in the state of Virginia this year. That's what some are saying. Just tonight, though, probably the biggest match up in the state tonight at Marshall. I said Marshall, right? That's in Fairfax, but I will be there. Not far from Pittman Hills record. And then I'm going home to watch Colorado. And then for the next several months, I know what I'm doing. It's pretty much locked in parking in front of my TV football, man. Football. It's the thing. It's the thing you like and I like the thing. We did it. Fantasy drafts everywhere. So much DFS in my near future thinking, you know, I probably have the right line up here to win all that money. Like I got it. No one else does. I figured it out. Not going to lose any leagues. It's my best. I'm only going to win leagues. David is in Sterling on Grant and Danny here on the fan. David, we're talking Noah Brown and the commanders. What's up, buddy? Hey, hey, guys. Thanks for taking my call. Just to start off, I watched your what you posted Grant yesterday of all his catches. And I really liked what I saw. There was just catches over the middle seem like 15 to 20 yards every time. And taking defenders and other five yards. I think it actually going to be a pretty good marriage for us. I'm looking forward to watching it. I mean, he just does some things that they don't really have guys doing here, based on being 62 and 215 in breaking dig type stuff. Second level behind, you know, linebackers. They needed it. They got it. And I'm happy that they did. Well, ask Adam Peters about the process that resulted in Noah Brown ended up in Washington and whether or not there were other teams vying for his services when Peters joins us among the other things we'll cover. Brandon, I you might come up here on Grant and Danny, Adam Peters, 415 today live right here on the fan. So make sure you're listening. But what about those totals I threw at you? Let's go over under catches 49 and a half. So I think just under that, I see basically three catches a game when you when you average it out. I think there's going to be a couple of weeks. He doesn't see many targets. Just not what it's in the game plan. It's going to be grounded pound close to line of scrimmage. So you're playing the Giants or something like that. And you're on a rock fight and they're going to win 1612 or something. Let me go back then. If you're looking at it as like averages per game, how soon because it might not be week one, he's learning a lot of the offense. How soon until you think he's actually a starter who's playing a lot? A month? Okay. Does that seem crazy? And then you think he makes up for a little lost time to get to those average like to me, the way he gets it is big place. Like that's that's where that's why he's here. He's got that explosive thing. Otherwise, if you wanted someone to run another seven yard hitch, Byron Pringle probably has 10 guys who could do that with him. You know, the special thing is that he's big and fast enough to go down the field over the top. So it's not going to be every week. And I mean, think of think of think of the Sean Jackson ownership experience, right? Where you go, there are weeks, it's three for 21. And there's not much happening. And then there's that five catch, 200 yard, two touchdown and he can't go into the end zone normally has to like go sideways and then back in and he's already doing the celebration. And he barely crossed the goal line. We'll still holding the football. That's the experience. I'm not saying you're going to get that because the Sean Jackson is one of a kind, but that sort of deal, he's going to end up, I think with over the yardage totals, but under the catch totals. So the four 99 and a half, you would go over? I think he goes over 500. Wow. And so it's probably, you know, in that five 50 range with about 46 catches. So I got under on both. I'm saying like 40 ish catches for like 425 yards. Danny, I'm going to be elated if he's in the 500s. So you've got him number two on the team among receivers only. Yes. Like tight ends running backs, whatever. I think his fourth on the team and catches second among receivers. And if he's over 500 yards, he's probably in the top three in terms of receiving yards total. I don't know if Earth's is going to be healthy enough to get there. If he is, he'll get over that. Echler very possibly is going to be over there. But McClurens, the only guy that if healthy would be a lock to surpass that receiving total. So as excited as I am about this, it sounds like you even think this is going to be a more impactful, immediate return. Yeah, because this has been my stance and everyone is going to make fun of me for saying the same thing. They receive rooms. Not very good outside of term. Wait, hang on a second. I'm going to let me go over a pencil. Yeah, write this down. I've only been bringing up since the end of last season. You're the only one here is. Let me hear you say it. Here is the opportunity. The opportunity's right there. There's no Curtis Samuel. There's no Johan Dodson. Even if there was, he would have been the second best receiver in this room. Now there's especially no Johan Dodson because he was traded away for a future draft pick. The opportunity is golden. I don't think they're going to heavily feature it and do it like, I would like it done to, you know, to have it more wide open and do more to help Jaden Daniels. I think they're going to run and do things close to Lana scrimmage and feature Aclar Earth's and maybe send it as the year goes on. But there's an opportunity here for him to catch some passes and be explosive. My only cold water that I would offer pouring. I'm not going to dump it on you. ALS ice bucket challenge style. I'm just going to get a little bit of cold water in a cup. Okay. Sure. I'm just going to sit it next to you. Good. I do wonder a little bit. He was in a Shanahan offense with Bobby Slowick running the Texans offense. He was a head coaching candidate, was interviewing for jobs, including this one, I believe, this off season. And he played with an outstanding quarterback. CJ Stroud last year was a top 10 guy in the league. You could even have said a lot of weeks was at a top five level in football, whether he does that again as a sophomore where you'd rank him. It doesn't really matter. I'm not concerned with that, but he played at that level last year. You're no longer in that kind of offense. We're hoping Cliff Kingsbury delivers the goods, but I don't have the same confidence in his scheme that I do in the Shanahan scheme that has taken the league by storm and everyone's trying to replicate. And I hope that Jaden Daniels is really good, but I don't know if he's CJ Stroud. So I do think in the same way, remember when we were talking about a possible a you trade, you and I kept coming back to two big questions. How much of his production is like the guys around him and being in the Shanahan offense. And then the other one was like, how much of his production is essentially the fact that he is schemed open, so to speak. I think you could still ask some of those questions about Noah Brown too. And maybe the faders get turned down on those important elevating categories around him. Now, I still think with his size and the way he runs routes, all you got to do is be better than Deami Brown. There's never caught 15 balls and Zacchaeus who caught 10 last year and you'll you'll play and you'll help. This is kind of my point. Maybe that's the answer. But I do wonder about that a little bit like I can spread a wonder. Seven for 170 in a game probably had more to do a situation than just this guy's ready to go do that regularly. And that's why I'm not calling for it. That's why I'm not telling you they just unearth the next gem that's going to catch 65 balls for 1000 yards. I don't think that's the case. I think they got a nice complimentary piece who by standing taller than really short folks will thrive quote unquote in his role. Mid 40s catches in like 550 yards is not setting the world on fire. That's less than, you know, Jake Ferguson that tight ended last year. I like this too. Nikki Javala of the Washington Post tweeted this a minute ago. Jaden Daniels after practice getting an extra reps walking through details of routes with wide receiver Noah Brown. Oh, yes. Give me that immediately. So your quarterback being a leader just let's get this dude up to speed. He can help me. I can help him. Let's help each other together. Adam Peters GM of the commanders who traded for picks yesterday in the John Ridgeway deal and acquired Noah Brown via free agency will join the show at four fifteen. We'll ask him about those moves and many of the other big decisions he's made since taking over the team. That's coming up in about an hour and 20 minutes to spread the word Adam Peters right here on Grant and Danny at four fifteen. We've also got Ben standing of the athletic on the commanders today at six. But next, let's catch you ready for a big night and a massive season of college football with Danny Canell right here on the fan. Hey NFL fans, you can start the season with a big return on Fandell America's number one sports book. So when you get a hunch in the middle of the game, you can check out the latest stats, view live play by play and so much more on the same page where you place your bets. You'll get started with $200 in bonus bets guaranteed when you place your first $5 bet. That's fandool.com/sportsfan. Never waste a hunch and make every moment more with fandool, an official sports book partner of the NFL. Must be 21 plus and present in Colorado. First online real moneyweights are only $10 first deposit required. Bonus issued is now a throwable bonus bets that expire seven days after receipt. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fandool.com gambling problem call 1-800-522-4700. Dear Autumn Leaves, you won't be covering roads alone this season. Toyota's lineup of cool, colorful vehicles is ready to ride by your side. Take on fall in a trail tackling Tacoma or go for the powerful tundra. Head to toyota.com for more info or visit your local Toyota dealership today. Toyota, let's go places. Doors take us to summers away or winter adventures and afternoon getaways. Your dedicated Fidelity advisor can help you open those doors by working with you on a comprehensive plan to help you reach your wealth's full potential because doors were meant to be opened. Visit fidelity.com/wealth. Investment minimums apply Fidelity brokerage services LLC member NYSE SIPC. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Whether you love true crime or comedy, celebrity interviews or news, you call the shots on what's in your podcast queue. And guess what? Now you can call them on your auto insurance too with the name of your price tool from Progressive. It works just the way it sounds. You tell Progressive how much you want to pay for car insurance and they'll show you coverage options that fit your budget. Get your quote today at progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive casualty insurance company and affiliates price and coverage match limited by state law. The seasons may be changing, but the deals at the sharpest rides are unbeatable as ever. Hey, what's going on? It's your girl Tasha McKeea and I need you to join the sharpest rides for their fall into savings events where they're offering incredible prices on their massive inventory. That's right, everything is on sale now. Shot from sleek sedans to rugged SUVs and sporty convertibles. The sharpest rides has the perfect ride to match your fall adventures. Plus with their exclusive financing options, getting behind the wheel of your dream car has never been easier. Log on and shop online at the sharpest rides.com right from the palm of your hands or check other massive inventory in person at the sharpest rides located 2250 South Sea Home Street in Inglewood. Either way, you will fall into savings. Don't miss out. Head on over to the sharpest rides.com today and explore the deals that make every season better. And tell them that your girl Tasha McKeea sent you the sharpest rides, affordable, sexy, sharp. Welcome back to Grant and Danny. On the fan, a Darris Dameron Ryan Clary production today. This show is sponsored daily by our friends, the law firm Condorian Murad. They'll guide you and your family in the right direction. They'll help you to draft a well set up a trust and create a health care power of attorney. Schedule a free consultation with their estate planning attorneys at kmloyers.com. Be sure to tell them we sent you, you'll get a discount. kmloyers.com. My parents went to Condorian Murad. They're very glad they did. And they told me to tell you guys that it was an amazing experience. And that's why we are sending you to Condorian Murad here at Grant and Danny. Remember, you can sign up for our fantasy football league right now. Go take a quiz at Grant H. Paulson at Funny Danny to try to win your way in to the league, the quizzes available on our Twitter accounts or at facebook.com/grantanddanny. You've got to take the quiz, submit your results by midnight. The best graded quizzes are going to get into the fantasy league. We'll make the announcement on the show tomorrow. We are drafting on Tuesday in Crystal City. Even if you're not into the league, you can come hang out with us for the draft, be part of the night. It's going to be fun. We're at Highline R&R over in Crystal City on Crystal Drive in Arlington, Virginia. But let's get to the bet QL guest hotline. Bet smarter to beat the books, download the bet QL app visit betql.com. We are joined now by former ACC player of the year national champion Danny Canell via bet online to get the college football season started. Danny, we are fired up. You have you back on the show. Grant, Danny, what's going on fellas? I'm fired up to talk to you. You know what that means, baby? It is time for some action. It's been a long off season. There's been a lot of speculation about a lot of teams. Like who's going to look like what? What's the conference realignment going to look like? We get to find out this weekend. I'm fired up. How different are things going to feel with this 12 team playoff system getting introduced this year? It's going to feel new and fresh and shiny and clean for a while, I imagine Danny. Oh, absolutely. I think this is one of the best developments we've seen in college football. Maybe in the last 50 years, like I was kind of excited when they went from the BCS to the 14. But I was like, man, that's still a really small number of 14s out of 130 that can make it. And going to 12, I think the most interesting aspect to it. And some people don't like this. And I'll give you an example. Florida State last week loses to Georgia Tech, my alma mater. In years past, that might have been a devastating blow. Like, man, you have almost no chance to work your way back into the top four. But you not only can win when you're way back in the top 12, you also can still win the ACC potentially, which is an automatic birth to the 12 team playoff. In fact, in a power four conference, it give you an automatic top seed in a buy for the 12 team playoff. So I actually like that. I think there's a lot of teams throughout history who have lost games early and missed out on a championship, maybe due to injury, maybe due to somebody starting that didn't wasn't supposed to, and they were able to play their way back in. Most importantly, though, I think the month of November is going to be that much more entertaining for way more fan bases. Historically, it's only been about eight to nine teams that felt like they could make it in that top four. Now we'll probably go 25 deep, and it'll be a lot of fun. It'll make more meaningful games in November that I cannot wait to look forward to. So I think it can be a really fun season. So we've had so many evolutions, right? I mean, you and I are old enough to remember when like Washington and Georgia Tech just shared it, no chance they would play. The voters just voted and that was the end. There was no ceremony, no nothing. Then we go to the BCS, then we got to go to this, this tournament. And the reason I wanted one more evolution was, I want that UCF magical season. I want them involved. I want that Boise State team to be involved in a playoff, whether they were going to win it or not. I just kind of wanted to see that. That's more fun than the sort of same collection of blue bloods. And I'm going, okay, now we got 12. It's going to happen. But is it? Does it still, is it feel like it's going to be more wide open or is it now? Well, we got two major conferences and it'll be, you know, five teams from each one and Notre Dame probably. How's it going to shake out? Yeah. Oh, it'll be largely dominated by the power conferences. So in the power floor, there's probably a super two, right? Let's be honest, the big 10 and SEC just go follow the money. That's always what you have to do in college athletics and probably anywhere else in life. Follow the money. They have the richest TV contract from ESPN and Fox respectively, the big 10 and the SEC. So I would, I would expect of the 12 for from each of those two. And I already saw Nick Saban making his productions trying to get five SEC teams in the 12 team field. Here's the one good thing, but I do think you better enjoy it before it goes away. There will be at least one group of five team in the playoff and it'll probably be that 12 seed, but they are guaranteed a spot. The highest ranked group of five conference champion will get a chance to play that role of Cinderella. And I agree with you. Like I was a, I was a big backer of UCF when they got left out that they should have had a chance. I was a fan when Cincinnati got a chance and actually I thought they held their own. They didn't beat Alabama, but they played Bama just as good as a lot of teams. And one of the things we love about the NCAA tournament basketball Cinderella stories, right? Like those upsets that first round we'd love seeing those. Here's the thing though. I think we could possibly get an upset. I don't think we see a Cinderella run to the championship game. They're just is such a big gap in the talent level. And while I say that, I do think so they're going to revisit the structure in two years. And I think we're probably closer to having the group of five teams have their own playoff system and their own champions as opposed to still getting access to this one with the big boys. Again, follow the money. Those teams are not going to like, like I can just hear it now. Greg, thank you to commissioner of the SEC when a Boise State gets in saying, well, our fifth best team would be favored by three touchdown versus Boise State. You know, he's going to make that argument and their voices carry a lot of weight. I don't think it should matter. I hate using that, you know, philosophy, using points, spreads to justify teams in the playoff. We've seen that before. I'm with you. I wish we could see that Cinderella type run, you know, still exist. But I have my stronger feeling that is after two years, that probably their chance goes away. Danny Canell, bet online, bet online. You can check out Ben online for updated college football, playoff, win totals, conference, Heisman and college football, week one lines. Danny, specific to the realignment in the super two conferences you referenced. What are the big storylines and for the casuals? What do they need to know about all the change going into the season? Well, first of all, it's going to take some a while to get used to, right? Like just speaking the lingo of college football, like I was doing a discussion on my radio show in the morning a couple of months ago, and we were looking for big, you know, non conference matchups and who the big 10 was playing. And I glossed right over USC playing LSU on Sunday night in Las Vegas, because I had forgot that USC is now a big 10 team, right? You see it, USC UCLA, like that to me just logistically compartmentally in my brain. It's going to take me a while to say USC UCLA or big 10 teams along with Oregon and Washington. The one thing also that I think fans need to know about, and this is why when both commissioners, when it was Tony Petini of the big 10 and Greg Sankey of the SEC, one of the things that they both have said is it's about matchups and it's supposed to be about the fans. And that is going to be really exciting. When you see some of these matchups on the table, like a Texas hosting Georgia as an SEC conference game, that'll be a ton of fun. Like the Florida Gators hosting the Oklahoma Sooners or just, you know, these new players at the party, you're going to see some really good match ups throughout the season. Every college football season in the past few years, there have been some weekends that have been kind of sleepy and you're like, where's the good matchup? Every single weekend, there's going to be some sensational matchups. Like there's going to be at least two or three because of the conference realignment. I still think you get better. I still think we should get to a place where everyone's playing the same amount of power for teams and we need to kind of iron that out. But I'll take some of these phenomenal matchups that we're going to see early this season. It's going to be a ton of fun. So we know the top of the board, a lot of the usual suspects here in Georgia, Ohio State, Oregon, Texas, Alabama, right there in your top five. Danny, give me a couple of teams that are maybe outside of that group, maybe 10 or lower, that you like, you know, maybe working their way up, making some noise that has the potential to disrupt here. Oh, I got, I got a few. Now, here's the thing, because I do think some people thought, oh, we'll open up to 12 teams. That'll bring parity because for a long time, it's either been Bama, it's been Georgia, it's been Clemson. It's like the same three or four teams, Ohio State, and it was great to see Michigan last year kind of shake things up and have a new player to the party. I think it'll be harder for some of these long shots to go through three or four games to win a national championship. But hey, the teams that could do it, I like it. I like Texas A&M, the Aggies. Now, they have a monster game this weekend against Notre Dame, come into town, Kyle Field, the place is going to be electric. They've got a quarterback and a guy named Connor Wegman, who has played a little bit and he's been really good when he's played, but the last two seasons have been cut short by injury. If he stays healthy, I think they could be the team that surprises. Of all these new schedules we've talked about, their schedule is still pretty favorable. And I really like Mike Elko, the job that he's done there as the new head coach coming over from Duke. They had Jimbo Fisher. There was always sort of some sort of drama coming out. There was issues with the crew. She had to kick guys off the team, got the scrunchled about playing time. Feels like they're more about business now. And I still think the one thing that Jimbo Fisher left behind was a pretty loaded cover. There's still a lot of four and five stars on that team. So if come together, I could see the Aggies being a fun bet from a long shot perspective, 45 to one. Another one that I'll give to you, another team on display this weekend. Now, I don't love their chances to win this weekend, but that's the beauty of this system. Like it doesn't matter. You could lose this game. The Miami hurricane, this is the most talented roster that they've had since joining the ACC. We're talking about 20 years. They've got the most stacked roster with four and five star talent and most importantly, a quarterback who I think is a difference maker in Cam Ward, who transferred in. He started his career at Inconnet Word. He threw 47 touchdown passes at the FCS, won the award for player of the year at that level, goes to Washington State, puts up two pretty good years on a team that's not that great, statistically had pretty strong numbers that he put up. Now he goes to a situation where he's got a back and Damian Martinez was another transfer portal edition the hurricanes made, pair that with a defense, which is out of some portal guys. And they've already been recruiting pretty well. All that being said, and I do kind of like them, if it all comes together for them, I think they could be that team. Mario Cristobal, the head coach down there, better get it going or else he's going to be facing some serious answers because I think most people, the win total for them is nine and a half. I think they should go over. I think even Miami fans feel like, yeah, that should be an over. If he struggles and they go eight wins or less boy, Mario Cristobal is going to find himself probably on that hot seat conversation the following season. But I like their chances to get it done this year. You can see why we love talking college football with Danny Canell, the former national champion at Florida state and fourth round pick in the NFL, joining us via bed online here on Grant and Danny. Danny, I actually want to hop up to the top of the rankings and the top of the board. Danny kind of glossed over Georgia, Ohio state, Dan Lanning in Oregon, Texas, Alabama with a new head coach, Ole Miss, everybody's kind of crowning coming into the season with Lane Kiffin. If you would just go rapid fire, if you don't mind a few thoughts on each of those teams and what you like and what you don't like or who's as good as we expect and maybe who isn't. So the favorites, I am pretty chalky like on my postseason, like final four picks who's going to win it. My pick to win it all was Oregon over Georgia. So a couple of the favorites in there, if you want a little bit better value, Oregon's at plus 750 as opposed to Georgia, who's a pretty heavy favorite. So the team that I did not talk about did not pick as Ohio state. And I actually, I'll steal this from Kirk Herp Street because I saw him say it the other day on Pat McAfee show, Ohio state has this loaded roster, right? That has never been the problem at Ohio state. They've always had talented players on the roster. The one thing they've lacked is both a mental toughness and a physical toughness, which is kind of crazy considering the talent they have on the team. How do they respond? Like how do they respond to that? Because they've been owned in the past three seasons by Michigan and they've got the opportunity. They have to go to Oregon in the regular season where they could have to travel, take this thing on the road. They have Michigan come into their place and then they have a Penn State game on the road. They'll be favored probably in every single game except for that game in Oregon. I think there's a chance they could be an underdog in that situation. But I'm very curious to see with this superstar team, how do they come together? Like how do they galvanize around each other? Most of the time when you see these national championship runs, you see teams that really have a lot of guys that come back, which Ohio State did. They had guys on the defensive side of the ball that could have gone pro, decided to come back. So I like some of the messaging coming out, but I need to see it. And the biggest question mark I have for them is their quarterback, Will Howard, who really is the only question mark. He played, he has a nice career at Kansas State, won a big 12th title there. But this is a whole different ball game going to Ohio State with the type of pressure you're going to get from your own fan base. And then I'll go with you to round it out. The team that has the fourth best plus 750 like Oregon is the Texas Longhorn. They are a team that I do think they'll make the playoffs. I do think they'll be in that 10 and 2 conversation. I've got them playing Georgia in the SEC Championship game. Quinn Evers, I think it's probably one of the more underrated starting quarterbacks in the country. Steve Sarkeesian always puts up pretty good offensive game plans. And oh, by the way, if anything happens to them, Arch Manning is sitting there waiting in the wings. My biggest question mark, what I worry about them is the defensive line. They lost a couple guys in the interior to the NFL and I'm kind of curious to see where they stack up. And then lastly, so I don't ramble too long. Two teams last year that were in the final four that I think we're forgetting about, Alabama and Michigan. Like Alabama, Kailen DeBore, they still have a lot of talent on that roster. By the way, he's got his quarterback, who was the finalist for the Heisman returning as well. They're not going anywhere. I think they'll have a say in this kind of finale and see if they can be in there in November. I think they'll be in the mix. And then Michigan, I don't feel quite as confident, but they have beaten Ohio State three years in a row and won the big 10. Like this is a team that knows how to win. And I think they're like sort of that perfect mix of talent. Plus you talk about chip on the shoulder, everyone, you know, picking Ohio State yet again. And they're like, wait a second. We just won the national championship and no one's given us a chance. If they figure out quarterbacks, they could be a team that could be reckoned with. Danny mentioned the Heisman. I'm throwing a couple of shackles on Jalen Millrow, I think, but there's some guys with some better odds. Who do you like and give me your prediction? I went super chalky and I hate it because the favorite never wins. I did pick Dylan Gabriel. Yeah, I had them to win the national championship as well. He's very, very similar to Bonix, like similar style of player. And he's going to be like, he's going to go down as probably the most prolific passer in college football history, which I kind of don't like because he gets an extra year like that's the college football record books are going to be skewered because of all these guys that have an extra COVID year and, you know, they're fifth and six year seniors. But he's still going to get that advantage of getting this sort of lifetime achievement award. I think he's going to put up monster numbers. And then I talked a little bit about him earlier. If you wanted a little bit longer shot, I do like Campbell or the quarterback from Miami. Think about the narrative as well as the quarterback who brought Miami back, right? That's going to be such a big storyline. If the Miami Hurricanes are relevant in November, he's electric too. He doesn't always play within the system. And I think Heisman voters love getting that Heisman moment. I think he's got some opportunities for that. So I like cam wars a little bit of a longer shot in that Heisman race. Danny Canell, Grant and Danny here on the fan bet online bet online.net. I don't know if you have question asking privileges of Colorado or not. I'm not sure if you're in the cool. Are you in the circle? I'm definitely barred. I am definitely barred. You had a little tough the last year me and Dion. I'm definitely barred. Yeah, you and me both. I mean, he doesn't know who I am, but he'd bar me if he did. I guess my question about Colorado, they played a night at eight. There's a slate tonight, by the way, top 25 games to watch, including 11 Missouri in action at home. A number 22 Kansas is playing, but Colorado on ESPN, eight o'clock kick this evening. I think it's going to draw the most attention. Where are you at on them this season? It was a very turbulent off season for Sanders in the program, but he's got a couple of the best players in America. Oh, it was a turbulent year last year for them, right? They started off on fire and then collapsed at the end. They fired their offensive coordinator, which was like the one bright spot of the team with the offensive numbers they were putting up. Like, I think you're going to see more of the same. The thing is, like, do we get the same type of fireworks that we saw to them? Can they beat on Nebraska again the way they did last year, which was one of their more impressive wins? They're in the big 12, which is kind of wild, like it's wide open. I think there's going to be some teams that are very evenly matched in the big 12. I know Shador is going to play really well. Travis Hunter is one of the best players in the country playing wide receiver and DB, which I love. But like, Dion is a circus. Like, the criticisms that he's taken are valid. Not like people are just making stuff up out of thin air. He brings a lot of attention. And for somebody who's a Hall of Famer and one of the best college players to ever play, one of the best NFL players, man, does he have some thick skin. But I think what Dion struggles with as a player, he could be brash and confident. And then he could go out there on the field himself and back it up and shut up his critics. I think he's struggling with being that brash, confident coach who feels hopeless when his team can't get it done. I think that's a struggle for him. And I think he's still trying to navigate that. To answer your question, like if I was going to lean one way or another, I think they're right around their wind total, which is five and a half. I think probably five or six wins is probably where I expect them to be. I probably lean under just because of the uncertainty. But at the same time, I wouldn't be shocked if they were eight or nine wins because they are a team that does thrive on the attention that drives on success. But I think a strong start is critical for them. Like tonight's game is not a cakewalk. North Dakota State has beaten six out of the seven FBS opponents they face. They are an FCS team, lower level. They have played the role of giant slayer pretty well. Then next week, they have to go to Nebraska where they'll probably be dogs. Like this the start of the season to me is crucial for Colorado because the one thing that we've seen from this circus atmosphere, when they face adversity, they don't always respond and they don't always handle it well. So very critical to the start of Colorado season. Check out Bet Online, updated college football, playoff, wind totals, conference, Heisman and college football week one lines, Danny Canal via Bet Online. We're keeping you too long. So we'll end it here. Just a little local flavor. We got a bunch of Virginia tech, JMU, University of Maryland, UVA fans, any thoughts on any of our local DMV, DC, Virginia area schools, anything that you like this season? Heck yes. I like the Hokies a lot. I do. I like Brent Pry. I like the job he's done. They have 20 out of 22 starters coming back. Their quarterback, Kyron Jones is really special. I do like them to go on the road at Vanderbilt this weekend. I would lay the 13 and a half and back the Hokies. But overall in general, you know, a lot of a lot of predictions and when guys look at it's very unique to college football because you can get a schedule that is completely different than some of the other teams within your own conference. Just look at the draw sometimes. They've got a very favorable schedule. They do have to go to Miami, but that's probably the one game that you look at or like there's two games. Miami and Clemson that they host. They're at Lane Stadium, one of the best home field advantages that I feel like, okay, those are games maybe they could struggle, but every other game on the schedule, I think they could win. So nine and three, I think, as well within reason for Virginia Tech. And if they kind of capture some magic, I think you can see a 10 win season. And then what happens? Are they in the playoff conversation? That could be really interesting. I'm mildly worried about the September 21st match up with Rutgers. But overall, I still like the Hokies this season as a whole. Danny, awesome as always, man. Enjoy the games tonight. And we'll catch up during the season, buddy. Thank you. Love catching up with you guys, man. Enjoy the game. Danny Canell on Grant and Danny here on the fan, assistant general manager Lance Newmark talked out in Ashburn today. And he said that the commanders got way more done from a personnel standpoint. And with player acquisitions, then he expected this off season. Do we agree? 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Your dedicated Fidelity advisor can help you open those doors by working with you on a comprehensive plan to help you reach your wealth's full potential because doors were meant to be opened. Visit Fidelity.com/wealth. Investment minimums apply Fidelity Brokerage Services LLC member NYSE SIPC. Welcome back to Grant and Danny on the fan taking you up to 630 tonight three hours from right now. We will be with you throughout the afternoon and evening live and local into the night at one oh six seven the fan the reason being known as tonight day off which is rare on homestand. They played at home yesterday. They played home tomorrow and they are off during the baseball season. How many of those do you think they get with their families at their houses? Seven eight maybe would say less you think I was thinking like two or three something like that tops normally that they build something in like a charity event or some type of endeavor. That's a good point yeah like an early season that's gala or whatever kind of deal you know. So I just want to get this out of the way. There was nothing particularly funny. A lot of people are tweeting me at Grant H. Paulson asking what was going on during the read. I wish I had a better story. You caught the giggles. What happened? Yes. I mean there was something funny said so right before I did the read we were kind of kicking around you and I like a couple of questions for Adam Peters who's going to be on the show at four fifteen and one of the questions that came up was what's it like to look in the mirror and to see your jawline and just know that that gets to be your jawline every single day which is funny. It's not that funny but it's funny little thing like wrote down jawline on the list of questions in front of me. I kind of moved on but then for whatever reason right before I started the read I just pictured him like looking in the mirror at his jawline and it just at that point I was like okay don't make it obvious that you're about to laugh and now you start tell yourself not to do something. Good luck. Good luck. So I wish I had a better story. There were times where Danny has ruined a read for me. I've done that with his flatulence. So yeah so to be very clear the instant Grant touched on on the microphone it sounded like a tuba through a megaphone went off and it came from me and it was my fault. You're talking about the last time. Yeah the time where I had a butt burp and it was loud and you couldn't concentrate and I ruined your read and I felt bad for you and the wonderful product you're endorsing. Everyone assumed in the glass menagerie in here Ryan and Dareson company and others sort of passing by. They're like what'd you do? Then I had done something this time. I was I was befuddled. My great starts starts chuckling looks at me and then everyone else looking at me I'm going I swear to God I didn't do anything. I feel like Charlie Sheen at the end of Major League. Like I didn't know she was. I swear to God. I'm just sitting there just totally guilty without doing anything. Yes I would like to take Danny off the hot seat. It was not his fault and I wish there was something hilarious that really isn't. I mean it's kind of funny. Just picture. It was just literally like in the mirror. The idea of what's it like to have your jawline as a question for him which is not something we're going to actually ask him or now maybe we have to I guess and just the idea of him like looking in the mirror going like you've got a good show. Yeah. Hey Adam what's up buddy. Let's show one. Thanks pal. Have a great day. That's it. That's all I got. There's not a whole lot more to it than that. His assistant general manager is Lance Newmark. He actually spoke today and he doesn't speak very often so this was kind of cool to see him a meeting with the media after the roster cut down and the off season that's now coming gone as week one really kicks off officially after the holiday day off for the players on Monday and they're actually going to be at the facility on Monday working I guess I should say but that'll be the next time that they're there because they're getting the day off tomorrow but Newmark talked about the fact that they got more done that they were able to make more moves and that from whatever the expectations were for this front office going into the off season to what they were actually able to accomplish they did more than he anticipated an aspirin today with the media. Well it's been it's been a very active five or six months whatever it's been every day we've come in here with the attitude of trying to get this better to make this team as competitive as it can be right away while also trying to build a team is going to be competitive for the long be competitive for the long haul so every day we just try to find ways to get better try to try to find ways to improve our roster improve our process whether it's free agency whether it's draft whether it's you know workouts whether it's you know going back on guys that have been hurt we try to you know look under every rock and and and find every opportunity to improve and we're trying to do that as best as we can. What do you make of that because I think you and I at different points have kind of been both excited and occasionally whelmed not under overwhelmed well well with what they've been able to pull off it was a busy off season the quantity was there yeah the quality maybe was underwhelming some in the sense that we both wanted like a really good wide receiver we both wanted a really good tackle and clearly if he's coming out saying we did more than we thought we'd do but what they thought was going to happen going in and what we were kind of expecting were two different things yeah so they kind of showed you what the thought was taking over a dreadful roster that went 4 and 13 needed a lot of turnover and I the way I interpreted it was we didn't think the Bobby Wagner's of the world would choose us right you know like a guy that's going to be in demand where you'd go we're gonna sign you to a one-year deal for not that much money Bobby Wagner would go choose you wouldn't think it's Washington because it hasn't been in decades you would choose I don't know something that's going to be good or a team that's on the ascent like like if Houston offered Bobby Wagner the same amount of money you probably choose there that's a team that's that's on the rise but maybe you want more of those little battles or those face-offs or you got guys that you weren't sure you were going to get you know it's like it's like a college coach you got you're waiting for signing day six different five stars you're hoping for three of them and you got four doesn't necessarily mean you're gonna wear everything but it just it's maybe more than you thought that was my guess as to what he meant I just took it to mean we made a lot of moves you don't normally make this many moves I mean by the time the season starts there's going to be probably 35 players out of 53 that were not here the last season think about that there's not another team in the league that can say that that is a massive overhaul so I just think he means how many teams went out and signed 25 free agents in the first couple weeks of free agency like the commanders did I think it's a quantity conversation that he's having he came from Detroit where he was instrumental in helping to build what was a really really good team with Brad Holmes the general manager there Dan Campbell Ben Johnson Aaron Glenn leading that coaching staff as the head coach and the coordinators but I always wonder when you go get a guy the way that I would do it and that's what Adam Peterson who are the ascending awesome teams in my conference let's bring as many of those people in that built that so that they can replicate it here how do you take those previous experiences like putting together a lion's team where you've got Jameer Gibbs David Montgomery Craig Reynolds in the backfield and Ammanra St Brown with Jamison Williams Khalifa Raymond and Isaiah Williams at receiver in a tight end room with Laporta and Brock Wright and Parker Hesse like they're loaded everywhere really good line golf and Henning Hooker at quarterback they're stellar on defense they're just aren't holes on that team he was a part of that operation so how do you try to then implement that here going back to you know you brought Dan Campbell and I think there's a lot of similarities between coach Campbell and coach Quinn in terms of um they really believe in team they really believe in brotherhood they really believe in um you know character and um love of football I think that um the kind of people we're trying to get here believe in football they believe in in work they believe in um you know team first and just that mentality that you see you know any anybody anywhere anytime there's really people that love to be around the game day in and day out and I think that's what we're trying to do here and that's similar to what I've done in the past as far as slogans go and that's like Hall of Fame tough guy slogan anybody anywhere anytime I kind of like it like it looks good on a t-shirt you need stuff like that I mean it is such a football cowboy bit like anybody anywhere anytime I'll fight you in a bar to fight you in my living room I'll just fight because I'm a fighter we'll do it on the moon I mean it's a little bit cringe but I love it in a way too yeah you just kind of it's football man that's that's this stuff is cheesy it's it's cheesy if you and me in the office space you know we're getting together at the m- the Monday morning staff meeting we won our attitude here at g&d our attitude is we'll fight you anywhere that's that's our ideas we're gonna work every single person around we will fight you anywhere here moon mars doesn't matter we're fighting all right okay we're are we we're fighting for ratings he was still gonna contract us Russell we'll slap him when he knew you know what no yeah we're not but it's football but in football you do it you fight you organize fighting not the actual fighting around a very wanted to get out of the league you claw with your fingernails but that in figuratively trying hard that's the fighting this was more on new mark on the changes that they made and it exceeding the original expectation I'm excited about where we are you know I think we're always like like we said we're always trying to get better but I'm I'm excited with what we've done I feel like we've worked really hard we've done a lot of things in every avenue possible whether it's free agency whether it's the draft I feel like it's a good balance of new and old you know that I think there's you know 22 players from last year's team on this one so it's some guys that have been here that have shown that they you know want to be here and that they've they've earned a spot on this team but there's also a lot of new energy and a lot of new excitement you know from the outside so it's a cool blend of of existing players and new talent overall like I said I feel really excited about where we are in the process probably we probably we're able to do a little bit more in this six months than I thought we were going to be able to in terms of player acquisition and getting to where I think you know we're going to be a fun team to watch so yeah it's been a great six months I'm really happy to where we are see that even speaks to maybe them getting to a point where they feel like they're a better team than they thought they'd be able to be coming off the four wins last season double play what's going on in our lives nothing to do with sports is next on Grant and Danny we are blitzing like always right at the top of the hour and 20 minutes at four remember spread the word please let everybody on the commander's text group that you've got no Adam Peters is joining us live at 415 right here on the fan. [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] Commanders General Manager Adam Peters on the show at 415 today and at six we're giving away tickets to see Kevin Hart at D.A.R. Constitution Hall. Plenty of reasons to stick with us here on the fan. Our double play comes your way driven by your local Washington area Honda dealer stopping for a great deal on the rugged and capable Honda pilot contact your local Washington area Honda dealers today. GPS you know I'm a gamer and per your recommendation I checked out blacksmith Wukong finally you were beating the drum on this yes from game developer which which company made it do you remember the developer remember which one of this I'm not telling you but you can just tell me if you remember I do you don't have to say the name of it that's the games that first all don't taught me or tease me like I said but that's the game it's it's absolutely not a but that's the game that's funny that's a good joke I remember when Grant joked I wrote a John in my journal it's from developer game science not a huge history about history I didn't play Order of War red ties did you loved it actually you didn't you liked it a lot red ties art of red tides tides I said art of war you liked it loved it how many hours did you think to completion 34 really that fast I forget I'm such a mole I take forever uh there are shades of ghosts of sashima in this game I didn't feel any ghosts of sashima I mean again I don't know why you say hurtful things there the in terms of gameplay fighting style in combat it's a lot of ghosts of sashima you got a little bit of the the blood souls kind of style you know from from software in terms of uh it's fun forgiving it doesn't allow just like a tank style to play long and short is this it's done incredibly well it's getting rave reviews I get a lot of sweets JP Finlay style uh for people like have you played it have you played it I got it I'm a couple hours in I'm hooked it's so well done we are in such a golden age of gaming and entertainment for people that love to stay home and I'm one of those people yeah it's so delightful but uh again early on I'm not really sure what the plot is I'm not even sure I care I'm having a great time going around leveling my character up uh beating bosses that are really hard figuring out how to overcome them really satisfying early early returns GP I'm gonna go eight and a half out of ten carbohydrates very early in the black myth wukong okay this looks like a pretty substantial undertaking here from being honest but um overall really really enjoying it have a great time and thank you again for the recommendation yeah my pleasure I'm just glad you finally listened I gave it nine buffalo wings out of ten I early on so how long you've been playing it probably two and a half hours three hours okay so at that point well I was clearly further along than you are yeah you know I take forever you know how I feel I slow on video games I know that about you um what I had thought at that point was I wasn't quite sure what we were doing with the plot yet but I was just being satisfied by the the fight against the the bad guys are hard to beat yeah and that was satisfaction boss fights me yeah you're the boss fights of the bosses yeah I call them the bad guys uh as you know yeah but uh industry term yeah at this point I didn't know the plot but wait till you find out you're gonna love it what maybe I will maybe I won't it's like they do well they're they're so excited to do plot stuff and it's like that's adorable could I just get back to destroying bosses with my staff like that's what I want to do sure yeah shades of ghosts of sashima in that way yeah the combat style is the same that's what I said the different stances the different you know sort of build that you have to do to make use of those different things I love the one where you balance on top of your weapon while someone was trying to hack underneath you yes how much fun is that it's time for my double play I had to go to the bathroom yesterday while walking to my car in the navy yard after watching some nats baseball and I ran into one of the little sports bar little restaurants in this area and they were doing trivia I'm here to tell you guys I dropped the ball clary you should be doing trivia all the time daris you should be doing trivia I am so bummed out that I was never a trivia guy I did it a couple times and both times I loved it it was so fun you go out with a bunch of people you're single you're young you're at a bar there's other people there they're single they're young there's no kids at home and you just have some beverages and some snack foods and you be merry and you answer some questions or you don't trivia man at a bar why wasn't I a trivia guy I feel like I should have been more of a trivia guy and I am here to tell Ryan who's the perfect age for it especially living in Arlington what you should be doing but daris who's a single guy go play trivia it's just a fun thing it looks fun I wanted to be like man I wonder if I just sit here if I could join a team and tell my wife I was at trivia night like it was just wacky questions I knew one of them I was pretty fired up it's so exciting when you know I mean it's just why am I not a trivia guy and I know now I'm just an old person with children and I can't do that anymore but I should have been I was I'm not even good at it but like that's my activity yeah it's a fun camaraderie at the table right now of course you can't cheat but it's fun where you're like I don't know and somebody's like I do because I took chemistry and you're like what how do you know that that's the thing I think if I would have done it I would have gotten serious about it I didn't have that like sports guy on my team you're our geography guy right daris you'd have been my weather guy my stadium guy yeah uh clary could have been my explained it all guy we have like a little bit of everything clary do you do any trivia you should absolutely add that to the portfolio we we do trivia we're we really used to a lot more than over the last few months here but we used to trivia like every Tuesdays and or Wednesdays it's right and it's awesome it was one of my favorite times going out I mean we went to solvens in claryndon we've been to like boardroom we've been to uh uh so you didn't have a home court you bounced around we bounced around everywhere there's a sports bar out in claryndon is what our impulse and I forgot it but first down first down first down would do one as well awesome time so our guy christian works on our sales staff now with also a comic he does a he does a trivia and comedy night at highline which i've done several times where we're going to be doing our draft run so he's he runs that pretty much every month it is the most fun i'm telling you he's awesome at doing that run in the trivia it's always like the right level he does it on the mic guy he does everything oh wow yeah very cool it's but fun if you're listening to me and you're between the ages of 21 and 27 there's no reason you don't have a weekly appointment at trivia go stick it up eat some wings why not what are you doing daris do you feel like you're too old you want to be at your house uh no it's actually a hole in my game i've always thought it'd be fun to do that to go to trivia nights um but yeah i just don't know anybody that's ever been like hey let's go to trivia i don't know it's kind of a hole in my game for sure i was driving last night out going home after seeing the trivia and i'm just like bummed out i'm like i missed that era i missed the time for me to be the trivia guy adam peters at 415 on grant and danny are blitz on the nats and the commander's next right here on the fan you're gonna peel back the curtain a bit here on grant and danny it's a mad dash of about way blitz today we're gonna get out a little early because adam peters is calling in right around 415 so again spread the word gm and the commander is right here on g and d exclusively coming up in about 15 minutes on the fan but let's get to our beltway blitz we're jamming two teams today into one quick little segment get you the latest on the commanders and right now the nationals our buddy mark zuckerman of mass and sports.com let's start with dylan cruz mark at his first hit on tuesday his first homer on wednesday back-to-back multi-hit games not too shabby for the kid in a series win against the Yankees no i think guys this was exactly who he is i think you saw all of it he hits for power he drives and runs he runs the base as well he plays the field well he he's not necessarily got the wow factor that james wood does in terms like individual moments but i think he's just going to be really good at everything all the time and certainly a 22-year-old who didn't look phased at all either i'm making immediately did you or doing it against the Yankees all the star power in that series i think arguably he rose the most of anybody i think he was the best player in the whole series mark mckenzie core was really good last night uh the the line overall doesn't look incredible but you know you you beat judges batney trickles one in the right field front rbi making your day look a little bit more pedestrian with two runs a lot two or runs a lot but i thought a couple straight starts now he's been mckenzie gore again which i think is maybe one of the most encouraging things about this stretch of the season yeah a hundred percent and the results obviously are good you want to see that but to me what stood out last night it was the stuff yeah the stuff was back to what it was in the first half of the year 97 98 with his fastball all the way through the sixth inning a good command of all his pitches he uh and didn't have those really long innings with all the foul balls driving up the pitch count and that kind of stuff and he had poised out there something did go wrong behind him he shook it off and got right back at it he feels like he turned a corner in the last couple of weeks you're obviously a long way to go still for him but if this is who we're going to see the rest of the way uh this is going to turn to a much more positive season than the least the way we shape you up here over the course of summer series against the Yankees was a blast and two wins clearly helped but free for all on the base paths rookies contributing everywhere you turn crews being up obviously did the heavy lifting there but james wood multiple hits and first two at bats with an RBI last night this team is a fun watch right now and it's september i mean that that's a win i think for this fan base no it was huge and and yes taking two of the free from the Yankees it's great but it's who did it it was all the young building blocks and you know they've had some young lineups out there this year but often it's a handful of guys who may be part of the future and then some others who we we know are probably stop gaps look at who they had out there the last three days in almost every case not all but in almost every case these were guys who were either supposed to be key pieces of the long-term puzzle or guys who could be part of it and i think that was the key to all we've been waiting through this for three years with this promise of okay the kids are coming the kids are coming they're not all here yet there's still a few more to come there's still obviously some other holes they have to address this winner but i feel like these last three days was the first time we truly got a glimpse of what a national team could look like that's ready to win by next year and the fact that they came together and performed as well as it did against that team that's me made this the most encouraging three-game series they've had in a very long time now for the part where the learners spend a little money uh mark how about the juxtaposition of crews and wood really quickly a little under a minute here but long-term is would the batman and cruise the robin or are they too different to say that or how do you view it yeah that's a good question i i mean i think they do compliment each other well not they're not really the same player at all physically speaking for one thing but also just the way they play i think like i said wood has the wow factor he's going to you know hit the ball hundred and ten he's going to be racing around the basis he's going to you know have i think more highlights i've looked at it this way i think that dylan cruz reminds me of the best version of anthony rendo the guy who he may not have those individual moments when he looked up at the end you're like wow this guy was really good at everything that he did um very solid doesn't go through slumps uh not streaky just solid all the time and if that's who he turns out to be that would be fantastic for them mark thank you as always buddy all right thank you guys appreciate you dude hit that local 53 sounder our guy Mitch tischler joins us to talk about that a foos ball team when he make a note brown Mitch gentlemen how are you uh i'm excited about him i think he's a guy who um i don't want to get too far ahead but you know you look at this receiver room and there's gonna be a lot of opportunities for guys to catch balls and if you think that jane daniel's is going to be the quarterback that i think he's going to be there's going to be a lot of yards to be to be had out there and he's a guy that can can help you out in a lot of different ways and so it'll be interesting to see how they how they implement them Mitch tischler monumental sports net beltway football thing Mitchell i'm curious about the defensive side of the ball confidence in what nerves about what i'm confident about the the front seven I would say and i'm pretty nervous about the the corner position i mean i think you've seen from dan clinton joe with the way that they like to attack a defense and there was a lot of success in dallas with creating turnovers but let's not forget that there were a lot of big plays that were given up out there and so i think it's going to be a you know a little bit of a change of direction for fans to get used to the fact that there might be some there might be some big plays for for defenses but they're doing that almost by design so they can try and create more turnovers and we're going to see those guys get up to the quarterback well and there's going to be a lot of times that those corners are going to be left one-on-one on island and they're going to have to step up and play well Mitch if Brandon Coleman is the dude and they and they have to look no further at left tackle than a guy that drafted to the third round what does that mean for this draft class in this regime oh i mean i think across the board you can look at this draft class and be excited about it obviously jadon daniel is who he is the brain involvement is able to step in and and be your starting left tackle i think mikey stainless steel is going to end up being kind of the guy over there as a slack corner and might play a little bit on the outside as well you got to be excited just about that the first half of that group and i think the biggest thing that we keep forgetting about jordan mcgee was on on pace to potentially be a starter as a fifth rounder or at least be a regular contributor before he got hurt he'll come back in week four and that's a fifth rounder that you expect it's going to play a lot too so i mean early on with this regime in this front office you're looking at a bunch of guys we're going to see a lot of time on the field and every opportunity to prove themselves mitch dish they're checking out monumental sports thank you buddy we appreciate you i appreciate you guys thank you see buddy good that is your beltway blitz speaking of the commander's roster who else would you rather ask about it than the general manager who put it together adam peters he is going to join us live next right here on grant and danny so spread the word we're going to be joined by the gm right here on the fan in moments you as the exclusive sponsor for our show the law firm condorian marad can guide you and your family in the right direction help you to draft a will set up a trust or create a health care power of attorney schedule a free consultation with our estate planning attorneys at kmlawyers.com be sure to tell them that we sent you to get a discount that's kmlawyers.com adam peters is joining us on grant and danny in just a couple of minutes the gm of the commanders just got a text he's getting out of a meeting here so we should have him in just a few moments right here on the fan i do think it would be nice if we extended a spot for him in the grant and danny listener league i think it would have thrilled it must be for him to get to like pull off trades and he could he could be the general manager of his own fantasy team like can you imagine how cool that must be to run his own team and get to like add and subtract cut players and trade guys i bet he'd be thrilled by the way in in some you know different universe a multiverse where i'm the gm of a real football team i would absolutely also have a fantasy team like i think that would be such a fun thing to do for me and my guys in the front office like lance newmark and and the various scouts and director of player personnel and college personnel like get together do a normal bit where you know we have a down weekend where we're chipping closest to the pin for draft order and like playing fantasy football with each other i think it'd be awesome i think you almost have to give it up not for any like conflict of interest things but just how much time do you really have and the amount of hours that these guys put in on football as their thing i'll bet the last thing they want to do in the world is deal with football is like how many cares is david's single terra getting this weekend it's like if you if you go to a family party or something danny ruey shows up and you know uncle steve is there and he's like did you see dylan cruz last night i did a deal and you just talked about dylan cruz for a few hours and then 20 hours off and on over the course of the week that's adam peter's the last thing that guy wants to do probably is have to work the waiver wire in his fantasy league you know what i mean that's right put a waiver claim on a tuesday for running back with some upside that's a handcuff we are 10 days out from the commanders opening their season in tampa bay against the bucks on sunday september 8th it's coming quickly and we are joined now by the architect of the 53 man roster the commanders put together the general manager of washington's football outfit adam peters adam you're back on grant and danny here on the fan thank you for the time how you been what's up guys doing well how you guys doing we're great man always appreciated let's dive right in how do you balance when you guys are making decisions as you're keeping players trading players drafted players or you know than the opposite of course how do you balance the right now versus the future in terms of what wins that tug of war yeah i mean i think you can do them both at the same time um but it's not so much a tug of war it's just but it is a it is a balance and um make no mistake about it i said this and i'm probably repeating myself a few times it's not a rebuild it's a recalibration and we are trying to win right now and we are you know we do have goals to be to be really good this season um but it is it is my job as a general manager and really in conjunction with dq and we make every decision together is to be good now and to build first sustainable team for the future to a team that you guys will so you can compete for championships every year along those same lines adam one of the things i've heard you say which i like a lot is you're going to do what is in the best interest of the team you know whenever anyone asks what about this player that you say we'll do what's best for the team but i think that could actually mean different things for every gm and for every organization when you say that are you talking about the 2024 commanders or are you like mike rizzo comes on our show occasionally who's got a one of three and a five-year plan what does that mean to you the idea of best for the team yeah i think um you know football is a little bit different than than baseball and and then hockey maybe where they they have a lot of developmental things that they're doing throughout you know getting guys from high school and all that but i think to to answer your question um i think every decision is it is its own decision and um you know the decision we may make on one player is different than the next player or whatever it is with a draft pick or anything like that for agency but i think it's more of just a reminder okay what are we doing we're trying to do what's best for the washington commanders for for the short term in the foreseeable future too so every decision you make you ask yourself that what are we doing and how does this make us the best for both of those things so it's a reminder but it's also a philosophy and how we do things adam peters with this here on grant and danny so kind of piggybacking off those first two answers adam what does success look like for you guys this year obviously you came in taking over a program you picked second in the draft uh you know last year's group was four and 13 there's been a lot of turnover a lot of change how do you view success this year versus where you want to be as you talk about committing for championships here hopefully not too far down the road yeah i think uh you do get in a trouble looking too far down the road and and so um again you know you're probably going to get a radio show fallically shape here but we're really uh i mean every single day we're trying to get better and i think that's how we look at it and and we got better today we had a really good day of practice today um guys looked really good the guys were into it before we have a three-day break before we get back and start working for tampa so um we went out and got a lot better today i thought and that's the outlook you have each day each week you're getting better and you're stacking you're stacking up days and then um if you do that and you get better each day you're going to like what it looks like at the end of the year adam i don't think that's going to make the headline after the interview for you know a radio show of cliche but stick aside like for you what's your wheelhouse what's the thing about being a gm that you've enjoyed the most now and your first time doing this where are you in your element is it watching film or just sitting around the boardroom with lance and the guys and then the other stuff that comes with this like doing media or doing interviews or being at the podium are you comfortable and feel like that's a fun thing or is it just that the thing you've got to do to do the other stuff like where you add in this new role well this is number one right here sitting with you guys totally everything else we knew that we got off after that so we've been dealing with how he roseman second sticking it up with his pals gnd number one i like that yeah how he's given you guys a run for his money for your money but um how i to talk about he's a great dude and i really love uh enjoyed learning from him and and you know probably not you know the most popular thing for our fans but he is a really good dude and a good person to do business so it's very straightforward so uh you love when you have someone who can shoot you straight but um to answer your original question um it's it's a lot of that it's all those things and and there's a lot of new things that that i'm doing here that i'm getting to really enjoy uh i think being with a group of people here that that we have together and getting to work together for one common goal is really cool that something you don't get to do in a lot of different professions but i think if i'm really if if you put a gun to my head and i said what's my favorite thing besides being on the grand danny show it would be uh being out on there on the grass with the guys and watching them practice and watching them interact and watching them get better that's that's really fun that the time we get to spend out of practice the second thing yeah that's if that's a perfectly fun number two all right uh Adam you you mentioned how he roseman and and i heard him years ago at the Sloan analytics conference talk about making moves and trades and different dealings and he referred to it all as just a modified form of betting right so if i was one of your players you'd be right to want to trade me away right so if you traded me away for a seventh rounder ostensibly you're making a bet that that seventh rounder in the future is worth more to you than me and again anything you could get from me is probably a win but is that how you view trades as if to say like i we're sort of making a bet about production or is there a different philosophy that you have when it comes to making a trade well i think first and foremost any of your first round in my book that's so sweet i don't want to use that as there's the head that's what i want that's the one thank you thank you um but i'm probably going to go back to my uh original thing that i said is if you're doing what what we're always trying to make decisions which are best for the team so um you weigh that you weigh what you have versus what you can get me in in you know are you right every time hopefully you are um you know most most of the time and you're not going to be right every time but you try to do what you think is right and within that moment with the information that you have so they're tough decisions they really are and you get to know these guys and you have to have the conversation with a guy like jhan dotson with a guy like you know sam howl the guy like uh john regway guys that you know in jhan and in ridges case that i got to know really well and see him out there and practice and compete in every day so it's never easy but um you know you make a decision as an organization and you live with it and hopefully it's the right decision commanders general manager adam peters kind enough to join us on grant and danny with the roster initially formed there will be tweaks i'm sure as we get closer to week one along the dotson trade front you don't seem to have any issues trading in the division is your philosophy best return possible regardless of who's offering it or is that case by case where maybe it was a quarterback or something you might think twice about having to play a guy twice yeah i think almost everything's case by case and you look at everything every decision in its own kind of light and but uh in this case put jhan um you know that was that was clearly the best offer i think you at the tie if you if you know give me some truth or the tie is going to go to the team outside of the division but uh you know there's not always going to be a tie and so um in this case there wasn't and in this case you know how it was very aggressive and they were um you know they were very bullish on jhan and rightfully so so um you know that you know but every every time it's going to be different but i mean if it's you know it's the cowboys and and the stealers and everything's the same you know that and we're making a trade it's probably going to go to pittsburgh were there more multiple teams you were talking to or just the eagles um you know i don't like to get i mean i can tell you that a lot of teams were interested in jhan because he's a good good player with it but in terms of you know real offers you know that that's that's a different story too you know i think the the thing that it's really cool for people to understand is um really all pretty neat that our our pro scouting staff is you know scower and um the internet and they're and they're reading about things who could be available who's not available and they're making phone calls to all the 31 other teams in the league so there is a ton of conversations that happen um and you know out of all those conversations very little actually is executed in terms of trade so um whether it's jhan or ridge or anybody like that there's there's thousands of conversations that that that i can and uh they're on the cutting room floor and was that like when they say in uh movies and stuff but really a lot of that stuff doesn't see the lighted day so there's a lot of conversations some are more serious than others but um in the end with jhan that was that was really the the best offer for us adam semi related to the john ridgeway trade how do you view late round picks like i think when we hear a six or a seven within a fan base it's almost like a dismissiveness but for a guy that was at the back of your roster to get picks at all do you view it as like just as many as you can have it gives you ammunition to move around later or what's your general philosophy you guys now have two threes two six is among your whole for for next year's draft yeah i love late round picks and i think um you know there's a lot of different things they can become they can be packaged to it into another trade and to move up in a draft or or to get another pick uh or you know we've had you know some success in my history hitting on late round picks so um that's really where our scouting staff makes their hay and and once you you know i think we have a really good scouting staff here guys that really understand what we're looking for and and that's only going to get stronger as we work together with this coaching staff and really identify what they're looking for so those picks you know those you can hit on those picks and they're not always going to be home runs but um in you know the places that i've been we've hit on a lot of great late round picks and and those guys have become probalers and more so um every tip valuable to us and really with with the scouting staff that we have i think those are um those are really valuable even more so well you mentioned the scouting staff what you guys are looking for i think a lot of fans are excited about Noah Brown uh how does that how does he fit what's his role going to be and i think a lot of folks are pumped about the potential he's got here yeah Noah Brown was with someone we actually were um pursuing in free agency too and it didn't come to us um you know for different reasons but um someone we've had our island for a long time someone i've had my own for a long time uh since he was at our state uh the the champion i would if i'm going to give you know credit to one person lance newmark was the champion in the building for for Noah and he loved him for but his play on the field and he in the style of play that he had not only his ability but his play style where you know he identified him as a commander and the guy who plays the way we we want to play so um when we had the chance to get him at the the price we got him at it was a no-brainer we jumped right on it called his agent and i got him here in no time so i really commend our scouting staff to be being ready for that understanding that may happen and bouncing on it uh immediately so we could be first in line and we've watched hard knocks for years that's our expertise on like roster formation is that i every tuesday get popcorn and have friends over and i've seen every organization but washington which is not infuriating in any way by the way so please get on hard knocks as soon as possible but how much of a say do the assistance have on on forming the roster like position coaches the assistant coaches yeah we um you know every building is different but um you know in our building we're we're very collaborative and uh we try it we strive to be and we strive to get you know everybody's opinion ultimately it's dan and myself who have to make the decision but um we have we have um personnel meetings every week very training camp and assess the roster top to bottom and each position coach goes through his group and talks about the players how they're doing how they're improving what else they need to improve on so it gives us great insight into what's going on in the inner workings of those meeting rooms in those in those drills which um you know you can't always see on tape so it's really helpful we have a really good group of assistant coaches uh love our coaching staff and that's a credit to DQ I mean he had a bunch of guys the first year staff and he had a bunch of guys who wanted to come coach here and and so uh really got to know those guys and and they've done an excellent job of communicating to us how guys are doing in the meeting rooms and in on the field along with what we see on tape so uh they're they're a big part of it do you run roster moves by josh arris before they're official uh yeah yeah i we keep josh updated on everything we do and uh what's great about josh is he trusts us and um he's he's not going to micromanage everything he wants to be informed of what we're doing and why we're doing it but he's done a really really good job of you know hiring Dan and myself and letting us do what we think's right for this football club and and really can't thank him enough for that it's not like that everywhere. Adam Peters with us here on grant and danny so just a quick thought that i love your response here Adam i think and i'm probably down alone in this becoming a good NFL quarterback is pretty much the hardest thing to do in sports i it's the the number of highly touted prospects that have just haven't made it or haven't thrived is countless and that's just it's so hard the numbers tell you that there's only a handful of guys that can really do it at a super high level for you right now given all the data we've got what do you think the best practice is to take a young quarterback and make him into one of those stars and then how do you feel like you've executed against that vision of this year for Jayden Daniels? Yeah um yeah you're right it's really hard and uh i've had more than my share of failures in terms of evaluating quarterbacks over the twenty plus years that i've been doing it so but just like anything um you know your ability only takes you so far and then you have to have the work ethic you have to have the mindset you have to have the determination the confidence all the different things and then you have to have the people around you to help you uh achieve you know what you permitted even didn't think you could achieve and that that's with quarterback or anything and so what we try to do here and and i think think you did a great job of that is really surround whoever we brought in uh into that quarterback room which we got four guys who we really like is with a really good environment to to excel and having you know starting at the top of our offensive staff with Cliff Gainsbury and you have a Brian Johnson uh who's a really accomplished coach that uh has been awesome for us and then Tavita Prichards our our quarterbacks coach and then David Blau who is assistant quarterback so you have four four guys that who can really help and give a lot of attention a lot of support to those guys in that room which really is the most important position in all sports um like he said in the toughest position in all sports i'd say probably hit in golf ball consistently straight is right up there with that but these guys i mean to evaluate uh these guys and for them to succeed a lot of things have to go right and so you just try to do the best job you can in order to put them in that position Adam want to drill down on something that you've referenced a couple times whether it's with your scouts coaches you kind of heard folks and Dan Quinn himself refer to this kind of playing this is the way we want to play etc and then you know when you're talking about player acquisition and your scouts finding the guys that you like that fit the way the commanders play what is that what are some of those traits and criteria and and maybe that fans can look forward to here yeah i think um yeah starts you know starts with their love of football and love of competing uh and that usually comes out in their play style playing fast playing physical playing aggressive and and being really consistent in that day in and day out and and that's not just love and going out and practicing on the field which you know everybody loves to do that but it's about putting in the time uh in the in the meeting rooms in the film room and all the different things you have to do to be great and be consistently great with the way you eat the way you you know what you study the way you sleep the way you you train your body um in the weight room in the in the training room so guys that love the whole process guys that love to compete guys that are great teammates and and i think we have uh really an excellent group really of 70 of those guys right now that that all embody that and that's that's what's been really fun to see that come together i love that two undrafted free agents made the team in tylor Owens and colson yankoff two guys who were promised nothing and kind of earned their way in that that really speaks to a meritocracy in my opinion yeah yeah i think um yeah you're exactly right no matter where somebody's drafting no matter what their salary is whatever it is we're going to play you know the best who we think are the best players the guys that have earned that and uh both of those guys came in with the mindset to work hard every day to play fast to play physical to leave it all out on the field and really got better each and every day and and and tylor and colson and um couldn't be more proud those guys on the work they did and but uh really want to give a shout out to our scouts for identifying those guys and and being convicted on them and going and getting them and and so really cool to see that and uh it's a good example you know just we're gonna play the guys who we think are the best and doesn't matter where they came from and doesn't hurt that it we got a brewing too so we got to get a shout out to the really sheriff colson and his his past both of those guys had really cool past where they got and uh can't say enough about him and the guys absolutely love those guys adam peters with us here on grant and danny very very cool of you to give us some time today here on the fan and speak to the fans uh through our radio show and the access to the organization um which we appreciate uh brand and i uke is someone we talked a lot about and reports where that you guys were at one point in time talking to san francisco has that ship sailed is he not coming here and is that book closed oh guys i know you guys are gonna go there at some point um i think probably give me the stock answer on that but you know we're not going to talk about guys that are not not on rostern and um you know uh that that's probably where i'll leave that and um you know that's i think uh next question probably that's your full bill bill of check your own descent you can go full bell and check that's around a tape about more than bill if you guys have seen them smiling more than bill but i i tried to emulate him on questions like that a lot of those things he's a good he's a good role model uh so in terms of the rost that you guys have going going into uh the game mix which by the way i can't believe it's here i'm so excited about it i think a lot of fans are um where do you feel the strongest what do you feel the most confident and then the flip of that is you know what i'm not sure about a couple things let's wait and see how this develops where you what do you feel the best at them and where are you maybe TBD yeah i i want to say you hit the nail on the head i couldn't be more excited i can't believe it it just felt like the blink of an eye that we're here now and uh just laughing at it on the field with a couple of coaches how how soon we got there and how soon we'll be in tampa um so i think i'm the most excited but i think our fans should really really be excited about uh this next week and and what's to come with this team and that kind of leads me into my answer i think um you know i'm really excited about everything really excited about our offense um with cliff and and the way he runs it and the guys that are executing it it's going to be a really fun offense to watch it's going to be a fast offense and and it's going to put defenses in a mind with what we do um and then defensively i really love you know how fast and physical the guys are playing a mindset of the guys in the in the leadership on that side of the ball too so um yeah honestly just really excited about how how we play and how we're going to play in the style of how we play and so um i don't want to get too much into specifics on certain areas but i i just can tell you that you know i'm not exaggerating when i say how excited i am about everything makes sense coach me up on this we do a topic here or there we talk about here's where we're nervous here's where we're confident the corner position is one in a passing league with everybody operating spreader 11 personnel where i've got some reservations right now going into the season presumably you feel very good or else you'd be claiming people or adding people why am i maybe off base there that you guys have what you need at corner yeah i think um you know one one i think you know internally we feel a little bit better than maybe externally and that's in that's the case most of the time um we see these guys playing day and day out and you go you know you you go down the roster and in in the depth chart and all of these guys have gotten better uh when you're talking about the secondary um really manual forge has gotten significantly better and that's and that's the testament to how he's practiced how he is worked and how he's been coached um Jason Simmons is an excellent coach Joe Witt those guys have really gotten him to improve quite a bit and he's done he's done the work too he's made a bunch of plays in the last few practices so you know and then Mikey Tanner still has been been awesome inside of the nickel and he can place them outside too in st. juice is um long athletic and has made a lot of plays on the ball this this camp as well so um you know we've seen how we do on the field they're very confident in all those guys and in the coaching staff putting them in the right place to succeed Adam I'm a big Malcolm Gladwell fan uh some a lot of his books whether it's outliers tipping point things like that and he's talked a lot about making habits right you do something for a week it doesn't mean you do it it's got to become something that's consistent and and and all the you're kind of all the time to make it part of who you are and the reason I bring that up is there's been a lot of roster turnover understandably obviously from what you took over and you it sort of seems from the outside looking in like you guys are really focused on we want to build how we do things here not for a day not for an hour not for a week at a time but this is all the time how long do you think it takes to implement kind of that culture and sort of the way that you do things the way you want things done into an organization. Are you 10,000 hours? Yeah 10,000 hours don't happen. Yeah I mean yeah you just keep it's just like anything uh my old high school coach Daisy Eira he said this and it was baseball but it's football too and anything you do repetition is the mother of learning and so you do things over and over and over again and DQ says that a lot they become habits they become who you are and that's what that's what you preach and that's and you you coach it you do it and you reinforce it after and so you keep doing that over and over and over again it becomes part of who you are and and that's what DQ has done with this team and that's and I've seen that evolution of how we practice how we play and and so I think you're going to see that on Sundays with the way we play fast we play physical and that's on both sides of the ball. When you talk about who you are but quick anecdote from training camp I met a guy in the parking lot walking to my car his kid had put something down that was signed and someone had grabbed it and taken off with it and he was crying and one of your security people asked the kid what was going on and he told them and then the way the story went to this guy told me was about five minutes later they brought him over to the building and you had come out and signed autographs and grabbed some players like Terry McLaurin to come out and meet the kid and that's not something where any media was around nobody knew it so I just wanted to say that when you got people in the building treating fans like that things are very much looking up. We'll let you out on this Adam I want to just let our listening audience learn a little bit about you. So we'll go rapid fire here you're most used streaming app. Oh streaming app? Yeah so at home watching TV. Oh okay. Sorry it's like a torrential down for here so I can barely hear it. It's all good. Oh man I probably would be gosh you know what you guys are going to laugh at me but I'm extremely boring. I don't really watch anything. I don't have a whole lot of time. I'd probably go Netflix. That's mine too or Disney Plus I guess with the kids. Oh you know what Disney Plus Disney Plus is 100% the most used in our house. Yeah well you got a couple girls as well. So are you bluey and extiller? Are you on to like Taylor Swift and Gabby's Dollhouse at this point? Yeah we're doing we're doing a lot of bluey still a lot of yeah you're getting they're getting into Taylor Swift. They've actually you know I just they've gotten me into Taylor Swift which is something I thought I'd never say. How about that? That's like live on the air. I'm on the radio but yeah so I'm a little bit of a flippy now just it just kind of gets you in your head. Favorite breakfast food? Favorite breakfast food? Oh bacon, I guess you sandwich. Let's go. You get to see one musical act live. Who would it be? Rolling Stones. Ooh strong. And then what product do you put in your hair and how often do you get air cut? Product. I don't know it's like some kind of pomade stuff. I don't know what it is. How often hair cut? I try to get a haircut once every three weeks for that never happened. What do you what do you say to the barber? Like what like you know I mean do you have like a phrase like a picture guy or a picture or like you know what you're about are you a picture guy that shows a picture of a good haircut one time. You used to be like when I was little you used to ask for the boys cut right? I don't know if they have the boys pet anymore. But you know I I am a picture guy. So that's the best way to say it because you can really go wrong if you start telling them what you want. And then it could be a bad deal. And there's it's hard to come back from that. Show them the picture of you in the snow getting off the plane back in the winter. That was a good moment. The lighting was so good lighting like like a president descending for the first time. Adam, we appreciate the time. It was a lot of fun. Thanks for hopping on with us. Yeah, thanks guys. It was great talking to you. Have a great day. Have a great holiday weekend. You as well. That's a great season. There's Adam Peters, general manager Washington commanders. Let's react to some of what he just told us next on G&D on the fan at six o'clock right here on Grant and Danny. We got the exclusive tickets in town to Kevin Hart's comedy show at a perfect venue. D. A. R. Constitution Hall shows coming up midway through September. When that show takes place, the commanders will have already played a couple games, including their opener and Tampa. It was nice to talk to general manager Adam Peters about week one looming in the roster that he just put together. Very gracious with his time, by the way, 25 minutes. Nobody told us that he had to run. Nobody said, hey, we got to get Adam off the line. So it was very, very courteous. And just to get him on the phone is not something I take likely, I likely rather because think about this, Danny. You and I have been doing the show together since 2014. Number one, there was no general manager to talk to for the majority of the time. I'll just start with that. Think about that. Who do you want to talk to who runs the football team unimpeded? That person hasn't really existed since Charlie Casterly in the 90s. There were some dalliances where Mike Shanahan for a year or two had a bunch of power, but still had to really run everything by Dan Snyder, who's breathing down the back of his neck. Yet Scott McLuhan for a couple of hours as a listed general manager. What were they trying to mount? Like he was he was the hero. Remember that came after the were embarrassed, were shamed press conferences. So here's Scott McLuhan, everybody. All I've ever wanted and what this team has never had is exactly what Adam Peters is. So correct. I think he's going to be really good. We'll see. I think he is really good. He is a talent evaluator who was beloved around the league, who was respected. A lot of the people that I still keep up with and have relationships with coaches on this staff that have moved on some in San Francisco, some other places rave about this person. Okay. I take that as gospel for me. Good enough. But here's what I have always wanted, whether it was Peters or somebody else. I'm happy that it's the very handsome man of Peters. Please give me a guy that will build a front office that is a professional NFL caliber outfit. And with Lance Newmark and I could run through all the names, but they are working toward. They're very close to Peters has talked about this. Basically having what they have in every organization that's good now. They've never done it here. It's the one thing the old owner never tried ever. He took over in 99 in May, the executive of the year that year that built a 10 win roster, Charlie Castorley was dismissed soon thereafter and they have not done that thing again. Go to a kitchen, find a sous chef who's excellent at a great restaurant somewhere and bring them to run your place. And they finally did it. Josh Harris, it took him three minutes to do what Dan Snyder didn't do in 24 years. I was 10 years old the last time they had this situation. So to just have this is great to have a guy that you could even, who do we talk to? Who do we call? It's been very, very rare. That was even a possibility. And then the availability, the willingness to come on and frankly talk to fans. He doesn't care about talking to us. It's not like he wants to have a conversation with me or you, but the point is he understands this is an important platform with older respect to the local TV shows and stations that are talking about sports for a minute and a half at a time. You know that my mom's watching. This is where the fans are. And so to get him on these airwaves for those 25 minutes explaining some things, giving perspective on things. He's not going to answer everything. I understand that. He, he, no, sold us on Brandon Ayuki, swatted me away like he was to give him a tumble at the rim. Cool. He's got a gig. I got a gig. Question asked to be asked. He can answer it however he wants to. Wasn't willing to go there on Ayuk, but I thought there were moments along the way where he's welcoming us in. Here's what we think about corner. We like our roster more than you guys do. I thought there were some great moments there and just the fact that it happened, how cool and calm he is and just being a dude throwing the ball around. Sign me up. So the last point you just made is where I want to go. So the way people a lot of times think of the general manager is this almost robotic figure who goes, I prefer Brandon Coleman to, I don't know, Cooper Beebe who went seven picks later and then we judge them therein. And that's part of it. Picking the players. You want to pick right more often than the next guy or whatever, because it's a competition business. But it's the second part that I care about way more, right? You're going to get players right and wrong. Good batting average in this thing is what 50% is 500. Maybe at best when we talk about draft picks, making the team, being what they thought. And there's always a story every year of the guy that everybody passed on who did really well. That's part of it, right? A trade, a signing, things, work, or they don't. The person, the person that's relationship building here, getting everybody in a group of alphas and everybody was the big dog and every, or the big fish and every pond that they've ever been in forever to all pull the rope in the same direction. That's what the GM does. That's almost more important than what players you're picking or who gets a contract and who doesn't or who gets traded or who doesn't. It's no coincidence that when they actually had a general manager, even if it was Scott McClellan and things were flawed, they had their best two year run that they have had, released since Gibbs came back. And then other than that, it's been decades. I'm not telling you right home and you said that you saw the greatest team ever when they went nine and seven and eight, seven and one or whatever the hell it was. But this is the point is you have this universally liked good dude who is able to build those kinds of bridges. When it said, if I did this, I did that. It's we. And by the way, we got Noah Brown. He got Noah Brown, but he championed Lance Newmark who said it was his brain child. The scouts did all this work, all of these guys that are grinding, they get the shine because if we shine, you know, if I shine, we shine, you shine, the whole thing is great. That's the whole point of this whole thing to me is the relationship building and having somebody that has that emotional intelligence, not to just be a I'm a player picker. This guy has better stats. So I pick him and that's only a fraction of the job. I also think that the ability to answer questions and be somewhat personable and not really give a lot is a skill in his job. Not one that the Venn diagram circle for him and for us doesn't really match up there, right? Like it'd be nice if he'd come on and just get to the bottom of things and break things down. Yes, I called John Lynch. We talked about Brandon Ayuk. I think 30 million in a couple draft picks is too much. We're not in a place where we're going to do that. That's a great quote. That's a good answer if he gave it to us. But I guess my point is even though it's not great for you and I necessarily, I do think having a professional who can talk for 25 minutes and isn't putting his foot in his mouth and just first time being a GM, I think that is a skill that will probably be a benefit as well that he is able to essentially answer things the way that he does, even if I wish there was a little more meat on the bone occasionally. But I thought overall it was awesome to have him on the show and to just be in a place where A, there's a general manager that actually runs the team that doesn't dictate it to and B, that general manager is willing to come on the radio and talk with us. That is a whole new world. Yep, that's different and it is not lost on me. So that's the kind of, I guess, stuff you could roll your eyes at, but been sitting in this chair since 2014 in a couple of time slots and I've been out on that sideline at training camp since 1999. I got to call it how I see it and that isn't nothing. Let's get into the roster next. I also want to open the phones for you guys. What do you think of Peter's? What do you think of the conversation? 800-636-1067. One of your first chances to hear him in that setting. Also, if you don't just have a reaction on anything that he said necessarily, what did you make of his thoughts on the roster that he feels pretty good about that they put together? You're listening to Grant and Danny on the fan. [silence] Yeah, I think you could do them both at the same time. It's not so much a tug of war. It's just, but it is a balance and make no mistake about it. I said this and I'm probably repeating myself a few times. It's not a rebuild. It's a recalibration and we are trying to win right now. We do have goals to be really good this season, but it is my job as a general manager and really in conjunction with DQ and we make every decision together to be good now and to build for a sustainable team for the future to a team that you guys will compete for championships every year. Grant and Danny, welcome you back on the fan. That was the voice of general manager Adam Peters, who joined the show. Gave us 25 minutes this past hour. If you missed any part of that conversation or our show today, make sure you podcast it when we are done into tomorrow, thefandc.com. Grantanddanny.com/audio. Peters was fantastic. We're going to talk with Ben standing of the athletic covers, Peters and the commanders. He'll join us at six. He had his agent survey drop today. Some really good content grilling a bunch of the agents around the NFL on all kinds of questions and I think the commander showed pretty well on that agent survey compared to years past, which is a nice change of course to be clear. I want to get the clip on cornerbacks in a few minutes because I thought that was some actual like good roster breakdown stuff where it's pretty obvious. He's going to say nice things about his own players, but I do think they like that group more than certainly I do where I'm nervous on the outside looking in. I think Benjamin St. Juice can play. I am trepidation about Michael Davis. I know he's physical, but I'm not quite sure what the end game is in terms of Emmanuel Forbes on the boundary starting. I love St. Ann was still in the nickel. I think a binogany looked really, really well at times at the practices I was at in the preseason. So I'm way less concerned oddly enough inside, which is probably the toughest position to play that I am outside where I've along with higher on St. Juice than a lot of people his length, physicality. It looks like to me like a queen with laboratory, a boom guy. Yeah, but take Benjamin St. Juice out of the equation on the outside. There's just nothing else that I feel good about. It's question marks and St. Juice should be a number two in a really good first division situation. I don't want St. Juice being the one guy standing between me and AJ Brown going for a buck 67 or Justin Jefferson going for 153. You know what I mean? It's just not an ideal scenario, but you're not going to fix everything in one off season. And he's not going to sit here and say he doesn't like his guys. I get that too. But also more just, I think larger picture, if you'd swap positions on a mad lip, what do you think about receiver? I know no Brown is added to the group or think about the offensive line, whether it's you know, the tackle spots, Brandon Coleman, Cornelius Lucas, Andrew Wiley, Trent Scott. What do you think? What do you think? He would probably give you the same answer. Where internally, we know more, we see these guys more, and we're confident in it. And that's kind of been one of my thesis is that what's the plural thesis? One of my theses? Theses I that sounds weird. Theses. I don't whatever. It's um, it's your. I have a thesis. I have multiple kinesiology. Kinesiology. I have multiple kinesiology. But I think this is that that's kind of the big one is they like their group better than folks on the outside. And it said that it's not just and it's not just me. This is people that cover this link for a living. Everybody from fantasy analysts to the Mike clays of the world to, uh, you know, Warren Sharp and the pro football focus, some of their groups where people are going, he they're going, no, no, we got it. And the proof will be in the pudding. Let's go to Steve and Haymarket on Grant and Danny listening on the fan. What's up, Steve? How are you? Hey, how are you guys doing today? Good pal. Good. No, I just wanted to echo the sentiment, the grant, um, you know, voice right before you guys went to break. Like I've been a lifelong fan, obviously, you know, 30, 40, 50 years, whatever. Um, but hearing a GM come on and talk to you guys for 20 minutes and earlier today on B mentioned family, I heard DQ on there. Like you haven't had that access and it felt like just refreshing to hear the change that everybody is all in the same page about. Um, so I don't have a question or anything, but I was just saying, like, you know, I completely agree with, you know, what you were saying and it's, it's a definitely an air of excitement around here over, uh, over this, the last off season. It's a sign of the times in a way. I really do think it's symbolic of, of something bigger. Now they got to win football games. All right. This is a business. And really what truly matters is do you win or do you lose? And that part is coming. They haven't played a game yet. Now, luckily for them, and probably for us, all of us collectively involved in this thing on the outside in a fan base media, whatever, the wins and the losses this year are not necessarily going to be the end all be all at some point next year. You probably turned the page to the record really starting to matter. And that's going to determine how much we like Dan Quinn or Adam Peters or anybody else in the building. That having been said, I'm just trying to provide as best I can as an intermediary of sorts who's has the access and could be in the building. The difference is night and day. It's just you, you notice it walking up to, to training camp. You see it in the paint on the walls and the carpets put down in the press box or in every now area of the stadium, the new flooring that's everywhere. Like there are attempts and efforts being made in every visual way that is possible and in how people are being treated. That's the part that I can never properly qualify to folks. I say this from time to time on the show, jokingly, but it's it's fact. Like if I was to tell you the two worst times I've ever been scolded yelled at or talked to by another human being as a grown up, both were over an ashburn by brass of the then dance night or operation, like Redskins organization, just utterly unacceptable ways to scream at people. You don't talk like that to someone as a grown up in the real world. It doesn't happen. You see it in movies where like, you know, some boss is making someone's life miserable and in the movie she's going home and crying to her husband who's begging her to quit. But I mean, like, that's real life. That was happening there for so long. And the story I told is 100% true. A bump into a guy in the parking lot is kid was crying. One of the staffers who's been just been told, try to make someone's day a little better while they're out here so that we can get them to come back because nobody likes this team anymore and we need to build a fan base. Like, just seize the kid crying and tell someone and they tell someone and then Adam Peters comes over and takes the kid in to get some autographs and takes them over to the facility. It's just again, that's not going to help you beat the bucks. That part's going to matter too. But for those of them that have been here the whole time, it also matters. It does. So I'm I'm trying to think of a good way to put this because I know for a lot of folks, they they'll roll their eyes at that. And I think if you're listening, someone in town from Boston who listens to E. E. I or something is like, oh, these squares, like, oh, these losers, you don't get it. And you haven't been here. But even here, like, I remember years ago, I got an argument years ago on the air with our buddy LaVire Arrington, right, doing afternoons. And he kept pointing to Shanahan's record at that point. And I was saying, okay, well, that's totally true. The record's the record. But they now can practice inside and not edit a gold gym or an airport hanger. They can now have nutritious meals at the facility. And things are improving. It's not great yet. And I'm not saying it is, but improvement is happening. And there's at least some sort of real adult football type things that are potentially taking place, whether it works or not, who knows, and he kept pointing to the record. And I'm going, okay, well, then why does anyone need us? You could just Google Washington's record and we'll all go home. No, there's more nuance to it. There's a discussion to be had here. And I guess that's kind of where I'm going. None of this, none of him being nice to us, none of him being a human being, none of them drafting Johnny Newton, or if Mike Sander stills in the slide or not in two years, or whatever, is going to decide if they want to Super Bowl or not, or if they're multiple division champions or any of these types of things. You're giving yourself a chance now. And that's the point. This is blackjack. You walking up to the to the table, you sit down, and you play tight and you play smart. And you're you're doubling down on 11. You're you're staying on when a dealer's got a sick showing. You're just doing the smart things that give you the best chance to win. The cards might bone you. You might be in the AFC at the same time as Pat Mahomes, and no one has anything to show for it, because he's there, that lurking demon, that monster ruining everybody's time, right? That could just be the hand your dealt. You could be a great major league baseball team just happens to be in the 90s when the Braves and the Yankees are meeting in the world series, it seems like every year. Bad luck happens, but you've given yourself a real honest to good shot. And that's all we're trying to sell you at this point. There is no guarantee this works, but I'll take my chances with this over everything that we've seen for the last couple of decades. Yeah, give me a front office. Give me a real general manager. And we've gotten beyond just Peters, the rest of the operation is filled out from Newmark to Saasna and just kind of an R and D department that they've now staffed. And the entire operation is more aligned with what the NFL looks like in places where the front office is good than this one has ever been. It's also such a stark contrast, by the way, that it makes it so revealing. Like we said this, but it was worse than we thought to really how bad it was. I mean, even recently, like when things have been better in terms of people aren't being harassed and, you know, Dan Snyder's not in the building the last couple of years, they had no chance because of the front office outfit, you know, the quarterback situation, they might have also fixed those two things. We'll find that out in short order, but just refreshing, man. And I'm glad to hear that, you know, that he but the caller there also had some of the same kind of thoughts as he's listening to Peter speak, some of those same emotions. Let's go to Vince and Akakeek on G&D. What's up, buddy? What's up, guys? So, the previous caller and everything y'all said is like exactly what I have. None of this translates to winter football games. And honestly, as much as I wanted, but not being cliche, trust the process, I'm still a little weary about as much as they seem to love sandjuice and for and as much as they love mariota, if Jayden gets hurt. And like Daniel says, Jayden gets hurt. It doesn't that anyway. But how confident they are that if for whatever reason the Jayden East pass shoe foreplay, mariota is this great backup quarterback. But outside of those things, the fact that like like the previous caller said, you heard that early in the year AP now, it sounds like they are really trying to build a thing. Yes. But not just grabbing stuff. What looks shiny or what sounds good or who says this thing in the media that makes me need to change my mind. Even if everything that they're doing wrong, they're like, we're going to do wrong altogether at the same time, at the same breath, the same beat. And it just gives you a chance to want to believe that we might have a chance to do something better down the line. And for a person who's never had hope for this team, and who kind of still doesn't, who you talking about? You mean, yo, it still doesn't is a great line. Look, I categorically agree with you, co-sign all of that in this sense. When you say, you know, I don't completely agree with what they did there. I'm not sure I see it the same way they do here. Yeah, that's normal. That's just football, man. You're talking to a guy who wanted an offensive coach, not Dan Quinn. You're talking to a guy who would attract a Drake May, not Jaden Daniels. By the way, it doesn't mean that I think Dan Quinn's an incapable goose or that Jaden Daniels doesn't have a bright future. Just saw it differently, paid to sit here, give my opinion. You're talking to a guy who wanted to acquire a star offensive tackle to start on the left side this year. Didn't want Andrew Wiley starting it right tackle. You're talking to someone right now who wanted to acquire a number two wide receiver with more pelts on the wall than Noah Brown. There's, there's a lot of things I thought differently about than they did. So and then what that's the football part of this. I think it's easier to win with an offensive minded coach because I think the numbers bear that out over the last 20 plus years in football. I don't think it's really that debatable. It doesn't mean you can't win with Dan Quinn. They're going to try to. They're taking the road that's a little more difficult traveled based on what the numbers tell us. They didn't care about some of the same like red flag ish analytics on sacks and some of those things with Jaden Daniels. By the way, so far so good. The guy looks like the stuff that they could learn that we can't looking at you know, stack pages that the stuff about when does he show up, when does he leave, how hard does he work, how smart is he all that stuff that we don't really get access to. It seems like he's getting a pluses in all those categories and frankly that's the most important stuff. So maybe they're going to have hit a home run on that and God willing they did because if they did then pretty much nothing else matters honestly. Then you could have the worst offensive coach available and still win because you got the quarterback. But it's okay to disagree. I don't think anyone should just do the in Ron we trust bit. I never liked it then. I don't like it now and I'm as big a mark as there is for Adam Peters be a critical thinker. Have your own opinion. Do your own study. There's great websites. There's all kinds of access. I got a whole budget I pay on just stupid websites. Some stuff I know how to use. Yeah. Some stuff you forgot your pain for. Oh yeah. I just figured that one out. Some stuff I don't even know how to use. Yeah. Where Adam Peters would like walk by and laugh at me like what are you watching? You don't know what you're looking at. You're probably right Adam. Just out here trying to do my best. I would have drafted some guys differently than the commanders did the last few years though. That might have worked out. Yeah. But I'm just trying to do my best. That's all I'm trying to do. And I think every caller is the same way. Like you don't have to do this all in with every move they make thing. But in the meantime, there was really no reason to give any benefit of the doubt to the last group. That's what I kept saying. That's all I cared about was why? What have they done? What have they won? There's there's no Super Bowl ring as a coach or GM on any of these guys hands. Adam Peters has three titles in three different buildings. San Francisco, almost one another one for him last year. They clinched the division when he was at that stupid stadium. Hugging guys as they came off the field last year. You can't find one person in the league that doesn't rave about him. I found plenty of people the last couple of years not raving about the guys that were here. Yeah, you know, you could throw a rock and a bit somebody. Yeah, I think it said very well. I mean, the way I look at it is I call balls and strikes. So I might miss a couple. I mean, I was loud wrong all the damn we need an electronic strike zone. You and I sometimes, especially for me. I mean, I got my misses, but when I'm one, I'm right. Sorry. Sorry about it. You know, like, if it happens to differ from their view, whatever it is, I don't I'm not, I can't get too bogged down in, you know, sort of blind deference to authority or blind deference to expertise, right? Where you just say, there's no question. That's Newmarket Adam Peters and all the rest of the guys in the front office, no more football than everybody in this room and everybody listening for God's sakes. And a politician knows more about the behind the scenes that are workings of the stuff they're dealing with. Bet you still have an opinion on some of the decisions that you do. And by the way, I agree with whatever you think about those things I'm talking about and I'm outraged by the right stuff. I am as well. Yeah. Your boss probably has more intel than you do on things. Bet you still dislike some of the decisions they make. You've never converged. You've never had a little session with somebody at the water cooler getting a cup of coffee. You never grouse about anything. Never not. Come on. Let's talk corners next. I thought Peters gave a great answer on why they like that room more than everybody else. And then we'll get to your calls as well. 800 6361067. What do you like about this roster that's now been formed and where are you the most nervous? You're listening to the fan. Yeah. Noah Brown was with someone we actually were pursuing in free agency too and it didn't come to us for different reasons. But someone we've had our eye on for a long time, someone I've had my eye on for a long time since he was at our state. The champion, if I'm going to give credit to one person, Lance Newmark was the champion in the building for Noah and he loved him for his play on the field and the style of the play that he had, not only his ability but his playstyle where he identified him as a commander and the guy who plays the way we want to play. So when we had the chance to get him at the price we got him at, it was a no-brainer. We jumped right on it called his agent and I got him here at no time. So I really commend our scouting staff to be being ready for that, understanding that may happen and bouncing on it immediately so we could be first in line. Adam Peters on signing new wide receiver Noah Brown was going to be very likely the number two wide receiver for the commander sooner rather than later. Welcome back, Grant and Danny on the fan. Someone they pushed for in free agency said he didn't sign for a lot of reasons. I would imagine Houston wanted him back, guaranteed him a little bit of money. Where would you play? CJ Stroud has proven and the Texans are a favor to win the division and have top five odds to get to the Super Bowl out of their conference or a Washington team. He says they're recalibrating, not rebuilding but that at four wins last year as a rookie quarterback in a first year head coach. No kidding, he chose Houston. But then when he got released, I'm sure they came back to the table and now it's a different combo. Absolutely. I mean, again, it's all about what you want, right? It's everybody's entitled to it as an employee, like you're working in the league, you're trying to make your own way. Do you want the most amount of money? Do you want the opportunity to thrive and get a lot of catches on a lot of yards and then maybe make the most money? Do you want to be in a city where you like the school system for your kids or your wife wants to live or do you want the shot to play the most? Whatever whatever you want, there's always got to be that fit. Both parties have to be willing. So your situation just changed. If you're no around, you're basically going, I'm going to be a complimentary receiver here in Houston. And well, then you enter Stefan Diggs, who's kind of now probably going to run on the slot and they drafted John Metche a couple of years ago. They actually still like him an awful lot. So he's probably the number four, then you got Tank Nell and Eco Collins. Uh oh, writing's on the wall, right? What I thought might be an opportunity isn't really anymore. So now your situation changes and you go, there's no one in my way. I got an entire side of the field, probably. Terry's going to be on the left. Cliff Kingsbury style. I got the whole right side of the field operate. I'll take that. You mentioned earlier that he gave Lance Dumark the credit as he did there in that clip for being basically the Noah Pete Brown guy, the guy that went out and and really stood on the table to go get him. Something else not lost on me while we're pumping Peter's tires today is to give him that credit publicly where you don't have to do that. You could just say we sign them. You're the GM, right? You don't hear like, think about other GMs in town. I'm not knocking them, but Rizzo or McClellan or whoever. It's not like they're shouting out a random scout who liked the guy a lot. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. So that's something that I think is cool that Peters did that. And then also Lance Dumark spoke today. He did a press conference as the assistant GM. Peters just did a press conference after they put the roster together a couple days ago. Mike, excuse me, Dan Quinn just did a press conference yesterday and today. I guess my point is it's not like they had to do the Lance Newmark thing. That was a let's get him out in front of the media and give him a little shine. Whereas a lot of teams just don't do that just so you guys know. You don't want people plucking your assistance. You don't want people plucking your general managers working underneath of your team president or whatever for other jobs. In fact, I know a club that was on hard knocks with them the last couple of years that had a coordinator that like did not show up on the show. And I was doing some asking around. I'm like, what is going on here? And basically what I was told was, yeah, I don't think they wanted anybody to really see a lot of him that they didn't want his start to rise, so to speak. Because that's happened. I mean, even here in town, no, Jay Gruden would have got a job eventually anyway. But there was this hard knocks and Cincinnati where he came off excellent. Yeah. And got a gig. I mean, the idea of empowering people and putting your workers over and like wanting good things for your own guys, that's a big, big deal. Yeah, for sure. You know, not only Jay, but like Dan Campbell years ago, Mike Vrayble became a star when he was a linebackers coach in Houston and showed very well on hard knocks. I mean, it's a star maker to a degree, but just to digress, a lot of guys and a lot of orgs will you have to kind of hoard and stash away because you don't feel like you got enough confidence with the ability to find the next guy. Like in other words, if it goes well, Lance Newmark's going to get a GM gig and you're going to lose it. Yeah. It can become the lions. Like this was his promotion. The next one will be the GM. If you're one of the better teams in the NFC, if you're the 49ers where Peter's came from, he's the Adam Peters. He's the guy people go, you know, it was really good because he helped pan pick Noah Brown and he was the reason they went out and they got Alama, Daisy Kies from, you know, whoever else people find out he gets credit for. Go to the cornerback conversation. This was one of the times in the conversation where Peter's really did let his guard down and actually talk ball and get into some of his talent on the roster and the personnel and what they like about some of their guys. The question was about why we're wrong on the outside looking in that this corner room is actually better than we think it is. You know, internally, we feel a little bit better than maybe externally and that's the case most of the time. We see these guys playing day in and day out and you go, you know, you go down the roster and in the depth chart and all of these guys have gotten better when you're talking about the secondary. Really, Emmanuel Forbes has gotten significantly better and that's the testament to how he's practiced, how he's worked and how he's been coached. Jason Simmons is an excellent coach. Joe Witt, those guys have really gotten him to improve quite a bit and he's done he's done the work too. He's made a bunch of plays in the last few practices. So, you know, and then Mikey Tanner still has been awesome inside of the nickel and he can play some outside too and St. Juice is long athletic and has made a lot of plays on the ball. This camp as well. So, you know, Ray, we've seen how we do on the field. They're very confident in all those guys and the coaching staff putting him in the right place to succeed. There's a patience there that that comes with. In other words, if let's say the sake of argument, Emmanuel Forbes has a renaissance here and is really good. That's a that's a win for them. That's such there be such a boon because that's free. You don't have to do anything. You inherited that. And if Forbes blossoms under much better coaching, guys with some pretty good pedigrees in terms of developing members of the secondary in Quinn and Witt, then all of a sudden, not only is that position solved, but it everything looks so much better, right? So, you need to give a guy a chance to do that in a year where people won't be quite as concerned if you end up seven and ten. Like if we're all in and you're Kansas City or you're Buffalo or you're one of these teams of Super Bowl aspirations, and you're going into the season with the weakest of weak links on the outside that's going to undo all the good work everywhere else, then you'd be more concerned about it. But in his mind, it's a non-emergency situation. And let's be patient and see. I mean, this is where sometimes you've got to figure out, are you endorsing a guy because you got to endorse a guy, or do you really like the player in Forbes's case? You should empower that player. You should come out and say nice things going into this season regardless. I'm curious what they really think. One thing we didn't get into that I would have liked to was with all the players they cut from the Rivera era, how much of a clean slate did all of these guys get from the film that you were watching, you know, all the evaluations you did before Dan Quinn took over. It's just it's a whole different world. If you're Benjamin St. Jude's plan for Dan Quinn in this scheme with Joe Witt from The Last Guys. And so does it matter if I'm just making this up, but if like if you graded Benjamin St. Jude's as a minus performer or as a, you know, in your view, he played like a backup last year, let's say, but you actually think he could be a cornerback one in this scheme, the way they're going to do it, the way they're going to use him with this coaching. I think that would have been an interesting thing to get to if we had a little more time because obviously it was their opinion that just a lot of the guys that were here previously just weren't good enough and they didn't like them enough to make the roster. But for him to say unsolicited, really the first and maybe the only player he cited is saying he's a lot better now was a manual for it. Yeah, he came out. That tells me something Forbes has gotten significantly better. He says it's a testament to how his practice worked and how he's been coached. Now, maybe he's also saying that because he knows when I'm suggesting I don't like the corner room very much. It's pretty clear. I'm not confident in Forbes. Right. You can do the math there. Yeah, exactly. But for him to just go right there and say, we think Forbes is better. They love San Restyl and they should. The guy was awesome in camp in the preseason and then to throw in St. Jude's as well. That's the foundation, but they're betting big on those guys. They need all three of them to play their butts off if the corner room is going to be good. Yes, we alluded to it kind of throughout. But obviously with 33 and counting new players from last year of your 53 man roster for agency trades, draft, et cetera, there's going to be a lot of turnover. There are some holdovers though. There are some guys that we would have thought going into this off season would be in jeopardy that are still here be it. Jamie Davis, Naomi Brown is still here. Finarian Matt, this kind of won the face off with with John Ridgeway. I know they were both holdovers, but from a very, but thinking of a draft pick of the Rivera era, they were able to move on from John Ridgeway, but it seemed seemingly they're confident in Infarian math. Do we have to step in and play well in that kind of rotational role? So there are a couple of guys that did survive it, which I think would be his pushback. It's not the right word, but would be his rebuttal. If you went, it seemed like one in doubt, you just went with your guy and he would go, well, there are a couple, there are a few guys from before who we liked a lot that sort of showed. So there is enough of a blank slate, be able to call in his, in his mind, balls and strikes on some players be able to say, you know what, this guy can play for us, can play the way that, quote unquote, commanders would like to Ben standing up the athletics, going to join us in 20 minutes at six. That's when we're giving away tickets to see Kevin Hart over at D.A.R. Constitution Hall. Next, I want to get into two NFL national stories that caught my attention today. The first is another player asked for someone's retired number and got it. Becoming a bit of a trend. And then also Tom Brady is going to be calling games and also potentially be a minority owner. And it doesn't sound like the league is very excited about that. Should that even be allowed? Are you listening to G and D on the fan? If you missed our breakdown in our first segment today of Dylan Cruz's huge series against the Yankees back-to-back multi hit games, first career home run last night. You'll want to go grab the podcast when we're done. The fan DC.com, Grant and Danny dot com slash audio, known at space ball tonight. So why not? All of our baseball and nets content here on the fan is presented by T mobile switched to T mobile and you can get tons of benefits and still save on every plan against ATM team Verizon. Your savings calculator is available there to find out how T mobile dot com slash switch up Danny Malik neighbors who I am so excited to watch play. I think I'll end up being wrong probably, but I like him more than I like Marvin Harrison, Jr. I think him and Roma Dunes and Harrison are all going to be amazing. I thought it was as good at trio as has come out in many, many years, but I love Malik neighbors at LSU last year. I thought he was unbelievable. He's going to wear number one, which is not interesting anyone in DC other than because he called, I guess, the family of a player posthumously who once wore number one for the Giants that is retired. They gave him permission to wear the number that he wanted to wear. He had been wearing another number during camp in the preseason and he's now going to rock number one. You'll remember that this happened with Dwayne Haskins and Joe Thysman. The tragically late Dwayne Haskins asked Thysman to wear number seven. Thysman said yes. And that was before Haskins ever played a snap. Now, especially because Dwayne's no longer with us, which is so awful, I don't want to beat up on his career here or in general, not a fun thing to do. But I do point this out just to say obviously it didn't go very well here. And somebody wore Joe Thysman's number and Thysman was put in the terrible situation where he either says, no, don't wear my number and he looks like a jerk or he says, yes, which he probably doesn't want. And then a guy wears his number. For some people, this might not be a big deal because it's just a number or whatever. I just don't like this trend. A retired number is a retired number. Or it's not. This is, yeah, this is on the team. But the giants are retired. Precisely. No, I know. This, this is a team thing to me. And it was with Washington when they forced, they're like, I don't know, Joe, you deal with it. So now Dwayne's got to call Joe. I hated that. But so for the Washington, you were right. Like it was on the team because the Jersey wasn't actually retired. It was just not in use. My understanding is with the giant, it's an actual retired number. I'm looking at right now, Ray Flaherty. It's a retired jersey number, but I guess it's not. The reason I bring it up though is retired numbers aren't really retired anymore. When a player wants to use them, you're just going to call and get permission. And it's such a terrible spot for the family when it gets leaked or someone finds out that they told the player, no. Of course, more often than not, I would say at a very, very high clip, people are going to say yes. And really, for what reason, your numbers unretired just because now you, you know, time has passed and people forget how important you were or, you know, how significant you were to get your jersey retired. I just think it's a bad practice. I don't like that young guys are asking for the number. Now, when we run out of numbers and we don't have a choice, obviously, like it's like running out of this is more of an awful, like running out of space for graves. We got to figure something else out. You know what I'm saying? Like, but that's not the problem. This is not a situation where there's no number he can wear. He just wanted a number that's retired. And to that, I say, to this guy that I really like, sorry about your luck. You're not going to wear a number once. I want players to stop asking for numbers that are retired. They're retired. Until we're out of numbers and we need to recycle them. I want this to end. Is that a hot take? Not at all. And again, I doesn't seem like you are. And I think that's fine. But I'm blaming the team here. This is a team thing to me. Meaning the giant should just tell them no. Yeah, the organization says no. Like, if you walked into, I'm a brand new Yankee, I'm a hot shot. I'm a first round pick. I'm going to the show. Can I wear number three? No, it's retired. It's Babe Ruth's. What about four? No, it's Garrix. Yeah, but this is a lesser retired jersey. This is just Ray Flaherty. What? We retired the number. There's no, it's a non-starter. And if we want to be more selective about retiring jerseys, fine. I'm fine with that too. We should only retire jerseys for the greatest of all time and not just the one-time MVP or the one-time Super Bowl champion or the four-time Pro Bowl or whatever. But if it's retired right now, it's retired. It can't be worn unless it can, unless you, unless you now have like a daughter-in-law or like a niece that's going to answer the phone and say, yeah, I guess that's fine. What are we doing? I cannot believe it. And again, this is small. This is, it's a jersey number. The end of the day, it's fine. And retiring a number is ceremonial. And it's about honoring the player, et cetera. But if you still have your jersey up on the ring of fame, and I'm sure it's in the stadium or whatever. But the whole point of the retirement is to say, you wore this so well, no one will ever wear it again. That's why you can't wear seven as a Yankee. By the way, all the single digits are out if you're, if you're a Yankee fan. Well, I also have an issue with this part of it. It's that these guys have never played before, right? So it's one thing if you have a career. It's another thing. We'll say goodbye to our listening audience and Richmond. It's another thing if you're a player and you do not have any experience, one catch, one snap, have not been on the field and broken a sweat or blood or anything. And you're asking for the number. If you've made four pro bowls or two time all pro or something like that, Danny, come on, man. Like seriously, if you've done something and you're asking for the number, even though I still think it's a bad look and I still don't think you should do it and I still don't think you should get it a little more. Okay, someone who's never played a rookie wouldn't dare ask a veteran to carry his pads. A rookie wouldn't dare not sing his fight song when told to or not go and get the snacks for the team meeting like he's supposed to. But a rookie is going to take a number away from a Hall of Famer. A rookie is going to take a number away from one of the most important players in team history. It's just a ridiculous thing. So I hear everything you're saying it's something to disagree specifically. But I almost don't even like the idea of saying, a rookie can't do it. What about a fifth year guy? Like, like to me, a retired number is off limits for everybody. I don't care how good you are. Like if Pat Mahomes walks in and goes, I want to wear 16 from now on. Sorry, that's a retired number. Len Dawson, where that number is retired. Pick another one. Greatest player of our generation, future Hall of Famer and guy that's going to have his jersey number retired. Like to me, I like, I don't care if you're a rookie, a second year guy, a 10th year guy, if you're near 15, you know, and you're like a Bruce Smith, one of the wear a certain number if Washington at the time actually had retired jerseys instead of their informal retirement. But when he came here and goes, I want to wear 77 and know Jim LaChay's numbers retired or whatever, I can't do that. Like to me, it's like there's, there's no achievement. There's no earning it. There's no, now you've got the right to place the phone call to the family. The team goes, no, that's, it's very simple to me. Thank you. We love you. We're so excited you're here. We cannot wait to throw you 130 balls this year. Pick a different number. It's retired. He's Danny. I'm Grant. This is the fan top of the hour. Tonight is the last opportunity you'll have to get into our Grant and Danny fantasy football league with listeners. We're going to be drafting. We're all going to get together on Tuesday night sports bar. We'll give you all the details how you can get in, how you can come hang with us on Tuesday night. We'll do that right at the top of the hour next. We're also giving away those tickets to see Kevin Hart in DC and Ben standing of the athletic joins us to break down the commander's roster next right here on the fan. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. 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