Tennessee Titans Brilliant Non Move Strategy POSITIONS Them for Generational HAUL In 2026 DRAFT

The Tennessee Titans won the trade deadline. They didn’t trade. Well, not very much. I’ll tell you why in just a second here on Locked on NFL. The barber shop is open and Tony Wiggins has a chair for you. He’s ready with some real NFL talk. The local experts of Locked On bring their expertise and Wiggy is ready with his clippers and shears. Sit down and enjoy. The new Locked On NFL starts now. Locked on podcast network. Your team every day. I love it. I love it when she says your team every day because it’s the truth. It is your team every day here on Locked on NFL. We thank you for making us your first listen. And shout out to the everydayers who join us each and every day. Welcome to the barberh shop. I am Tony Wiggins. He is David Harrison. That means it must be Wednesday. And that is the the absolute truth of this Wednesday. It’s also uh the day after the trade deadline. So, we got some things to discuss with you. We’re going to use the help of local experts from around the National Football League who have their finger on the pulse of each and every team. And we believe that we can give you the best coverage that you can get. So, that’s what we’re going to do. All right. Today’s show is sponsored and brought to you by FanDuel. Make sure you tap in because right now, new customers can bet just $5. And if your bet wins, you’ll get $300 in bonus bets to use across the app. All right, here here we go. This is what we’re going to talk about. Teams to watch in the second half of the season. Technically, it’s not quite the second half, but you can’t really have 17 games. Uh Jerry Jones and Dallas win, a rare win, a rare W for the Dallas Cowboys. I’ll tell you what that is all about. But I’m going to start at the top saying that the Titans won the deadline without moving. They did send Draymond Jones to Baltimore. I don’t know if that was actually technically yesterday or the day before, but David, how do you feel about the trade deadline? And how do you feel about me thinking that the Titans won without moving? Uh, I think it was a lot of fun. You know what I mean? The NFL trade deadline, like every sing every single season, we kind of amp it up and we we anticipate it and all that stuff. And some years there’s a little bit of action, some years there’s no action and the trade deadline just comes and goes and nothing really happens. Uh, but this one was interesting. a lot of teams uh making some interesting moves, you know, trying to capitalize on what they got going on in the first half of the season and even some teams who are kind of, you know, punting on the year, understanding that they they’ve got a lot of work to do. Looking at you, New York Jets. Uh and then the Miami Dolphins kind of interestingly half step it, right? Like we’re going to trade away Jaylen Phillips, but not Bradley Chub. We’re not going to trade away Jaylen Wadd. So, uh you know, and look, you know, I don’t know what offers they may or may not have received for either of those players. So, if it’s not worth, you know, the the the sale price, then then I then I get it. But it was it was definitely interesting, uh, to say the least. And, uh, you know, unfortunately for my side of things, you know, Philadelphia Eagles getting better in the last 48 72 hours. Uh, but, you know, for the league as a whole, very entertaining last 24 hours and and good for football. It was it was almost like the NBA at the trade deadline. I’m going get to the Titans real quick. I’m going tell you why they won. They won because the Jets loaded up with a whole bunch of picks and Cleveland already has a whole bunch of first round picks and there’s one quarterback sitting at the top of that draft next year shining and the Titans don’t need him and they’re probably going to end up with the first pick. That’s what I’m talking about. Listen to my man Tyler Rolling and we’ll come back and peel some more layers off of it. The trade deadline is a dud for the Tennessee Titans as they make no moves on Tuesday. And look, I know that some Tennessee Titans fans will be angry and upset about the lack of deals on trade deadline day, but I think the reality is you have to think the Titans made two trade deadline moves. Trading Roger McCreary in a pick swap to the Los Angeles Rams and then of course the move with Draymond Jones going to the Baltimore Ravens. So the Titans didn’t actually do anything on deadline day, but they did make two trades at the trade deadline. And I think the Roger McCreary move is a salary dump and a guy that they didn’t want to bring back. You could say that’s a C++ type deal. But I think now that we know the conditions on the Draymond Jones trade, I think that deal looks absolutely fantastic. If the Baltimore Ravens make the playoffs and Draymond Jones has just two more sacks the rest of the year, then the Titans get a fourthround pick back from the Ravens. So I think that the Draymond Jones trade is an A. The Roger McCreary deal is a C++ B minus. All right, there you go. So, let’s get to it. Mike Burggoni uh was known as a dude in Kansas City that was really instrumental in building that team and now he’s in his this will actually in my opinion be what you’ve seen lately is his first actions as the real GM and the real boss of this team, right? They’re a horrible team, but they drafted a quarterback number one last year and that quarterback can play. You can absolutely look at a team that’s terrible and look at the quarterback and say, you know what, he can still play. We did it with Drake May last year. That’s why I argue with all the Jaguar fans about Trevor Lawrence all the time sometimes is that there a team can be horrible and the quarterback can still show you enough that you go, “No, we got something right there.” So, I that’s the way I feel about Mr. Ward, Cam Ward. Now, let me tell you why I think they won. Yeah. Because Ty Simpson is is according to all people sitting at the top of the NFL draft. There is not another quarterback worthy of taking in the top five. Doesn’t mean the teams won’t do it because they do it all the time. But David, if I’m sitting there and we just traded away things that could help us and I have no path to winning and I can have the number one pick, you might say that the Jets will sit there at number two and go or the Saints or the Browns who will probably be right behind them and go, “Oh, you ain’t going to take him, so we’ll take him.” No, that’s not the way this works. You know what I do? I call all three of them and say, “Which one of y’all want them now? You come get them.” And now I’m gonna get a bounty, a bounty of picks in 2026. And I might even push some of them to 2027 because that draft is supposed to be loaded. That’s the forward thinker that I’m talking about. That makes me think that the Titans won by absolutely doing nothing. Yeah, I like that angle. And I mean, even a one a one pick swap, you know what I mean? Titans trade from one to two to whoever has that second overall pick. Um, you know, the Jets, the Browns. I mean, look, don’t count out the Miami Dolphins from potentially out a quarterback. I mean, look, don’t count out the New Orleans Saints. I know they got Tyler Shuck, but like, you know, if if he’s proven pretty quickly that he’s not going to be the guy, this league is not patient. And if Kell Moore is feeling the pressure and that front office is feeling the pressure of having to try to figure this thing out, you know, don’t count them out of the picture as well. I think when you’re looking at the bottom or the top of the draft, bottom of the league, top of the draft right now, I think the only honestly out of the bottom eight teams, you know, when you go four and four from each division or each conference, the there’s only three teams I look at that don’t potentially need a quarterback outside the Titans, and that’s the Giants, Commanders, and Falcons. I think all three of those teams are going to roll into 2026 with their current starting quarterback. But the rest of those guys, yeah, let’s let’s start the bidding. Let’s start the bidding with two number ones, right? Like, let’s start the bidding where we can. And there’s a plus side here. If the Miami Dolphins decide to get into the quarterback market, you got the Dolphins and the Jets both in the same division, both competing to be the guy to be the team to go get that quarterback. So, yeah, I think this is a great position for the Tennessee Titans. Um, any Titans fan that’s upset about their team not going out and getting, you know, players and stuff like that. Look, you’re usually going to get players that are either incredibly over overpaid, right? There’s a reason their team paid them all that money and is now trying to move them. or you’re getting a guy with a close to or expiring contract who you’re then going to have to pay and you’re now giving away draft capital to get them and the Tennessee Titans are not one, two, three, four, or even five players away uh from being a seriously competitive team. I’m I’m sorry, Wig. I got to do this. Look, the Tennessee Titans are one and eight in the AFC South, okay? You’re not one and eight in the AFC North. You’re not one and eight in the NFC West. You’re one and eight in the AFC South. That is how far away you are from being a serious team. you have a serious quarterback. I like Cam Ward from what I’ve seen of him so far in the NFL. Not every game, but I’ve seen enough to have an opinion. And I think the Titans did the exact thing you need to do. Go collect some capital. Uh go go set set the table. Look, Borghazi, he was my second pick. Like after Adam Peters, when the commanders for GM, he was my second guy. He was the next guy I wanted them to look at if they didn’t get AP. So, I think the Titans for once doing some things right. Let’s see if they can stack it in the offseason with the head coach hire and and you know, all things considered, I think it was absolutely a very good day for the Tennessee Titans. Yeah, I think it was and I know that’s my macro way of looking at things, but I mean, you got to meet people where they are right now. They are where they are. They did the right things. They’re pushing everything forward. Uh the the good thing about it is they got a nice piece on the offensive line. They got a nice young receiver to go with their quarterback. They got a real real good quarterback. And that’s the main part. main part is for the Titans is they dumped bad cargo and they didn’t go add a whole bunch more and what they did was put themselves in a position where they can absolutely uh regroup really really fast after this year and get it going. All right, we’re going to talk more about some things. We’re going to talk about Howy Roseman and Jerry Jones, a couple of teams uh Dallas and Philly in the division where David covers. We’ll get to that in just a second here on Locked on NFL. All right, today’s show is sponsored and brought to you by our friends over at FanDuel. You know, the NBA is back, right? Yeah, I know we’re in week nine in the NFL, but the NBA is just getting started and there’s no better place to get in on the action than FanDuel, the official sports betting partner of the NBA. Even if you missed the start of the game or want to ride the hot hand, FanDuel has live bets on everything from who will score next to fourth quarter comebacks. Plus, you can even combine your live bets into the same game parlay for a shot at a bigger payout. It keeps every game really, really exciting, especially when your team’s making that late push and you want to win you some money. Right now, FanDuel is giving new customers $300 in bonus bets when your first $5 bet wins. So, head to fanduel.com to sign up and play your game with FanDuel, the official sports betting partner of the NBA. All right, rolling along with my main man David Harrison here on this hump day in the National Football League. And good thing about it is the trade deadline is over. David even hit it dead on the head. David say it was very, very entertaining and it was it kind of reminded me of how fast and furious things go in the National Basketball Association that you just heard me mention. Um, sometimes teams that are rich, they stay rich for a reason. And that’s I always say you need a financial advisor more when you got a whole bunch of money than you do when you don’t. You just need to know how to survive when you don’t. And Philly is not in survival mode. Philly is in the mode of of flexing their dominance. And they got Howie Roseman who I wouldn’t even say is the best GM in the National Football League. I think he’s going down. He’s getting in that Ron Wolf, Jimmy Johnson, Bill Walt territory in terms of GMs. Uh, and I know Louie always says this in the history of the National Football League when he refers to Philadelphia, but listen to the way he talks about Howie right here about what they did on trade deadline. I just I love having a GM that does what Howie Roseman does and makes no excuses that says we’re going to go for it. We are going to be aggressive adding talent and if we miss on a guy, so be it. we’re going to move on and find the solution. Like, we’re not going to stop adding to this roster and trying to make it the best it can be. And there’s a lot of general managers that don’t do that. They sit on their hands and say, “This is what we have. This is what we’re working with with 2025.” They kind of get complacent and are stubborn and say, “We’ll see what happens next off season, free agency, the draft.” Like, that’s not Howie Roseman. This guy is going to go down as the most active general manager by far in the history of the National Football League. All right, I’m gonna apologize to my friends in the DMV, including David. I did not include Bobby Beth. There was a different time, but Bobby Beth actually might be the goat. He had like a 20-year run. I know people going to think about what he did with the Chargers, but what he did in Washington when I grew up, I think it really set the template for all GMs. But how he’s taking a page out of his book, man. He’s finding veterans at the trade deadline to continue their push towards another Super Bowl. Yeah. I mean, listen, look at you. You look You look so resigned, dog. You I ain’t mean to make you feel defeated. I knew this was going to happen. That’s why I came back and gave Beth props because it’s true, but you look so defeated, man. Go ahead. It’s not even that. Like, listen, I I appreciate what the Eagles are doing because when you look at their organization, I mean, let’s be real, man. Jaylen Herz is is is a limited quarterback. Uh not that he’s not talented. He’s just he’s limited, right? Like he’s not one of these Eagles fans want, you know, him to be amongst the Mahomes, the Jacksons, the Josh Allens. He’s not that. He’s he’s a very good second or third tier quarterback, which is great, but you need pieces around him. Like that’s that’s the bottom line. You need a defense on the other side. You need offensive weapons on the other on around him. Um I’m getting the feeling like these offensive weapons that are around him feel like they’re more the imp. more impactful than he is, but the quarterback always gets the credit. Uh, this thing with AJ Brown, I think it’s coming to a head at some point in time, might come to a head this offseason. And if you’re Roseman and you see it that way and you understand that your stark wide receiver may very well put you in a situation where you got to move your quarterback or you got to move him, um, you understand like the clock is ticking because one way or another, you get if you have to move AJ Brown or if he forces his way out or whatever, you got to bring in a new number one and that might not gel. If you decide to keep AJ Brown, you move Jaylen Herz, your quarterback may not click, right? Like, so that that’s a problem. So, and here’s the reason why I kind of just kind of flinch at Louisie, uh, you know, wanting to wanting to put, uh, wanting to put his GM up on a pedestal with the all-time greats because really, when I saw Howie Roseman operating this year, I’m like, “Oh, he’s taking a page out of Less Need’s book. Less just did this like five years ago.” You know what I mean? So, it’s not about quantity. Like I know how Roseman makes a ton of moves and a lot of them have panned out in the short term, some of them in the long term, right? Like listen like Cooper Deene, you know, look, how Roseman executed a trade with Adam Peters in division in the NFL draft, went up, got him, Cooper Deene. Cooper Jeene gets an interception on his birthday in the Super Bowl, they win the Super Bowl, do all those things. So it looks like a an absolutely sniper shot of a trade, but you know, Cooper Deian is a long way away from Canton, right? like Cooper De’s is not getting a gold jacket based off of what he’s done so far in the NFL, nor should you be expecting him to. So, I think it’s just it’s just a little bit of like like praise him for the shortterm successes, yes, but let’s pump the brakes on the long term. There’s a long way to go to figuring out if Howe Roseman is an all-time great in totality. Uh like you mentioned, guys like Bobby Beth had a had a really long decades long run. Like, you can say what you want about Bill Bich in his draft classes. That man still put together the greatest dynasty we’ve ever seen as a decisionmaker GM operator. I know that’s not his title, you know what I mean, but he deserves to be in that conversation as well. You know, there’s the Cowboys of the 90s. There’s there’s all there’s the Bills even though they lost all their Super Bowls, you know what I mean? Just getting to that amount of Super Bowls historic. There’s a lot of dudes out there that have lot of done a lot of great things for a long period of time. How Roseman is great. He’s definitely the best GM in my opinion right now. Mhm. We don’t need to try to overextend him to the all-time great yet. Yeah, we always we get on Bill Bellich. I’m glad you mentioned that. We get on him for his misses and he’s had a bunch of them now. Yeah. But we don’t we don’t talk about the makes. We You got You got the GOAT quarterback probably the GOAT tight end. You got Richard Seymour. You got Tai Law. You got moving Teddy Bruski from defensive tackle to linebacker. I mean, come on. You go down the line of great players that contributed to those championships and I think sometimes we give Bill a check. It’s low hanging fruit to pick at. Plus plus and and this is a little bit maybe too far to go with it, but let’s also not forget the reason he’s executing these trades to go get these players is because the amount of defensive players the Eagles let walk out the building this off season. And look, it takes two to tango. So, a lot of these players, Milton Williams, Josh Sweat, like I don’t know how many of those dudes were really negotiating to come back to the Eagles anyway, like like in fair, you know, in true faith type of thing. Um, so you can’t put that all the feet of Howy Roseman without knowing the details of those negotiations. But it’s not like the Eagles have this great defense they had last year already and now they’re just adding pieces to it. No, like they’ve got leaks in their defense and they’re trying to plug those holes right now. So again, like it’s almost like Jamus Winston, like we used to have these conversations all the time with Jamus Winston when he was leading the Buccaneers wig where it’s like, oh man, Jameus Winston at the end there, man, he almost had them back in that game. It’s like, yeah, but he threw three picks in the first half that had him in that situation where he had to get them back in the game in the first place. So like I get it, but don’t forget there’s a reason why he had to do all that stuff. Yeah. And some of it’s necessary because you you can’t pay guys. So the flip side of that is you can say, well, he let real good players go and they’re still sitting right in the cat bird seat. And now that it worked out, now he’s plugging a little a few holes. So that kind of goes both ways. Jerry Jones, I’m going to give him a little bit of credit, went into the day with uh two first round picks of his own in 26 and two in 27. Got a great player in Quinnon Williams, a good player in Logan Wilson, and he still has three of those first round picks left. Here’s Landon Mcool with locked on Cowboys. The Dallas Cowboys came into the trade deadline committed to improving their defense, which has been absolutely atrocious this season. And they’ve made a big swing while trading for Quinnon Williams, defensive tackle from the New York Jets. Hi, I’m Land Mool with the Locked on Cowboys podcast. And the Cowboys have sent a first round and maybe a little bit more with compensation still hasn’t been announced yet to the Jets for Quinnon Williams, a 27-year-old defensive tackle, who’s been one of the best defensive tackles in football for a few years now. This is a major trade for the Cowboys. A move not only obviously for this year, which may or may not be uh lost at this point, but certainly moving forward. A guy that the Cowboys can build a defensive uh uh front around a a high-end player who is worth a first round pick uh and is still a very young player. Lots to discuss here. Make sure you guys check us out all week on the Locked On Cowboys podcast. Got about a minute here, David. Give Cowboys some love a little bit. Just a little bit. Yeah. This is where I’m going to get a lot of like it’s just you’re just an NFC East hater. Listen, uh I give all credit in the world to Jerry Jones for playing situational football. This man is 83 years old. If he’s going to see the Dallas Cowboys win another Super Bowl, he doesn’t have a lot of time. But the truth of the matter is, if Quinn Williams was good enough to carry an entire defense that’s at the bottom of the league by himself, he’d have done it in New Jersey. He’s not that good of a defense. He’s a great defensive tackle, don’t get me wrong, but defense is an 11man game, not a one-man game. one man is not going to fix Dallas Cowboys defensive wos and now the problem is the draft capital they could have had from the Michael Parsons trade which was stupid in the first place they now have given that away which would help them build the franchise of the future for somebody else but again Jerry situational football he’s not worried about the future he’s worried about right now so props to Jerry Cowboys I it’s a thud for me yeah 35 and one you wonder okay why now that it’s almost like you’re reversing ing what you did, but to a lesser degree, cuz Quinnon ain’t going to have the same impact as Micah, but he did make some soup out of u leftover chicken. That’s what he did. All right, here’s where we going, man. We’re going to talk about teams to watch in the second half of the season for various reasons. One of them is in New England, and one of them, believe it or not, is still the LA Chargers. I’ll tell you why I feel that way in just a second here on Locked on NFL. All right, let’s get after it, man. Today’s show is sponsored and brought to you by Built. Nobody likes paying rent. But if you must, you might as well get something for it. That’s where Built, B I L T, comes in. Built is changing the game by turning your rent payment into real rewards you can actually use. When you pay rent through Built, you earn flexible points that can be redeemed towards hundreds of hotels and airlines, a future rent payment, your next lift ride, and more. But built isn’t just about rent. It’s about rewarding you around your entire neighborhood. There are things that you do in your neighborhood, your dog groomer, your favorite taco spot, all of the things that you do on a daily basis or a weekly basis. There are built rewards attached to it. And you need to do your research and check it out so you can save you some money. Turn your rent into rewards and start earning points around your neighborhood by going to join.com/lockton NFL. That’s ji n i lt.com. Make sure to use that link so they know that we are the ones that sent you. All right, we moving and grooving here. Third and final segment on locked on NFL with my main man David Harrison. All right, teams to watch as we get and this list was not really based on the trade deadline, but it’s just that you got a good sample size. You’re halfway through the season and there are some teams that you think are for real and some teams that you are worried about. One of the teams that I was really worried about was the Chargers. Look, not only did they lose both tackles, they lost both great tackles left and right, have been moving around and for a team that views offensive linemen as weapons and that love to ground and pound, that usually is a death sentence. They did make a trade for Trevor Penning. Not a great player by any stretch of the imagination from the New Orleans Saints, but it’s another situation where the Saints are going, “Okay, we’re rebuilding. He’s more than a serviceable tackle.” Because one of the things I always say is you cannot find offense. This the hardest thing other than a quarterback to find in the middle of the season just walking around that teams think that they can get rid of and that is a left tackle or a right tackle in his 20s. They managed to do it and here’s why they had to do it. Here’s the guys from locked on Chargers and and David like it it’s hard to understate how important Joe Wald is. We had the buyer sell last week. He’s the most important player on this team right now outside of Justin Herbert. So very important to be able to still find offense, find a way to win the game after losing those guys. But man, like this is one step forward, two steps back with this team health-wise. It it just seems like it’s every week. Every single game, every single time they step foot on the field, somebody’s going down. And now they can’t lose another one. If they lose another one, we’re going to be like, “All right, we just need to go ahead and start thinking about next the off seasonason. But that’s a pretty solid pickup at this time of the year for a team that has some things that they still want to accomplish.” It is. You know, look, you’re not getting a blue chip offensive tackle the trade deadline. Like, it’s just it’s just not going to happen. And there’s not a blue chip offensive tackle walk around the street. So, Trevor Penning is about as good as you’re going to get at the deadline. You know, that being said, uh, you know, look, I feel like the Chargers probably missed their window. You know what I mean? They had MVP quote unquote candidate Justin uh Herbert and all this stuff. They had that was quote unquote quote unquote they had they had a defense that was scary, but they’ve started to sell off the pieces of that defense and they’re not not necessarily rebuilding it. Uh and then you look at the rest of this season, man. I mean, they got the Pittsburgh Steelers who found their groove uh coming up this week. They got the Eagles, Chiefs, Cowboys, Texans, and Broncos to end the season. And I think the Los Angeles Chargers are not only going to miss the playoffs this year, but they’re going to be looking up at not just Kansas City Chiefs, but now they’re going to be looking up at the Denver Broncos. And they’re going to be wondering, are the Las Vegas Raiders going to turn their assets this next off season into a team that’s going to contend to potentially push the Los Angeles Chargers down to the bottom of the AC West in the next year or two. Um, I think the Chargers had an opportunity to go up there and compete with the Kansas City Chiefs. Look, it’s not easy to build a competing roster. Um, so I’m not necessarily dogging anybody for it, but I think they uh swung and missed on on a few too many things. They’ve had some bad luck with injuries, especially in the trenches. And, uh, you know, uh, Wig, I think I think the, uh, the age of the Chargers being in third place in the AFC West for a little bit might be coming. Yeah. Yep. You’re right. You’re right. If they can get back and get healthy though, they can push it and challenge. But you, they got to really they’re going to be too good to draft high, so they got to draft really well drafting somewhere between 18 and 23 every single year. And that’s very, very difficult to do. Yeah, it’s very, very difficult to do. Trade back and get really good day two guys or trade up and go get you a blue chub. You got to be bold. You can’t sit there in purgatory and expect to get better. Somebody stood pat yesterday. No pun intended, but they stood pat because their young players are playing at a high level. The culture is working and it’s real because the way the Patriots are playing right now, we have seen Mike Greyel do this before and it’s actually working. And they have a young quarterback, too. They got to keep it from getting hit a little bit. But here’s my man Nick Cat to talk about the Patriots who I think the sky is the limit for them this season and in the future. Not every single game is going to be a thing of beauty. You’re going to fall on your face every once in a while. How do you get up? How do you respond? This game was certainly not a Picasso. Drake May isn’t always going to be great. I I know we almost take it for granted because he’s been so good for the past six or seven weeks, but he’s not going to be that guy every single week. I say this all the time about quarterbacks. We get spoiled. And then sometimes there’s illusions of grander where you think quarterbacks because they get so much credit do it all by themselves, but there’s no quarterback that has to be Superman every week. They got to be Clark Kent for half the time and Superman every now and then. Even Patrick Mahomes, even in the game last year when Buffalo beat Baltimore. Look at Josh Allen stats. He didn’t have 150 yards passing. I think that’s a misconception sometimes. And I think Drake is learning that at a very young age. And the Patriots, that’s a good good solid football team that’s only going to get better. Yeah. I mean, look, it shows it shows that leadership and coaching matters, right? That’s that’s really what it what it boils down to. I think that when you’re a team like let’s you know, they’re the Pats are near the top of the AFC. Let’s look at a team near the bottom of the AFC. I know that the Tennessee Titans fired their coach in season this year, but when they fired their last coach, they went out there hoping to get a head coach kind of like the one the New England Patriots got right now. Ain’t that something? That hurts, bro. Here’s the great Here’s the great thing about the New England Patriots. Hopefully, y’all know enough about the league to track that joke. Here’s the great thing about the New England Patriots. Not only are they doing really well, but they’re doing really well without a true blue chip number one wide receiver. Stefan Diggs, do not come in my mentions. Do not come attack me. I’m sorry, bro. You’re just not that anymore. But very solid player, very good player, but he’s not that true number one. Uh you got you got other guys. You got Pop out here making noise. You got really great things going on with a team that is not really stacked with paper players that you would stack up next to other rosters and say, “Man, this on paper just looks like a terrible matchup for the opponent.” Right? Beyond that, they’ve also got resources coming up this offseason, and they’ve got draft capital coming up this offseason. They have five picks projected to be in the top 150 picks of the 2026 NFL draft. You can maneuver a little bit. You can maybe move up. Now, just like we talked about with the Los Angeles Chargers, there’s a window opening up here for the New England Patriots to go out there and compete. Maybe I mean, right now, they’re sitting on top of the Buffalo Bills. So, go out there and compete in your division. Take back that top seat. You got to hit these picks. You got to make some smart moves. There’s no guarantees those things are going to happen, but the Patriots are set up great for Drake May to do what people thought Justin Herbert was going to do and potentially become a legit MVP candidate in the AFC. No, no doubt about it. Uh, as I watched the game the other night uh on TV between Seattle and Washington. I realized it was two secondyear coaches. Why we got to bring up old stuff? because I was going to bring cuz I was going to bring up Seattle as a team to watch, but I said ain’t no way I can do that without uh some drive by shrapnel hitting my man David. So, I’m just going to let you know what my mindset was. My mindset was to talk about those two teams, two quarterbacks, two very different areas of their career, and then go, what happened? Why is Seattle what we all thought Washington was going to be? What’s happening in Washington, man? Uh, I mean, for one, defense, like just any semblance, just any semblance of effective defense is just is just not there. You know what I mean? When they when the when the commanders rush before, they can’t get pressure. And no, no, no secondary can cover when that’s happening. Uh, when they blitz and take players out of the secondary, the blitz still isn’t getting home fast enough and the secondary isn’t covering long enough with the depleted amount of people in the secondary to keep quarterbacks from hitting those those quick hitters and all that stuff. And you know, uh, never say never, but it’s only going to get worse. Marshon Latimore to his ACL. He’s out for the season. Uh, and he was actually one of their better defenders so far this season, even though he had his own struggles and all that kind of stuff. So, you know, I think it boils down to the trenches, man. You know what I mean? Saying that you can’t get pressure with your organic front four. And listen, there’s a little bit of a caveat there, you know, to go off what the Chargers guys were saying. Dietri Weise Jr. lost for the season in week two. Javvante Jean Baptiste, his replacement, uh, who also was a secondyear seventh round player. anyway. Um, but has a lot of promise. Lost for the season a couple weeks later. Dorren Armstrong Jr. who’s actually like third in pass rush win rate when he got hurt and lost for the season just a couple weeks after that. Like the the the defensive front is not being effective at all. But it’s also been decimated by injury. So there’s a little bit of of of you know permission slip, I suppose, to give out there. They can’t set the edge. Um that the Washington commanders can’t. So all you got to do if you’re the offense going up against the commanders defense is go left and right and then once you soften them up left and right and stretch them out and tire them out go up the middle and now they’re not going to be able to stop you there either. And you look at the Seattle Seahawks what they’re able to do look practice squad receivers getting a touchdown. Tight ends that people don’t even remember was in the draft last year is getting a touchdown. Jackson Smith and Jigba’s doing his thing but he’s not even the guy doing all the damage. Tory Horton is suddenly a household name around the National Football League because he baldled out on prime time and I love it for him. But this was not a this was about 60% uh you know I would actually pay say it’s about 40% Seahawks offense 60% Commanders defense uh that led to what you saw on Sunday night which is why the Seahawks went out there and and they did some things and they try to do some things to make their team better uh as well because they recognized that. I think it was a smart move for them. But the culture is good on both teams. I think that’s really the most important thing and for the Washington Commanders as long as your culture is strong then you have the opportunity to write this thing. Maybe not this year, but at least going into 2026 for the Seattle Seahawks. It took you a year longer than the Commanders to get to this point because this is where the Commanders were last year, right? But because it took a little bit more to build it and the foundation behind it is a little bit younger, I think you feel a little bit stronger about the viability of it moving forward. No doubt about that. Uh it’s something to watch the alignment between GM and coach Peters Quinn. Just take a look at it. And this is why you don’t get too happy. uh the first year you got to make sure you do that thing so it manifests itself over a long period of time. I think in order to win a championship you have to be good for a sustained period of time and hope hopefully everything kind of lines up. It lined up for me and David here today. Almost didn’t but y’all need to understand why it almost didn’t but we managed to get through the show today and Tyler Roland will be here tomorrow morning because locked on NFL is twice a day. It’s a double shot. That’s right. Shot of espresso early in the morning and then a shot of whatever I got in this cup here in the barber shop in the afternoon on locked on NFL. Catch David on locked on commanders for great coverage. We will see you. We appreciate you spending a little bit more than 32 and a half minutes with us. We don’t take you for granted. Thank you for joining us here on lockdown on NFL in the box

Tennessee Titans won the NFL trade deadline without making a single major move. By standing pat at 1-8, they’ve positioned themselves to control the 2026 draft’s top pick and auction it to quarterback-desperate teams like the New York Jets and Cleveland Browns for a massive haul of future assets.

Tony Wiggins and David Harrison break down the smartest and riskiest moves across the league. Philadelphia Eagles GM Howie Roseman’s aggressive deadline strategy sparks debate about his all-time legacy. Dallas Cowboys shocked everyone by trading for Quinnen Williams despite their struggles. The LA Chargers face a potential playoff collapse after losing both starting tackles. New England Patriots are quietly building something special under Mike Vrabel with Drake May’s development, while the Washington Commanders’ injury-decimated defense exposed critical flaws in their Monday night loss to Seattle Seahawks.

Discover which second-half contenders are real and which teams are headed for disaster as the playoff race intensifies.

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