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00:00 Adam Kaplan is our NFL insider. He's covered the NFL for well over two decades. You can
00:09 follow him for free on X at Kaplan NFL. He's constantly on SportsGrid and thank God he's
00:16 constantly on Coast to Coast. And here he is today from Pharrell, Adelphia. I wanted
00:22 to keel over today. I didn't see that coming. The Tomlin extension. You know, I like Mike
00:31 Tomlin a lot. And I think that I understand people's frustrations with the playoff failures
00:39 and postseason failures. But when you win as much as he does and the Roonies have had
00:45 four coaches and I knew they would stand behind this guy and that the media was wrong. The
00:50 fans are definitely wrong. The fans want him fired every time they lose. But the Roonies
00:55 love him. Yeah, you and I have talked about this over the four plus years we've worked
01:00 together here together on SportsGrid. And for some reason, there's this disdain for
01:06 Tomlin with certain Steeler fans. And I understand, look, he hasn't won a playoff game in seven
01:11 years. It's been since 2017. Never has had a losing season. They're always competitive.
01:17 But the one thing as we look at this contract extension, you have to remember, first, Mike
01:21 had to decide whether he wanted to be back. If you recall, he didn't want to talk about
01:24 it, didn't want to deal with it. And then he said, I'm coming back after they were done
01:28 playing and they've always wanted to bring him back. Like this is for future years. This
01:34 is just a matter of can they figure it out and how it would work. They did a three-year
01:39 extension. So he'll be the head coach through 2027. And when you look at his situation and
01:44 why it's important to do this now, let's say he said, look, let's table this. Let's wait
01:48 till after the season. I could tell you from talking to players and coaches, specifically
01:53 coaches over the years, Scott, they don't like coaching on the final years of their
01:57 deal. Typically the assistants have the same length of their contract as their head coach.
02:02 Because let's just say it's late in the season. It looks like they're not going to make the
02:06 playoffs for the first time in Tomlin's career. That's when players potentially could tune
02:10 out of coaching staff. You want to avoid that. You don't want that. And the endless speculation
02:15 and questions, what do you think about this situation? You don't want the players thinking
02:18 about her having to talk about it. So they end it. And by the way, they do have their,
02:23 their mandatory camp this week with 20 other teams. And then there'll be off until late
02:27 July, but it's a good thing. They did this now. And you're right. Looking at social media
02:32 today, when the Steelers announced it, look, there's a certain part of the sealer fan base.
02:37 It just won't accept it. They want to play off wins and they want another ring.
02:40 Well, you know, I don't blame them for that. When you have six super bowls, six Lombardi's
02:48 in your foyer, you play for higher standards than most franchises. When you win that many,
02:56 you want more and that's all there is to it. There's no, no difference in Brady, what he
03:02 wanted to accomplish and what he did accomplish in new England. And then in Tampa, he has
03:06 seven now. There's no one that plays in the NFL that doesn't want that ring and that Lombardi.
03:12 And when you win a bunch of them, the fans, they expect it. I don't think it's any different
03:16 than Kentucky basketball, Duke, North Carolina, UCLA. They think that they should win titles
03:23 every year, but I do believe that he is a good coach and he handles his business the
03:31 right way. He handles the team the right way, the media, the right way. I think he does
03:36 everything the way it should be done by a head coach in the NFL. I think he sets a standard
03:42 high, the bar's high with him. And I don't think fans understand that because they drink
03:47 and eat too much food, honestly.
03:51 Let me add this before we move on here. If you go back to when he was hired, he was not
03:55 the first, second, third or fourth choice when they went into the process. He was way
03:59 down the list. Mike Tomlin was an unknown with the Vikings as an assistant and he went
04:05 up and he aced the interview. Remember Russ Groom was the guy most people thought, in
04:09 fact, myself and others reported that he was the favorite, but he went up not getting the
04:12 job and Mike Tomlin got it. And he said nothing but win there. Again, he's never had a losing
04:17 season.
04:18 Now, one thing that we should add, look at the quarterback situation. Roethlisberger,
04:23 before he retired, was on the downside of his career, beat up physically, didn't have
04:26 much left. Kenny Pickett didn't work out over his two seasons. He was traded to Philly and
04:31 they're starting over the quarterback position on a one-year deal with Russell Wilson. So
04:35 you've got a good roster. Tom's got a very good staff, but sometimes you're only as good
04:39 as your quarterback.
04:41 So let's talk about Coach of the Year award odds as we head into the season and all these
04:47 final mandatories and then camp in late July through August into September in the regular
04:54 season. Already a lot of odds out for Coach of the Year.
04:58 Yeah, this one is interesting. So Jim Harbaugh is just plus 550, the head coach of the Chargers.
05:05 In his first year, they have a hype machine here with this football team. If you look
05:09 at their win total of nine, to have a winning record in a rebuild, I know they've got the
05:15 quarterback, but the roster they inherited isn't very good. So they're kind of rebuilding
05:18 that roster. He's plus 550. Matt LaFleur, plus 800, the Packers head coach. Raheem Morris,
05:24 plus 1000. Now, Scott and I, we've talked about this on Sports Grid. The Falcons are
05:30 picked by oddsmakers to win that NFC South to me. I still think it's the Bucs, but a
05:34 lot of people like Raheem Morris and the Falcons this season. My pick are the Houston Texans.
05:39 Remember, Kevin Stefanski won it last year. He's actually won it to whatever his four
05:43 years. He's now in year five. He just got a contract extension last week. But when you
05:47 look at D'Amico Ryan, he's plus 1400. Scott, those are great odds. That to me is the best
05:53 odds if you look at it, potentially winning it. With their turnaround last season, which
05:57 was really historic, it was incredible. They came from out of nowhere. Oddsmakers gave
06:02 him four and a half to five wins, and obviously they wound up winning that division. The Houston
06:06 Texans led D'Amico Ryan's there. I absolutely love them and him at plus 1400. And how about
06:13 Mike Tomlin, who's never won, by the way, the AP Coach of the Year. He's plus 2800.
06:18 And you notice, almost always, not always, but almost always, the coaches who win it
06:23 are the teams that either the oddsmakers don't expect, or there's not a lot of hype for,
06:28 who exceed expectations. Again, when you look at it, Kevin Stefanski is, in two out of his
06:34 four years, is one coach of the year. You look at Mike Tomlin, he's never won it. Now
06:38 they've had expectations every year because they're always good. He's plus 2800. Mike
06:42 McDaniel, the head coach of the Dolphins, by the way, there should be some pressure
06:45 on him to win the season. He's plus 2000. One that I kind of like, now he's always been
06:50 good, is the Rams there, and Sean McVay, plus 1800. With the Aaron Donald retirement, they
06:55 overachieved last year, by the way, but they still have Matthew Stafford and a fantastic
06:59 offense. They have a new defensive coordinator, so things are going to change a little bit,
07:03 because Raheem Morris is now the head coach of the Falcons. But Sean McVay always exceeds
07:08 expectations.
07:09 >> What about our boy, dental floss, Matt Eberflus in Chicago? They've already given
07:14 them the hype machine. They've given him hard knocks. They got the number one pick in the
07:20 draft. Everyone thinks the Bears are going to have a great season and shock the world.
07:25 Would it be past him to win it?
07:28 >> See, I don't see him winning it. Now, he's got the same odds, believe it or not. It's
07:32 D'Amico Rhynes at plus 1400. I get it. There's a hype machine with Caleb Williams, the first
07:37 pick overall. No question, they've added a ton of offensive talent, competitive defense.
07:43 They're not a playoff team to me in the NFC, which is going to be very, very competitive.
07:46 They're going to be somewhere at eight or nine wins. Will that be good enough to get
07:49 him the coach of the year? There's only one per year, not two or three. I don't do it
07:52 by conference. I only do one. He's not going to get it. Again, D'Amico Rhynes at plus 1400.
07:57 Same odds as Matt Eberflus. I don't see that. D'Amico Rhynes is going to get it. He's got
08:02 a great chance to get it.
08:03 >> All right, so what about the New York coaches? Salah in his fourth year. D'Amico's had two
08:09 years, one great year, one awful year. Is Salah, with all the expectations of the Jets
08:16 that they're going to the playoffs and Aaron Rodgers and all the rest are going to the
08:20 AFC title. If they don't go to the playoffs, is he going to get fired? And if D'Amico has
08:26 another bad season, is he going to get fired or will the Marra-Tish ownership group keep
08:31 him going until the end of his deal?
08:33 >> Robert Salah's plus 1400, by the way, yes. The expectations are playoffs or bust, no
08:38 question about it. Obviously, if Aaron Rodgers plays 14 of those 17 regular season games,
08:43 that's the expectation. If they don't, there's a real problem. Brian D'Amico, they severely
08:48 overachieved two years ago. They came out of nowhere to make the playoffs when a playoff
08:50 game at Minnesota, but the bottom dropped out.
08:53 They finally addressed their offensive line, but they're in a semi-rebuild here. It's hard
08:57 to imagine they're going to make the playoffs. With Daniel Jones coming off a tour in ACL,
09:01 drew lots of decent backup, but he's not good enough to be a full-time starter. They're
09:04 not going to be good enough. They're not a playoff team with the Giants.
09:07 [MUSIC]
09:09 (bells chiming)