The Daily Briefing Tuesday, February 14, 2023

Officials hadn’t called defensive holding all game, but with the score tied 35-35 and the Chiefs in the red zone with 1:54 remaining, deep wing John Jenkins flagged Bradberry for restricting JuJu Smith-Schuster. What gives?

First things first. While the world decried the call, Bradberry himself admitted guilt.

“It was a holding,” he said after the game. “I just didn’t know if he’d call it.”

Referee Carl Cheffers stood by the call during an interview with Pro Football Writers of America pool reporter Lindsay Jones, which is how referees always roll in these situations. It’s easy to see why defending their own is ingrained in officiating culture when the commissioner himself claims things have never been better.

Bradberry’s uncommon grace and Cheffers’ stock answer do not change that Jenkins, a nine-year NFL official, threw a flag in a situation when officials frequently do not throw flags, with legacy-altering consequences.

“You know how many times that route gets run and it is not called?” a veteran offensive play caller said. “It’s a play teams perennially send into the league and never get the call. Guys grab like that all the time. If it stopped the receiver from getting to the ball, I understand, but that was not the case.”

The resulting first down let the Chiefs run down the fourth-quarter game clock sufficiently to leave Philly with only eight seconds after Harrison Butker’s 27-yard field goal.

“What we all want in that situation is for the officials to do their conference and pick up the flag and say, ‘There is no flag on the previous play,’ ” a game-management coach explained. “But the problem is, the crew does not have multiple sets of eyes on that play because the contact occurred before the ball was thrown.”

Jenkins, the deep wing, would have been the only official with eyes on Smith-Schuster and Bradberry when the flag was thrown. Other officials would have shifted their focus to that area of the field once the pass left Mahomes’ hands toward Smith-Schuster.

Because defensive holding is a judgment call, rules prevent the NFL’s officiating command center from using “replay assist” to spur a quick reversal without a formal stoppage. No matter that Fox’s 44 cameras dedicated for game coverage quickly provided replays calling into question whether such a call was warranted.

“There were two restrictions on this play, and neither was enough for a foul in my opinion,” the game-management coach said. “It looks bad because you want competitive plays at the end of the Super Bowl instead of Mahomes kneeling it down to center the ball for the kicker.”

Twenty-four years ago, then-commissioner Paul Tagliabue made a contrarian assertion amid similar outrage over officiating.

“I think officiating is as good as it’s ever been,” Tagliabue said before Super Bowl XXXIII following the 1998 season.

Sound familiar?

“I don’t think it’s ever been better in the league,” Goodell said Thursday.

Goodell’s comments affirm prediction No. 6 in the Pick Six column from last week:

The big change in NFL officiating will be … nothing, unless there is a catastrophic breakdown in the Super Bowl.

Changes come to officiating — to the rules, anyway — when an incorrect ruling affects an important enough team or person. This was the case in the NFC Championship Game following the 2018 season when the Los Angeles Rams got away with defensive pass interference while defeating the Sean Payton-coached New Orleans Saints.

Payton was sufficiently incensed and sufficiently powerful to push through rules subjecting such plays to instant replay. The cure wound up being worse than the malady, however, and the changes were scrapped after one year.

The call against Bradberry isn’t going to spur change when Bradberry himself did not protest it in real time or after the game.

“It was legit early in the down, but a little ticky-tack,” an offensive coordinator from an AFC team said. “It is hard to criticize beyond a couple days. By Wednesday, no one will even remember it happened except Philly players coaches and fans.”

That’s a little optimistic, but when it comes to officiating, some things never change.

GREEN BAY

QB AARON RODGERS is in his second day of darkness – and more than second day of annoying Mike Florio:

Last year, it was something called ayahuasca. This year, it will be nothing at all.

Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers has said he’ll embrace darkness for four days in an effort to make decisions about his short-term future. Via NFL Media, Rodgers entered voluntary solitary confinement on Monday.

His choices are simple. Retire. Play for the Packers. Play for another team. If so, which one?

On behalf of the billions of adults who make decisions the old-fashioned way, it just seems stupid and unnecessary and borderline narcissistic. Every day, people sift through choices and options without the presence of hallucinogens, or the absence of halogens. And most decisions are far more problematic, frankly, than whether to cash $60 million in checks for one more season of doing something he has done since 2005.

Do I need to list the sorts of decisions we all have to make, all the time? I won’t because this is your escape from the strain of navigating real life, from worrying about jobs to worrying about kids to worrying about pets to worrying about aging parents to worrying about paying bills to worrying about health issues to worrying whatever in the hell they’re shooting out of the sky in Alaska. (I guess I just did.)

It’s fine if Rodgers feels like a first-world problem needs to be resolved by pretending to be thrown into a third-world prison. It would have been better if he’d kept it to himself.

It’s not exactly relatable to the average person. And it will make more and more of them long for the day that Rodgers exits the arena for good.

DALLAS

First they booed Santa Claus, then the Eagles fans booed Dak Prescott when he was announced as NFL Man of the Year at the Super Bowl.

Peter King on why Prescott was such a good choice:

I think in all the years I’ve covered the league, 39 of them, I’ve never seen a better, more sincere speech for winning the Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year than the one Dak Prescott gave Thursday. It was beautiful. The everlasting influence of his late mother and his devotion to do something fruitful to commemorate his brother’s life after he committed suicide both show the kind of person he is. The NFL absolutely got Man of the Year right this year.

PHILADELPHIA

Michael David Smith of ProFootballTalk.com says QB JALEN HURTS had a great stat line in defeat:

When his team loses, a quarterback who plays a great game never gets enough credit. But Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts‘ performance in Super Bowl LVII should not be overlooked.

Hurts had, quite simply, perhaps the finest stat line in Super Bowl history: He carried 15 times for 70 yards, a Super Bowl record for a quarterback. He scored three touchdowns, tying the record for any player, regardless of position. He scored 20 points (three touchdowns and a two-point conversion), also tying a record for any player regardless of position. He completed 27 of 38 passes for 304 yards, with one touchdown and no interceptions.

Hurts had 41.16 fantasy points, the second-most in Super Bowl history, narrowly trailing the 41.90 fantasy points that 49ers quarterback Steve Young had in 1995.

If the Eagles had managed to win the game, Hurts would have been Super Bowl MVP, and an argument could certainly be made that Hurts played better than Patrick Mahomes in Sunday’s duel of two of the league’s best young quarterbacks. Hurts turned in a special performance, one that deserves to be celebrated even if Eagles fans don’t feel like celebrating today.

WASHINGTON

Besides Eric Bienemy (see Kansas City), the Commanders are searching far and wide for an OC.  Adam LaRose of ProFootballRumors.com:

Should Washington not be able to land Bieniemy, another veteran coach appears to be in place as Plan B. The Commanders are keeping an eye on Pat Shurmur, who interviewed with the team not long after their season ended. JP Finlay of NBC Sports notes that no other team has met with the former Giants and Browns head coach during the 2023 cycle, and that none are expected to in the coming days. Fowler concurs that Shurmur, 57, is likely the Commanders’ fallback option.

Meanwhile, ESPN’s John Keim reports (via Twitter) that Washington is lining up an interview with former Ravens OC Greg Roman. The latter spent the past four years at the helm of the Ravens’ offense, enjoying considerable success in the running game but coming up noticeably short regarding the team’s passing attack. The 50-year-old has previously served as the offensive coordinator of the 49ers and Bills.

Here is the updated breakdown of where things stand on the Washington OC front:

Darrell Bevell, quarterbacks coach (Dolphins): Declined interview request

Eric Bieniemy, offensive coordinator (Chiefs): Interview requested; team remains interested; interview being arranged

Thomas Brown, tight ends coach (Rams): Interviewed 1/24

Jim Caldwell, former head coach (Lions): Declined interview request

Charles London, quarterbacks coach (Falcons): Interview requested

Anthony Lynn, assistant head coach/running backs coach (49ers): Interviewed 2/1

Greg Roman, former offensive coordinator (Ravens): interview being arranged

Pat Shurmur, former offensive coordinator (Broncos): Interviewed; fallback option?

Eric Studesville, running backs coach (Dolphins): Interviewed 1/23

Ken Zampese, quarterbacks coach (Commanders): Interviewed 1/18

CAROLINA

Frank Reich may hire a coach from Sean McVay’s Rams staff as his new OC.  Elliss Williams of the Charlotte Observer:

Carolina Panthers head coach Frank Reich has yet to name an offensive coordinator but that could change following the Super Bowl.

Carolina is expected to have a second interview with Los Angeles Rams assistant head coach/tight ends coach Thomas Brown on Thursday for the team’s offensive coordinator job, a league source confirmed. Brown is scheduled to fly into Charlotte on Thursday following an interview with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers for the same position.

Brown has worked under Rams head coach Sean McVay for the past three seasons. Brown coordinated in college, was a standout at Georgia and played in the NFL. Brown, 36, also interviewed for the Houston Texans’ head coaching job in January. Brown, a former running back at Georgia, coached the Rams’ running backs in 2020 before being promoted to his current role the following season.

DENVER

Sean Payton on why he is in Denver:

“There was a point at which she looked at me and she said, ‘When are you getting back to work?’ We all live with this idea that we’re going to work to this golden spot and then we’re going to retire and it’s going to be wonderful. We’re sold that on TV a lot. My prior owner, the late Mr. Benson, used to tell me how overrated retirement was. I kind of feel where he was coming from.”

—Sean Payton, being introduced as the new Denver coach, on what his wife, Skylene, said to him in his year away from football, and what the late Saints owner, Tom Benson, told him about retirement.

In Payton’s “retirement”, he was well compensated to do something by FOX.

KANSAS CITY

It’s never too early to think about who the Chiefs will host to start the 2023 season.  Kevin Patra of NFL.com:

The NFL Kickoff game traditionally takes place at the Super Bowl winner’s house. For the ’23 season, K.C. is set to host the Buffalo Bills, Cincinnati Bengals, Chicago Bears, Denver Broncos, Detroit Lions, Los Angeles Chargers, Las Vegas Raiders, Miami Dolphins, and Philadelphia Eagles.

Let’s take a look at our top four matchups to kick off the 2023 campaign:

Cincinnati Bengals

The budding AFC rivals, who faced off in back-to-back Conference Championship games, would kick off the 2023 campaign with a bang. MVP Patrick Mahomes against Joe Burrow would be a marketer’s dream scenario, with months of promos leading up to Week 1. Even with inevitable offseason turnover, the Chiefs and Bengals provide two evenly-matched teams that play intense games. The league would have little fear of a dud kicking off the season. The Bengals’ high-flying offense featuring Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins against a Chiefs young secondary that corralled the Eagles in the Super Bowl. The remnants of the “Burrowhead” talk that ended in the AFC Championship Game would be reignited, this time with K.C. providing the taunt as Super Bowl champs. Who would say no to another Mahomes-Burrow battle to start Week 1 of the 2023 season?

Philadelphia Eagles

Let’s kick off the 2023 season where Super Bowl LVII finished. The Chiefs stormed back in the second half Sunday after getting punched in the mouth by the Eagles in the first half. Even on a tweaked ankle, Mahomes led K.C. to a spirited second-half comeback victory. The back-and-forth affair was made-for-TV drama. A late flag on James Bradberry — which the corner admitted was a hold — took some of the pizzazz off a potential historic ending. Kicking off the season by giving the Eagles a chance to avenge their Super Bowl loss would be a full-circle opportunity.

Buffalo Bills

Can I interest you in Josh Allen versus Patrick Mahomes to start the 2023 campaign? The NFL might not want the Bills in the kickoff game in back-to-back seasons, but there is no denying the intrigue Allen & Co. bring to the table. After a disappointing end to the season, Buffalo is in reload mode, hopefully adding more playmakers to the offense around Allen and Stefon Diggs this offseason. If Von Miller makes it back for Week 1 from his season-ending injury, it will bring added juice to the kickoff game as the legendary pass rusher attempts to corral the MVP. The Bills have knocked off K.C. at Arrowhead Stadium in each of the past two seasons, which could help build fuel for the Super Bowl champs.

Detroit Lions

How about a wild card matchup to kick off the season? Detroit is sure to be the darlings of the offseason after falling short of the postseason in 2022. If the NFL decided to put the Lions in the kickoff game matchup versus the Super Bowl champs, it would speak volumes about how the league feels about their chances of building upon that hot streak in 2023. Dan Campbell himself provides enough storylines to fill headlines heading into opening week. Then there is the upstart offense behind OC Ben Johnson that could provide a fun-filled matchup against Andy Reid’s powerful point-generating system. However, with the Lions, there’s always the possibility of a letdown, particularly given the defense’s up-and-down play. Would the league risk Mahomes blowing an opponent out of the water in Week 1?

Sean Payton’s first game with the Broncos did not make Patra’s list.  Nor QB JUSTIN HERBERT and the Chargers at Arrowhead.

Andy Reid on why he will be coaching them in the opener:

“I look in the mirror and I’m old. My heart, though, is young. I still enjoy doing what I’m doing.”

Peter King:

There will be 272 regular-season games in the NFL in 2023. The most anticipated one is not up for debate:

Philadelphia at Kansas City.

First meeting between the teams at Arrowhead since week two, 2017, when Alex Smith was KC’s quarterback and Carson Wentz played for the Eagles … in Patrick Mahomes’ second game as an NFL player.

Just watch NBC, FOX and ESPN brawl over that one.

With the new TV contract, we think CBS is part of that brawl.  This from The Spun in May:

For years CBS and Fox have effectively divided the majority of their non-primetime games based on which conference was the away team. Starting next year, that process will change significantly.

Appearing on The Ari Meirov NFL Show, NFL schedule-makers Mike North and Charlotte Carey revealed that there will be no restrictions on which networks get allotted which games. Starting in 2023, all NFL games will be “free agents.”

“Every game is a jump ball,” North said.

That isn’t to say that CBS and Fox won’t still get the majority of AFC and NFC games respectively. Rather, more games will be exchanged across the various networks along with ESPN, NBC (and presumably Amazon) than ever before.

– – –

Andy Reid was quick to praise OC Eric Bienemy for some of Kansas City’s brilliant plays and play calls on Sunday.  But Bienemy could be elsewhere come summer.  Adam LaRose of ProFootballRumors.com:

Eric Bieniemy is now a two-time Super Bowl champion, after the Chiefs’ offense sparked a second half comeback victory last night. The Kansas City offensive coordinator was already on the radar of several other teams before the title game, and its result has not changed his situation.

Bieniemy remains the top target for the Commanders, who are setting up an interview with him for this week, per ESPN’s Adam Schefter (Twitter link). Washington was recently named as a suitor for the 53-year-old, along with Baltimore; Schefter’s colleague Jeremy Fowler tweets that the Ravens are also expected to meet with Bieniemy regarding their vacancy.

The Commanders have undertaken a wide-ranging search in their replacement for Scott Turner. An interview with Bieniemy was only possible after the Super Bowl, of course, but they could have competition for his services. Bieniemy’s agent explained to Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk over the weekend that he has an “outside shot” at the Colts’ head coaching position, one of two in the NFL which has yet to filled. Bieniemy interviewed once for that role, but has plenty of competition amongst his fellow finalists.

In addition to the Indianapolis HC gig and the Washington and Baltimore OC postings, Bieniemy could also be a contender to become Arizona’s next offensive coordinator, per his agent, depending on who is ultimately hired as the Cardinals’ new head coach. To date, the 10-year Chiefs staffer has not taken any OC interviews, but that could change very quickly given his position atop the list of the Commanders’ preferred candidates.

LAS VEGAS

The Raiders have pushed their $40 million decision to the final day.  Charean Williams of ProFootballTalk.com:

The NFL’s personnel notice does not have Derek Carr‘s name on it. That leaves the Raiders 24 hours to make a move with Carr before the $40.4 million in injury guarantees on his contract become fully guaranteed.

The Raiders are expected to release Carr before 4 p.m. ET Tuesday. He then would become eligible to sign elsewhere.

Carr has said he has no intention of extending the trigger date, and Carr informed the Saints this weekend that he won’t except a trade to New Orleans or elsewhere.

Carr has a no-trade clause on his contract, complicating things for the Raiders in their attempt to get compensation for their quarterback.

One way or the other, after nine seasons, Carr’s time with the Raiders is coming to an end and probably sooner than later.

He made four Pro Bowls and threw 217 touchdown passes to 99 interceptions but lost his one playoff start, which came in the 2021 season.

BALTIMORE

Kliff Kingsbury, who knows a thing or two about mobile QBs, has talked to the Ravens per Josina Anderson:

@JosinaAnderson

I’m told Kliff Kingsbury had conversations Sunday with the #Ravens about potentially joining their staff. However, those talks did not produce an imminent fit on timing and other factors at this specific time, per league source.

MIAMI

Marcel Louis-Jacques of ESPN.com on Miami’s running back plans:

When the Miami Dolphins hired then-San Francisco 49ers offensive coordinator Mike McDaniel as their new coach last offseason, the expectation was for the NFL’s third-worst run game to improve.

It did — gaining an average of 99.2 rushing yards per game compared to 92.2 in 2021. But it’s not the type of improvement Dolphins fans hoped for, considering McDaniel’s previous role coaching one of the best rushing attacks in the NFL over the past five seasons.

Miami certainly did its best 49ers impression, bringing in former San Francisco running backs Raheem Mostert and Jeff Wilson Jr. The tandem started off promising, but the run game as a whole faltered down the stretch.

Neither Mostert nor Wilson is under contract for next season. In fact, the Dolphins don’t have any running back under contract entering 2023, but there are options.

Familiar faces

In his second game with the Dolphins, following a Week 9 trade from San Francisco, Wilson recorded 119 total yards in a blowout win over the Cleveland Browns.

It was the type of performance Miami hoped would rejuvenate its run game.

“It made me so happy, because I couldn’t articulate it,” McDaniel said at the time, referring to telling his players what to expect from Wilson. “I was like, ‘Just wait, guys. Just wait.’”

After trading for Wilson, the Dolphins ranked 9th in the NFL in yards after first contact through the remainder of the regular season.

But quarterback Tua Tagovailoa’s concussion issues, and poor offensive play as a whole down the stretch, impacted the Dolphins’ efficiency on the ground.

There is reason to believe Mostert and Wilson can get the job done with Tagovailoa healthy — and for a far cheaper price than some of the bigger-name players on the market.

Miami could realistically bring both players back on one-year deals, shore up its offensive line and spend draft capital on a running back to fill out the room, plus add via undrafted free agents.

The pipe dreams

If the Dolphins want to make a splash at running back, this is the year to do it — if they can find the money. Right now, they’re projected at $12.7 million over the cap, but they can get back under it with a series of restructures and other roster moves.

Saquon Barkley is the biggest name on the market, but the New York Giants aren’t likely to let him walk. The same goes for Las Vegas Raiders running back Josh Jacobs, who led the NFL in rushing yards this season.

Both players are likely to command more than $13 million per season, which would qualify as a short-sighted decision for a Dolphins team not yet bogged down by a franchise-quarterback contract. They could get away with it in the short-term, but it could backfire if they don’t win a Super Bowl while Tagovailoa is under his rookie deal.

The realistic options

The Carolina Panthers were the fourth-best rushing team in the NFL from Weeks 7 to 18, after trading superstar running back Christian McCaffrey. Why? Because D’Onta Foreman became the league’s third-leading rusher during that span after taking over as the team’s starter. He tore an Achilles as a rookie in 2017 but has been relatively healthy since, spending two seasons behind Derrick Henry in Tennessee. He’s produced when given the opportunity, as the Dolphins found out in 2021 when he ran for 132 yards on 26 carries in a blowout Titans win.

Kareem Hunt wanted out of Cleveland prior to the 2022 season, but his trade request was denied. Instead, he put together a relatively unproductive fourth season with the Browns as starter Nick Chubb remained healthy for all 17 games. Hunt has proven capable of high-level play when called upon to carry the workload and is effective as a runner and receiver.

Rashaad Penny is an interesting candidate because of his injury history. He tore an ACL in 2019 and broke a leg in 2022, with a handful of soft tissue injuries suffered in between. That’s the bad news. But he’s an undeniably talented runner when healthy. From Week 14 of the 2021 season to Week 5 of the 2022 season, he led the NFL in rushing yards and ranked second in yards per rush behind Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen.

The former first-round pick is all but finished in Seattle after the emergence of Seahawks rookie Kenneth Walker III, and the Dolphins haven’t hesitated to add players with injury concerns over the past year.

THIS AND THAT

JOE MONTANA

Wright Thompson of ESPN.com hits a grand slam homer with his long story on Joe Montana – about who he was and who he has become.

This part is interesting – because the DB was there when Montana struggled to get on the field for Dan Devine at Notre Dame:

NOT FIVE MINUTES later we’re at the same table drinking the same crisp white wine from the same delicate stemware when the mood suddenly darkens. The trigger, I think, is a question about the bitterness of DiMaggio, who’d grown up so close to where we sat. Montana chafes at the word, bitter, and empathizes with the baseball legend.

“Some things stick with you,” he says.

A neuron fires in whatever part of his hippocampus that’s kept him as driven after four titles as he was before one.

“Are there things you’re still struggling to let go of?”

He pauses.

“I struggle to try to understand how the whole process took place with me leaving San Francisco,” he says. “I should have never had to leave.”

You wanted an audience with that other Joe Montana? Here he is. In the flesh, vulnerable and wounded, holding his hurt in his hands like a beating heart. Time seems to collapse for him a bit, as if an old wound is being felt fresh. We’re at the table waiting on pesto, but he’s somewhere else.

Jennifer Montana spots these approaching storms faster than anyone else in his life. Some mornings, she says, she sticks out her hand and says, “I’m sorry, my name is Jennifer. I don’t think we’ve met.”

A black mood can make him shut down.

“He’s so complex,” she says. “Joe, and you’ll hear me tell you this so many times, he has so many different personalities. There’s two or three main ones. The main one is about kindness. There’s a deep, deep kind of love and affection. And then there’s a moody, everybody-out-to-get-him kind of personality. It’s only true in his mind.”

He’s most sensitive when someone tries to take something from him. At every level he’s had to fight his way onto the field. Chuck Abramski wanted to replace him with a kid named Paul Timko. Dan Devine wanted to replace him with Rusty Lisch and Gary Forystek. Bill Walsh and George Seifert wanted to replace him with Steve Young. “It’s actually what was feeding the beast,” Jennifer tells me later. “He continually thinks of himself as the underdog and that they want to take this or that person wants this. They said I can’t.”

He sits at the table now reconstructing a timeline. Chapter and verse. In 1988 and 1989, he led the team to Super Bowl titles. His third and fourth. In 1990 San Francisco was leading the NFC Championship Game deep in the fourth quarter when he got hurt. Steve Young took over and Montana never started for the Niners again.

“Why wasn’t I allowed to compete for the job?” he says. “I just had one of the best years I’d ever had. I could understand if I wasn’t playing well. We had just won two Super Bowls and I had one of my best years and we were winning in the championship game when I got hurt. How do I not get an opportunity? That’s the hardest part.”

As Montana worked to recover, he says Seifert banned him from the facility when the team was in the locker room. Something ruptured inside Joe that still hasn’t healed. Those other coaches doubted him, fueled him, even manipulated him, but in the end they never pushed him out of the circle. A team was a sacred thing. Joe’s an only child — an essential detail to understand, former teammate Ronnie Lott says, because he lived so much of his early life in his own head — and his teammates became his family. All the old Niners knew Joe’s parents. They gathered around his mom’s table for ravioli. Jennifer made fried chicken for team flights. As much as Joe wanted to win football games he also wanted to belong to his teammates, and they to him.

“Why am I not allowed in the facility?” he says. “What did I do to not be allowed in the facility?”

Montana did his rehab alone. Isolated and wounded, he faced endless blocks of time. One way he filled it was going to a nearby airport for flying lessons. The 49ers facility was in line with the flight path in and out of the field. Every day he’d take off and from the air he could see his team playing without him.

“They wouldn’t even let me dress.”

He returned for the final regular-season game of 1992 and played well in the second half. On his last play Seifert wanted a run, according to Montana, who instead threw a touchdown pass. On the sideline, Montana says, Seifert threw his headset down. Word got back to Montana, who has never let that go, either.

He sighs.

He says he ran into Seifert the night before a funeral for one of the old Niners a few years ago. Jennifer and Joe walked into a hotel bar and there was George and his wife. Jennifer pulled Joe over to say hello.

“The most uncomfortable thing I’ve been through in a long time,” he says.

They tried to make small talk and then just fell silent.

“Inside I think he knows,” Montana says, before he moves back to talking about old Italian recipes and family vacations, the storm ebbing away. “You guys won another Super Bowl, but you probably would have two or three more if I’d stuck around.”

Three more, by the way, would give him seven.

Actually, as the DB remembers it, it was guy named Rick Slager from Upper Arlington, Ohio who kept playing ahead of Montana in 1975, the first season after Tom Clements graduated (Slager also played in 1976, but Montana was red-shirted with a shoulder injury).  Slager has a Wikipedia page and this is what it says:

After backing up quarterback Tom Clements for two years at Notre Dame, Slager was named the starter by new head coach Dan Devine.[3] In an injury-plagued 1975 season, he completed 66 of 139 passes for 686 yards, often relieved by sophomore Joe Montana, en route to an 8-3 record. During his final season in 1976, Slager led the Irish to a 9-3 record and a top-20 ranking, completing 86 of 172 passes for 1,281 yards and 11 touchdowns.[4] After graduation, Slager served as a graduate assistant coach for three years while attending Notre Dame Law School.[1]

Here is how Thompson starts his piece.

MY LATE FATHER bought me a Joe Montana jersey when I was a boy. Home red with white stripes. I don’t remember when he gave it to me, or why, but I’ll never forget the way the mesh sleeves felt against my arms. The last time I visited my mom, I looked for it in her closets. She said it’d been put away somewhere. On trips home I half expect to still see my dad sitting at the head of the long dining room table, papers strewn, working on a brief or a closing argument. He was an ambitious man who had played quarterback in high school and loved what that detail told people about him — here, friends, was a leader, a winner, a person his peers trusted most in moments when they needed something extraordinary. Lots of young men like my father play high school quarterback, roughly 16,000 starters in America each year. Only 746 men have ever played the position in the modern NFL and just 35 of them are in the Hall of Fame. What my father knew when he gave me that jersey was that only one of them was Joe Montana.

Tom Brady Sr., bought his son, Tommy, a No. 16 jersey once, too. They sat in the upper deck of Candlestick Park together on Sundays. They looked down onto the field and dreamed. Tommy enrolled as a freshman at Michigan the year Joe Montana retired from football. Forced out of the game by injuries, Montana left as the unquestioned greatest of all time. His reputation had been bought in blood and preceded him like rose petals. Everybody knew. But over time the boy who sat in the upper deck idolizing Montana delivered on his own dreams and built his own reputation. Here, friends, was a threat. The boy, of course, went on to win his own Super Bowls. A fourth, a fifth, a sixth and a seventh. Parents now buy their children No. 12 jerseys because there can only be one unquestioned greatest of all time. No. 16 is no longer what it once was. Joe Montana now must be something else.

“Does it bug you?” I ask.

“Not really,” Montana says.

He sits at his desk and taps his fingers on his thumb, counting, keeping track of odds and evens. Placid on the surface, churning beneath the waves.

“You start thinking,” he says, his voice trailing off.

“I wish … “

– – –

MONTANA COMES INTO his San Francisco office waving around a box of doughnuts he picked up at a hole in the wall he loves. He’s got on Chuck Taylors and a fly-fishing T-shirt.

“… so chocolate, regular and maple crumb,” he says.

It’s a big day for his venture capital firm and nothing spreads cheer like an open box of doughnuts. He looks inside and chooses.

“Maple.”

It’s a tiny office, stark, with mostly empty shelves, a place rigged for work. There’s a signed John Candy photo a client sent him — a nod to a famous moment in his old life — leaning against the wall. Four Super Bowl rings buy him very little this morning on the last day of the Y Combinator — a kind of blind date Silicon Valley prom that puts a highly curated group of 400 founders in front of a thousand or so top investors. Each founder gets about a minute and a half to two minutes to pitch investors like Joe. A company founder promises to, say, fully automate the packing process, reducing manual labor from days to hours, a market opportunity of $10 billion. You can hear the nerves in their voices as they talk into their webcam. Some clearly haven’t slept in days. Without considering my audience — 11 plays, 92 yards, 2 minutes, 46 seconds — I marvel at the insanity of having your entire future determined in an instant.

“I know,” Montana laughs.

His company, Liquid 2, consists of multiple funds. He’s got two founding partners, Michael Ma and Mike Miller. Recently he brought in his son, Nate, along with a former Notre Dame teammate of Nate’s named Matt Mulvey — which makes three Fighting Irish quarterbacks. His daughter, Elizabeth, runs the office with a velvet fist. Their first fund is a big success and contains 21 “unicorns,” which is slang for a billion-dollar company. They’re headed toward 10 times the original investment. Montana, it turns out, is good at this.

“You just look at the teams and the relationship of the founders,” he says. “How they get along? How long they’ve known each other?”

Find a half hour or so and read the whole thing here.  Montana gave Thompson a lot of his time and his wife, Jennifer, and Steve Young and Ronnie Lott are among those who make an appearance.

BROADCAST NEWS

Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com on the big, but not record, rating for the FOX Super Bowl.

Fox was wishing for a record audience. Wish in one hand and, well, you know the rest by now.

The final number for Super Bowl LVII landed at 113 million. That makes it the third most-watched TV show ever, and the most watched Super Bowl since Super Bowl LI in 2017.

The all-time record continues to be held by Super Bowl XLIX, which racked up 114.5 million average viewers on NBC in early 2015.

Fox had hoped a close game would push Chiefs-Eagles over the top. And it was indeed a compelling and competitive finish. A sluggish first half by the Chiefs may have caused some folks to disengage, until the Chiefs woke up after halftime.

Regardless, what was everyone else doing? The country has more than 330 million people in it. Seriously, what else would have been more interesting than the Super Bowl?

Do two of every three people not watch the Super Bowl?

2023 DRAFT

The host team of the 2023 draft will have the last pick of the first round – at least at the moment.   Five picks have already been traded. Charean Williams of ProFootballTalk.com:

The first-round of the 2023 NFL draft is set to take place Thursday, April 27, in Kansas City.

Chiefs fans will have a long wait after their team won Super Bowl LVII on Sunday. The Chiefs draft last in the first round, which this year is 31st after the Dolphins forfeited their first-round choice for penalties announced by the NFL on Aug. 2.

The Bears hold the No. 1 overall choice with the Texans second.

Here is the first-round draft order:

1. Chicago Bears (3-14)

2. Houston Texans (3-13-1)

3. Arizona Cardinals (4-13)

4. Indianapolis Colts (4-12-1)

5. Seattle Seahawks, via the Denver Broncos (5-12)

6. Detroit Lions, via the Los Angeles Rams (5-12)

7. Las Vegas Raiders (6-11)

8. Atlanta Falcons (7-10)

9. Carolina Panthers (7-10)

10. Philadelphia Eagles, via the New Orleans Saints (7-10)

11. Tennessee Titans (7-10)

12. Houston Texas, via the Cleveland Browns (7-10)

13. New York Jets (7-10)

14. New England Patriots (8-9)

15. Green Bay Packers (8-9)

16. Washington Commanders (8-8-1)

17. Pittsburgh Steelers (9-8)

18. Detroit Lions (9-8)

19. Tampa Bay Buccaneers (8-9)

20. Seattle Seahawks (9-8)

21. Los Angeles Chargers (10-7)

22. Baltimore Ravens (10-7)

23. Minnesota Vikings (13-4)

24. Jacksonville Jaguars (9-8)

25. New York Giants (9-7-1)

26. Dallas Cowboys (12-5)

27. Buffalo Bills (13-3)

28. Cincinnati Bengals (12-4)

29. New Orleans Saints, via San Francisco 49ers (13-4) through Miami Dolphins and Denver Broncos

30. Philadelphia Eagles (14-3)

31. Kansas City Chiefs (14-3)

Note: The Dolphins forfeited their 2023 first-round pick and 2024 third-round pick after violating league policies pertaining to integrity of the game.

Who has the best draft capital, based on the first round?

The 3-13-1 Texans are 2 and 12

The 9-8 Seahawks have 5 and 20

The 9-8 Lions go 6 and 18.

The 14-3 Eagles have 10 and 30

The Saints shuffle from 10 to 29.

The Rams, Broncos, Browns and 49ers don’t have a first.