How the Garrett trade impacts both Rams and Browns
Devin McCourty and Mike Florio dive into the blockbuster Myles Garrett trade, analyzing if Garrett will get a new contract with the Rams and how the move positions the Browns for the future.
Video Transcript
I, I have the mentality a little bit like the Rams of why I, I hate that everybody clings on to all of these draft picks.
If you can get a player that you know can possibly help you go win a championship right now, and I think of, like a guy like Myles Garrett is As good as Jared Verse already is, and then you have another first-round draft pick.
When you look at your team and you have Matthew Stafford and you have Davante Adams, you have some of these players who you know you won't have forever, and I know you drafted a quarterback in Ty Simpson and you hope, you know, that brings in the future and you can still be a good team.
But you can win right now, so you go and get Myles Garrett and, understand, hey, those picks, we know what they possibly can turn into because we have, we have kind of the best way you can get a pick.
We get Jared Verse, Defensive Player of the Year, two-time Pro Bowler.
We see what that means, but we fell short.
This guy was Defensive Player of the Year as a rookie, then he came back and had a good, another good year and more sacks in year two, and we still didn't get to where we need to, where we needed to be.
So how do we get over the top?
Okay, Myles Garrett, as good as Jared Verse is, right now he's way better.
So now it gets us closer to what we wanna be, and I think that makes so much sense of when you have certain guys on a team, you don't have time to worry so much about the future and not dive into right now.
And I think it's so funny when we look at the Rams because draft night you draft Ty Simpson and everyone questions what are they doing?
You have Matthew Stafford.
You waste a draft pick on a quarterback when you know And then they're like, they're just sitting there smiling and they're like, "Nope, we- we're a step ahead of you."
And, and I think as great as this Myles Garrett trade is, you know me, a, a former DB, I always gotta loop in to Jalen Watson and to Trent McDuffie.
Signing those guys in the off-season so you make your secondary better.
You add two corners, two veteran corners from Kansas City who play a t- played a ton of man to man in that Spagnuolo defense who know how to go out there and defend, but now you add even more pass rush.
Everyone was already excited adding those two corners and that young nucleus they had in those pass rushers, but now you add Myles Garrett.
So now all of those other guys on the Rams who we've been talking about as young, really up-and-coming pass ru- They're gonna see one-on-ones all year next year.
You're gonna have to give more, more coverage to Myles Garrett.
You're gonna have to send more guys over there.
You're gonna have to chip.
You're gonna have to do all those things, and now you're gonna be Bryant Young one-on-one, Braden Fiske, t- Kobe Turner, all those guys now are gonna be able to rush one-on-one.
I mean, it is just such a, a mega deal for the Rams.
but again, just getting the other side of what you said, I do like for Cleveland that you, you add Verse and now you try to You do what you did a year ago.
How do you dive back into the draft next year and figure out, hey, all of these guys that we brought into the team a year ago that were highly productive, how do we do that again?
How do we bring in the next Harold Fannin?
How do we bring in all of these guys that we brought in a year ago to make us a better team, to build towards, hey, how do we win back this division?
Because that division's gonna continue to be a hard division to win with Cincinnati, with Baltimore, and with Pittsburgh.
All those other teams in the division have to be very happy to see Myles Garrett go.
There was a time where Joe Burrow was gonna be dealing with Myles Garrett and Max Crosby.
Now he's gonna be dealing with neither.
He only has to worry about his former teammate Trey Hendrickson and TJ Watt.
But Crosby never made it.
Garrett now gone.
It really is something that we didn't think the Browns would do because they'd said chronically and repeatedly they would not do it.
Andrew Berry, whose voice you heard at the top of the program and whose face you saw if you're watching us on Peacock or NBCSN, he said in the statements released by the team yesterday after the deal became official, "As discussions intensified, we were stuck at a legitimate crossroads.
Do we hold on to a truly generational player who has become the identity of our team, or do we make the difficult decision that we think is best for the organization over the long run?"
That was true last year, and it was more true this year because as we said, what did 23 sacks get the Browns?
Jack diddly squat as a team.
It did.
So they have the young players.
They did well in the draft last year.
They need to hope they hit on their draft picks this year.
They've got the two first-round picks next year.
They have Jared Verse.
The only caveat to having Jared Verse is he's one year away from being eligible for a second contract of his own, and because he's made it to two Pro Bowls, his fifth-year option is going to be very expensive, and that's gonna lay the foundation for his second contract, and the market has changed.
And on that note, I do need to mention, I don't think Myles Garrett's gonna walk through the door content with his current contract.
I suspect, and we haven't heard this yet, I suspect the Rams are gonna adjust his deal because when he got the $40 million per year new money average that made him the highest paid non-quarterback in the NFL a year ago, well, he's been passed, most significantly by Michael Parsons, who pushed the average up to the range of 47 million per year in new money, but more recently, Will Anderson, after only three seasons with the Texans, is at 50 million per year.
I suspect Myles Garrett is gonna get himself a bit of an adjustment.
When you consider what the Rams gave up to get him, how do you not welcome him through the door with a little bit of a splashing of the pot, as Simms would like to say, to make that contractfit the current structure at the position to acknowledge that this is the best defensive player, the best non-quarterback in the NFL, for a team that has become the first in league history to have both the reigning MVP and the reigning Defensive Player of the Year on the same roster.
Hey, may- maybe Myles Garrett says, "You know what?
I'm taking a discount 'cause I'm in LA now, and I, and I'm on a team that's a contender, and I just wanna go win the Super Bowl."
You n- you never know.
And I do If I'm the Rams, you, you probably go to him before he comes to you with a deal that possibly makes more sense for you than him, on the standpoint of, okay, do we have to take him to 51?
Do we have to take him to 53 if he wants it?
Or do we come and we get him closer to that number and say, "Hey, you got the reigning MVP on your team.
You got a chance to go win a Super Bowl, and you're in LA.
You're gonna get more opportunities to do different things."
Like, do they, do they take that approach and try to get ahead of it before sitting there a- and trying to figure it out later?
That, that would be the interesting thing to me because that is, you know, my time in the league, that was always a little thing of, "Hey," especially in New England, "how do we make you happier, by not necessarily giving you more money, but speaking to you about how special an opportunity you have being here on this team with a chance to win a Super Bowl and be at the top, not just this year, but also probably next year.
We'll be in the, we'll be in the same boat of trying to be that team that plays in the last game and hoists the Lombardi, and that comes with you being here, but also this person being here, that person being here.
So, you know, you help us out more if you don't stay number one or stay at the top of the list for defensive player."
So I, I think that'll be very interesting for him in a new, new surroundings, new type of team that he's never been on throughout his kind of great career.
He's never been in a situation on a team that, you know, looking at it now, will probably be the odds favorite to go out there and win a Super Bowl.
Obviously, they'll have to battle Seattle, but, you know, this move really puts them in the driver's seat it feels like.
Well, it already has put them at the top of the list in the odds for Super Bowl 61, and it moved quickly yesterday.
6/1, I think, is where it finished.
It was +650.
We got that email that it was +650, and then the next thing you know, it went to +600.
I don't know if it's gone back to back to In fact, I think that that hasn't been updated.
It's already down to +600, and to win the NFC is down to +300.
So that's how it's moved after that trade.
And yeah, they were already there.
The Seahawks and the Rams were the two best teams in the NFL last year, and it all came down to that crazy two-point play on the Thursday night.
The Zach Charbonnet picking up the ball in the end zone, Terry McAuliffe calling Walt Anderson and saying, "Hey, maybe you guys should review this," turning that play around.
That changed the whole thing.
That determined home field advantage for the NFC Championship, and otherwise, it would've been the Rams manhandling your Patriots, not the Seattle Seahawks.
I mean, I'm sorry, but you know it's true.
You know it's true.
You know this, this Patriots team wasn't ready to compete the way that your Patriot teams were, and that's okay.
They're moving in the right direction.
We're gonna talk about them later in the show because they're trying to get better, too.
The two teams that are currently in that conversation with the Seahawks are making moves to try to get better, and that's what the Rams are trying to do.
