 but we start with a very special first guest for our safety. I'm so excited about this nine-year NFL veteran, Patriots, Panthers, and the Indianapolis Colts, of course. You can hear him on his man-to-man podcast, which you can hear all over the place. And he is a fan-dual partner that you can see, hopefully, right here, every week this season. If I don't scare him away, please welcome Formula One enthusiast, Darius Butler. Hello. Yeah, hello. Okay. Good to see you. It's been a minute. Yeah, Darius, I literally don't recognize you without that Marlin's hat. What is going on? You know, I had to switch it up. A lot of people don't recognize me without a hat, so I had to switch it up, take it off for today for your show. But congratulations on your new show as well. But I'm happy to be here and fun to be here. One more sleep, still football. Can't wait. I cannot wait either. And you're busy. You got a espiango. You got a lot going on. You got, I think, Italy F1. We'll talk about that in a little bit. But we got to hit the headlines for the people out there. You guys can tweet the show. Tell us what you want to hear about. But, Darius, you were once upon a time Tom Brady's teammate up in New England. Weird offseason to say the least. I did think it was kind of crazy to read that Todd Bowles was asked if Brady was all in, which, of course, he brushed off. What are your thoughts? Do you have any doubts? I mean, no doubts. Talking about Tom Brady, like he said, he's 45 years old. No one else. I actually had a teammate in his 40s, Adam Venetieri. And nobody would question Adam about, you know, his preparation and what he had to deal with in the offseason. And Tom Brady, you know, that's literally the greatest of all time. Obviously had to take some time away. But when he got back in the build, I'm sure he picked up right where he left off. All his teammates have faith in him, trusting him, same with the coaching staff. He is a coach on the field. So no doubts about time at all going into this season. I think the Bucks are supposed to do their compete to win every game. So I know if I'm in that locker room with Tom, I have no issues with him taking that little break. I'm sure he'll be the same Tom that we saw last year, which is ridiculous at 44 leading the league in almost every quarterback metric there is. So he's a unicorn. So there's no questions, no doubts with him at all. It's impossible to know. He's the only one that knows if he's all in or not. We'll see how it plays out in the field. I do hate that. Of course he is. If even if he is all in, he's 45. He could be mentally there. And his body eventually could fall apart. It could be the offensive line like back up in New England, he could tie his shoes behind that offensive line. That might not be the case this year. Even if his level of play falls a little bit, as it should because he's strong arming father time, people could still point to that and say he's not all in. So I hate, you open yourself up to perception when you don't go to OTAs, when you're in Qatar on camels taking selfies or taking time, whatever you're doing, he's dealt with distraction though Darius so much in his career. Deflategate, family, we saw he won a, he's always sort of made it. So whatever might be going on, I have no concern, but I do think at some point the level of play has to go on and sort of go on decline naturally. Are you worried about that at all? Sean Payton yesterday said it's the Saints that are gonna win this out, then the Bucks. What are your thoughts? No, I mean, I'm not worried about that at all. You know, as a kid, literally, I watched Tom Brady growing up playing, winning Super Bowls, winning, played with him for a couple of years, left him, got cut from New England, had a nine year career, had been retired for five years and his dude is still in the MVP conversation. Like, I mean, father time is a million 37 in one right now with Tom, so I got no doubts about him. He's a, he's a, he's brilliant at eliminating distractions and taking care of what's in front of him. Being, taking that next step every day and practice, the preparation is, no doubt it's about 12 at all. Come on, Kay. You've been around the game long enough, what are you talking about? But tell me, when does it, how does it end? How does it end on his terms? I mean, I thought it ended last year, honestly, but I mean, it's going to end on his terms. I think this will be most like this last year. Obviously he's got the TV deal, you know, lined up already, who knows what's going on, you know, at home as far as I'm sure his family, you know, kind of excited maybe that he'll be retiring. So, I mean, your guess is as good as mine when it is. I think he said he wanted to play until 45 or 50, who knows, but he take care of his body. He's playing at a high level. So maybe I see this year as really being his last ride, though, on the football field. I'll be sad to see we've got to enjoy every moment. Big game against the Cowboys to kick off the 2022 season. All right, from an OG to a young cat, let's talk about Trey Lance here. He was named the starting quarterback for the Niners. Are people overblowing this? If you're in that locker room, how messy do you feel like this will get? I mean, that's tough. I, you know, nine years, been in nine different locker rooms, but I've never been in that 49ers locker room and everyone is unique. Obviously they were teammates last year, Trey Lance, Jimmy G. Trey Lance, I mean, Jimmy G was still the guy, but you know, when you draft the guy number three overall, you trade all those assets to get him, he's going to play at some point. He's going to be your future. The GM and the head coach, they're locked up long term. But if he comes out and struggles early on in the season, you know, five, six games into it, that locker room is going to start looking around because we're seeing Jimmy G practicing, you know, he'll probably be on the scout team going against the first team defense. So you'll see, you know, that's a guy you've won with and you're going with your future, which is cool if you're in the front office or you're a coach. But as a player, you know how precious, you know, every year is out there. So it's harder to trust that process when you're a player and it's almost impossible not to look around and say, hey, you know, we know we have a guy we can win with, but Trey Lance is a reason they traded all those assets and jumped up to number three to draft him. But he hasn't played, he hasn't played a lot in this NFL level. So it's going to be a learning curve. I expect him to struggle early, but hopefully he shows improvement and get better week by week and the Niners got a stick with him. But it's a very, very weird dynamic in that locker room. Couldn't imagine being a teammate in there. And now Jimmy G, you know, he's on a one year deal, basically no trade clause, so he will be there. So now Trey, you know, he kind of got to look over his shoulder all year and all those quarterbacks last year, they struggled. You know, outside of probably Mac Jones, but Trevor Lawrence, Zach Wilson, Davis Mills had a decent year, Justin Fields struggled. You know, all those guys struggled. So I expect Trey Lance to have some sort of struggle, at least at the beginning of the year, but hopefully his talent kind of takes over. It's not fair or reasonable to expect him to not struggle. He has less experience than everybody else. He's going to have those rookie problems. And you're saying that you've never been in that locker room. Joe Staley was for 13 years and he was on local radio yesterday. And I thought it was so interesting because he, you know, he admitted like there's going to be struggles. And if they're in a locker room, you're saying we have a Super Bowl team. Why are we waiting to develop a quarterback if you have a guy that's taken us there? Like we want to win a Super Bowl. So I thought it was interesting about the players. I will say this and I like, I don't know if I'm being too optimistic about it, but it doesn't work everywhere what's going on. And it could get messy. But if there was one player that I would be like, Jimmy Garoppolo is that guy. This is not Brett Favre and Aaron Rodgers. It's not, Jimmy Garoppolo is not out there politicking saying like, I want to play, put me in. It's a perfect situation. You have a Super Bowl contender. You have two great options. One, if it doesn't work out, you have one that has the experience that the players might want. So it's almost up to the players to sort of tell themselves be patient and let it out. But Jimmy Garoppolo redid a deal to stay there fully knowing what the deal is. And he's the kind of player I think, the rare player who's like, whatever, like I understand the situation. This is the best situation for me. You might use me, you might not. And that makes it okay. And it might not be okay in 31 other locker rooms, but I think it might work in this one. Yeah, contrary to some reports that came out, I think Jimmy G is a really good teammate. I do think the locker room loves him, which can kind of be more of a problem, I guess. But Jimmy G, he's been a good soldier thus far. And he knows, you know, next quarterbacks, they're always in high demand. So he knows next year, there'll be a spot for him. But it's going to be tough. It's going to be a weird dynamic. The only thing that can make it easier is Trey Lance playing well and improving and showing improvement every week. And this team, like you said, this is a team that is built to contend for the Super Bowl. This isn't the, you know, the New York Jets or the Jacksonville Jaguars. Like you have top tier players at every position, Fred Warner, Trent Williams, Nick Bols, Jimmy Ward, Debo. Like these are top tier players. And so he's going to be in a good situation from that standpoint. You got Kyle Shanahan, who's obviously a show. He's a great play caller in the league. You got really good receivers out there. And it's a receiver that's kind of blown a lot of people away this preseason in training camp. And that's Brandon IU. I think Brandon IU could sneakily be probably a wide receiver one even over there. Debo is obviously an amazing weapon in the backfield and out at receiver, obviously George Kittle as well. But everything I've seen and heard from Brandon IU this preseason, I'll be definitely bullish on his production this year. Do you think the Niners make the playoffs? You know what, honest, I'm gonna say no. I'm gonna say no. You know, he's just about to make the playoffs as obviously winning your division. I think the Rams will win that division again. And you know, I got high expectations for the Cardinals as well. You know, every year they kind of start off fast but kind of finish, you know, telling off. I think Calamari takes a step in that off the field in tangibles leadership wise. Obviously they'll be getting Hopkins back after a week six, I believe. You brought Hollywood Brown over who did some amazing things in college with Calamari at quarterback. So I ain't got JJ Watt back healthy again. So I like the Cardinals this year as well. And once again, this is gonna be really Tray Lance's first year. And he didn't play much in college. So it's really almost gonna be like his junior, senior year on the college football field but he's gonna be playing against pros. So unfortunately, if I had to make a bet today I would say the 49ers don't make the playoffs. 49ers missed the playoffs. Brandon Iuk over a thousand yards ish. It's what you're saying, wide receiver one out there. I would say around that thousand yard mark. Maybe I would say over, I don't know what his prop is right now, but I would say he's in that 900 range. I love it. All right, let's go down to Miami we're doing all the hot topics here with Darius Butler, Patriots never loved to play there. They lose there pretty much all the time. And now they're opening the season down in Miami. They do, it's just, it's very weird thing that happens. They have to deal with a really creative new head coach. They don't know what they're really getting. And then I don't think New England's ready for that speed that Kyrie Kill's gonna bring. So to the wild card here in the situation I have always defended him. I've always had this soft spot for him. What do you need to see from him early this season to convince you that they are a playoff team or at least ready to contend in that East? You know what, early I won't react too much to what he does early in the season, but once again, just progression. Just want to see him continually get better. And I'm a lifelong, I'm a South Floridian. I'm a lifelong Dolphins fan, a Dolphan. And Tua may be our guy, right? He drafted him top five, the pick before Justin Herbert. So the pressure's always there on him. But now the team is behind him. Tyreek Hill came over and he's been singing his praises from day one. Maybe a little too far at times, but singing his praises from day one, they showed up at offensive line. Last year they were at the bottom of the league when you look at 11 personnel. That's basically when you deploy three receivers out there. And obviously we expect him to have much more that this year with bringing Cedric Wilson over from Dallas, Jay Lenoado going into a second year with Tua. And then obviously the amazing dynamic weapon that Tyreek Hill is, he's kind of a one-on-one at that receiver position. So all the pieces are there. Mike McDaniel, this is his first year as an actual play-caller and coming from San Francisco. You know, they like to lead and start things off with the run game as well. I think he came out and was quoted a couple of days ago saying they wanted to run the ball 30 times a game, which I wasn't really much a fan of hearing that, but they'll be having a lot of speed out there and Tua, everything's there for him. And then on the other side of the ball, the defense. Josh Boy, he was actually my coach when I was in New England, he was my DB coach. Now he's a DC over there. They got a lot of talent over there as well. Xavier and Howard, Javon Holland, who will be a super star at the safety position. And guys, they're really multiple, do a lot of things up-front and on the back end to confuse quarterback. So the expectations are really, really high for the Dolphins. High enough for me that I may even sprinkle something on them to win that division. I know everybody's high on the bills. Talk to me. And I am as well. Josh Allen, digs, you know, you brought Von Miller over. You lose Brian Debaldo, so there are, there is some question marks there. So I may sprinkle something on out at Dolphins winning that division. I don't even know what to say. But like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, is that like a Florida thing? Like, are you thinking about this clearly? Are we objective? Like, how, what, what? No, no, I'm gonna be honest with you. No, there is some bias here. So maybe don't tell me here, but there is some bias and I've been looking for, like once again, we've been looking for this type of offense. Tyree Hill, we've never had a weapon like Tyree Hill in Miami. Nobody saw this coming last year when the year ended that we'll have the cheetah down in Miami. So yeah, my expectations are way up here. So I'm there. I wouldn't advise you to tell me because it builds, they are that deal this year, but I love the Dolphins as well. They're super overhyped quickly. You keep talking about the speed in Tyree. What do you make of this narrative that's been out there the entire off season since that deal went down that Tua can't get the ball to Tyree. So what's the point? What do you make of that? Much to do about nothing. Tua can throw the ball. And Tyree Hill, he's not just a guy who just you got to throw in the ball six yards down the field. He could kill you with crossing routes, slants, screens, speed sweeps. Like it's just so many things that you have to plan and prepare for as a defensive player, as a defensive coordinator when 10 is on the field. And it's things like, you see certain, you see speed every week, it's NFL, but that Tyree Hill speed is something completely different. And you know, Patrick, my homes will miss it. Obviously, the chiefs will be okay. My homes, Andy, Rhee, Eric, being to me, they'll be all right, they'll be good. But to have a weapon like that for Tua, it's just gonna open up the field for Waddle, Gisecchi, Wilson, Moster and all these other guys. You're obsessed with the Dolphins, I love it. Really, really excited. I'm all chips in on the Miami Dolphins. I'm excited that you hit me with a much to do about nothing, Shakespeare out of Darius Butler this morning. I got range, baby, I got range. All right, quickly, we're gonna go through some of the games, the big matchups. Week one, the NFL season starts tomorrow. I'm so excited. Let's go to the AFC Steelers. Bengals, what do you got, Mr. Drabisky starting? Will the Steelers be able to get something done? They'll compete. They'll compete. I got the Bengals winning this one. I would never, it's tough to bet against Mike Tomlin in the Steelers team where I was gonna come out prepared. He named Mitch the starter, you can't doubt him there. Weapons on the outside. Obviously, Nigel here is the weapon in the backfield. Defense is always Blitzberg out there in PA. So they'll compete, but I got the Bengals. A lot of firepower and they got better this offseason as well. All right, revenge game, which might be overplayed, but I'm here for it. Baker, of course, going up against Miles Garrett and company. He is getting the start. So when it comes to playing a former team, who has the advantage? Is it the quarterback who's familiar with the defense or is it the coach? In this case, Mr. Stefansky. You know, the situation is situational. But I think Baker, he's gonna be fired up, but I got the Browns actually. I got the Browns in this one. Just that team. And I like, I love Jacoby Brissette. You know, he's a guy who's been around for a while. And he's, this whole offseason, he's kind of been preparing. The Browns have been preparing to have him start at least a few games. He'll be starting at least the first 11 games. So he'll be prepared. The game plan will be tailored for him. Nick Chubb, Kareem Hunt in the backfield, invest a lot of money into that talent offensive line. Great defense as well. Baker Mayfield, I think, will still be figuring things out the early portion of the season. So I got the Browns in this one. Christian McCaffrey's healthy. I think the Panthers are going in the playoffs. I like the Panthers a lot. If he stays healthy, you know, that's a big if. Yeah, number two total defense. Like, if he stays healthy, how good does Baker even have to be? Not that great. And DJ Morrill touched, you know, a ton of rocks for him for over a thousand yards no matter who's throwing his way. So I'm excited about the Panthers. Chiefs at Cardinals. Great offensive matchup. I love this. You know, I love fantasy football. What do you got on this one? I think a lot of points would be scored. I got the Chiefs in this one. I got the Chiefs in this one. And Patrick Mahomes, he's one of those guys that's like, everyone is off season, went out of their way to kind of add some fuel to his fire. One of the most talented players that we've ever seen touch the field. Once again, brilliant play callers. They went and invested, got MVS from Green Bay, drafted Scott Moore. You just got Travis Kelsey is still there, who's a top, probably seven, eight receiving weapon period on the offensive side of the ball. Well, some moving parts on defense. Obviously Cardinals will be missing DHOP for these first few weeks. So I got the Chiefs in this one. Bills at Rams. I cannot believe this game is tomorrow. We have been waiting and waiting and waiting. What are you looking at in this game? Who do you think comes out on top? It's here. Finally made it. I can't believe this game is tomorrow either. And I also can't believe that the Super Bowl champs are underdogs in this one. I got the Rams in this one. I think the Bills of Mr. Davies White got some young guys that'll be starting out there cornerback going against the Sean McVay offense, Matt Stafford, Cooper Cup, be on the same page their second year together. Allen Robinson coming over as well. McVay does a lot of things that make you think and kind of have a little hesitation as a defensive player as a D-back. So I think the Bills will struggle with that. Josh Allen and that offense, obviously they're going to be amazing. And the Bills defense is very good as well. But young corners on the outside, I think Sean McVay, Cooper Cup. Yeah, Stafford and Cole will kind of have their way. I got the Rams in this one, straight up. I love the Bills. So much hype about them, but that secondary is their glaring hole, right? And for Davies White, one of my favorites, but he's got to be out there. Or Cooper Cup's going to have 150 yards, 200 yards in his first game, 24 hours here in LA. Quickly, Jalen Ramsey. You know D-B's, I got to give, I see the best in the game right now. He's the best. You know, he did what he does. And then now that he goes and plays on the inside as well. And he's a slot defender. He can blitz, he can tackle, he can cover obviously. I would definitely have him in that conversation for, you know, the best in the game. Before I go, I wasn't kidding that you are a Formula One enthusiast. Maybe expert even. You are so engaged in fact that you watch the qualifying runs. I don't even know what that is. Who do you like this weekend? You're like a sick pup when it comes to F1. I'm sick. Yeah, clearly. Who do you like this weekend in Italy, I think? Yep, it's I and Grand Prix. I see you. The Tafosi will be in full force out there. Ferrari, obviously that's their home. And then Ferrari has done great things with their car, but they've had a lot of mixups on strategy and leadership, I would say, when the Grand Prix actually comes about. But it's hard to bet against Max Verstappen and Red Bull. You know, he's been the best driver on the grid this year. They have the best car on the grid this year. And their management. I mean, you know, football, you got to judge. You come in with a game plan and you have to just and execute on the fly and Red Bull does that better than anybody else this year at least. So, you know, Max is the easy bet here. And once again, you can always bet on something going into qualifying and then obviously at the race as well. But I got Max and Red Bull winning. They're running away with the Constructors Championship and the Drivers Championship right now. So I mean, that's that's an easy bet right now. They're like inevitable this year. I don't know what you said, but I'm here for it. You are an expert in everything football and F1. Listen to your man-to-man podcast. It is amazing. We will have you on in a little bit. Big Dolphins fan, Darius Butler. Thank you very much. So good to have you.