Welcome to the Tuesday edition of the Pick Six newsletter!
If you like when we rank things here, then you’re really going to love today’s newsletter, because we have three different rankings coming at you. First, we’re ranking the top 10 running backs in the NFL, then we’re going upside down by ranking the 10-worst QB/WR/RB trios in the NFL, and then we’re going to let Tyreek Hill rank some things, because it’s the offseason and why not.
In non-ranking news, here’s a quick reminder that we’re having an auction and you can bid to on a chance to have a 10-minute Zoom call with me. It’s arguably the greatest item in auction history. The auction is for our annual CBS Sports telethon that raises money for St. Jude, so all the money from the auction will be going to charity. Basically, the auction combines the two great things in life: Talking to me and donating money to charity. If you want to bid, all you have to do is click here. FYI: I am dirt cheap right now.
As always, here’s your daily reminder to tell all your friends to sign up for the newsletter. To get them signed up, all you have to do is click here. All right, let’s get to the rundown.
1. Today’s show: Breaking down the Dolphins‘ offseason
The best thing about the dead part of the offseason is that it means it’s now time for the Pick Six Podcast’s annual beat writer breakdown. Over the next month, we’ll be taking a look at each team in the NFL by bringing on a beat writer that covers that team. Today, we’re starting off that series by bringing on Dolphins’ beat writer Adam Beasley.
Beasley currently works for Pro Football Network, but before that, he was the Dolphins’ beat writer for the Miami Herald.
Here’s what Beasley had to say about several notable topics involving the Dolphins.
Can Tua Tagovailoa stay healthy?
The good news for Dolphins fans: Beasley is completely sold on Tua’s talents. The bad news is Beasely doesn’t sound so sure that Tua is ever going to make it healthy through an entire NFL season.
“He’s missed games due to injury in each of his three years in the NFL,” Beasley said. “I don’t doubt his talent, I don’t doubt his ability, I doubt his longevity.”
Tua has missed nine games due to injury in three years, and he’s never played more than 13 games in a season over the course of his career. The Dolphins went 1-3 without Tua last year, which tells you how much they miss him when he’s out. Based on his injury history, it’s hard to see him making it through an entire season without missing a game or two.
Will the Dolphins sign Dalvin Cook?
Cook has hinted that he’d like to sign with Dolphins, but will it actually happen? Beasley doesn’t think it will happen unless Cook is willing to lower his asking price. (He’s reportedly looking to make somewhere around $10.4 million in 2023, which is how much he would have made with the Vikings.)
“They’ve only got like $14 million in salary cap space,” Beasley said of Miami. “If Cook wants $10 million per year, the Dolphins aren’t going to pay that. They’ve had the opportunity to for months. They could have traded for Cook at any point this offseason if they were willing to eat his contract. They’re not going to do that. They don’t value running backs at that level.”
If we get midway through training camp and Cook still hasn’t signed with anyone, Beasley sees a situation where the running back might be willing to sign for a discount, with the Dolphins offering $4 million or $5 million to land the former Vikings star.
Can they make the playoffs?
“They have to play the NFC East and the AFC West, and they have to travel to Germany,” Beasley said of Miami’s schedule. “They have to get to 11 wins, maybe 12, to win the division.”
Beasley was torn on this one. He thinks the Dolphins will struggle to win the division, but if they end up taking home the AFC East crown, he thinks they would have a legitimate chance of winning the Super Bowl .
Beasley spent a full 20 minutes talking about the Dolphins, and if you want to hear everything he had to say, you can listen to today’s show here. You can also watch today’s show on YouTube by clicking here.
2. Ranking the top 10 running backs in the NFL
As you may or may not have noticed, we love to rank things here at CBS Sports, and because of that, we thought we would spend the next few weeks ranking every position group heading into the 2023 season.
After ranking the NFL’s top 10 quarterbacks yesterday, we’re going to move on to running backs for today.
Top 10 running backs for 2023
1. Christian McCaffrey, 49ers
2. Derrick Henry, Titans
3. Austin Ekeler, Chargers
4. Nick Chubb, Browns
5. Jonathan Taylor, Colts
6. Josh Jacobs, Raiders
7. Saquon Barkley, Giants
8. Aaron Jones, Packers
9. Tony Pollard, Cowboys
10. Dalvin Cook, free agent
This list was put together by Garrett Podell, and if you’d like to tell him how perfect it is, or if you’d like to argue with him, you can do that by clicking here. If you want a detailed explanation of this top 10 ranking, then be sure to click here so you can check out Podell’s entire story.
3. Tyreek Hill and Bijan Robinson rank the top 5 running backs in NFL history
Since we just ranked the top 10 running backs in the NFL, let’s go ahead and stick with the running back theme by ranking the top-five running backs in NFL history. The twist here is that this ranking isn’t coming from us, it’s coming from Tyreek Hill and Falcons rookie Bijan Robinson.
During a recent episode of his “It Needed to be Said” podcast, the Dolphins receiver revealed his ranking for the top 5 running backs of all-time:
1. Adrian Peterson
2. Derrick Henry
3. Barry Sanders
4. Gale Sayers
5. Eric Dickerson
The guest on the episode was Robinson, who also ranked his top 5 running backs.
1. Barry Sanders
2. LaDainian Tomlinson
3. Marshall Faulk
4. Adrian Peterson
5. Walter Payton
Considering Hill (29) and Robinson (21) are both under the age of 30, I’m actually impressed with their lists. They’re clearly familiar with NFL history. If you combine both of their lists, the only real snub is probably Jim Brown and maybe Emmitt Smith. If I had to vote for who had the better list, I’d probably go with Robinson.
Both lists are impressive, though, which is mildly surprising, because it’s been a pretty wild year when it comes to active NFL players ranking other players. Back in April, we had C.J. Stroud include Justin Fields in his ranking of top 5 NFL quarterbacks. Earlier this year, we also had Davante Adams rank Calvin Ridley as the fourth-best receiver in the NFL even though Ridley didn’t play a single down last year.
4. Ranking triplets: NFL teams with the best QB/WR/RB trio
You know what, we’re on a roll today when it comes to ranking things, so let’s just keep doing that by unveiling our annual ranking of NFL triplets. Some teams have a good quarterback, some teams have a good running back and some teams have good wide receivers, but not many teams are good at all three positions.
When you have good players at all three of those positions, it usually means you have a pretty high-powered offense, so Jared Dubin and the team here at CBS Sports decided to go through and rank all 32 teams based on their three best offensive skill players.
Today, we will be unveiling the bottom 10 teams on the list:
23. Packers (QB Jordan Love, RB Aaron Jones, WR Christian Watson)
24. Colts (QB Anthony Richardson, RB Jonathan Taylor, WR Michael Pittman)
25. Titans (QB Ryan Tannehill, RB Derrick Henry, WR Treylon Burks)
26. Falcons (QB Desmond Ridder, RB Bijan Robinson, TE Kyle Pitts)
27. Patriots (QB: Mac Jones, RB Rhamondre Stevenson, WR JuJu Smith-Schuster)
28. Panthers (QB Bryce Young, RB Miles Sanders, WR Adam Thielen)
29. Commanders (QB Sam Howell, RB Brian Robinson Jr., WR Terry McLaurin)
30. Texans (QB C.J. Stroud, RB Dameon Pierce, WR Nico Collins)
31. Buccaneers (QB Baker Mayfield, RB Rachaad White, WR Mike Evans)
32. Cardinals (QB: Colt McCoy, RB: James Conner, WR: Marquise Brown)
Dubin actually ranked the entire bottom half of the NFL, and if you want to see his entire list, be sure to click here. The rest of his triplets list will be coming tomorrow.
5. NFL over/unders you might want to bet right now
There is no one who loves betting on the NFL more than Jordan Dajani, so we asked him to come up with a few over/under totals that he likes right now.
Here are three over/unders that Dajani really likes with just under two and a half months until the 2023 season kicks off:
- Vikings: OVER 8.5 wins (-125). “Kevin O’Connell went 13-4 in his first season as head coach. I think everyone is expecting the Vikings to take a step backwards record-wise, but why is Vegas expecting them to go from 13-4 to 8-9 or worse with Aaron Rodgers out of the division?”
- Raiders: UNDER 7.5 wins (-190). “When it comes to teams falling well short of their win total, it usually has to do with injuries and/or coaching problems. The Raiders are a candidate to experience both. Josh McDaniels went 6-11 in his first year as lead man, and his team became the first in NFL history to blow five double-digit second-half leads in a season. He ditched Derek Carr for his old friend Jimmy Garoppolo — who has an injured foot.”
- Panthers: OVER 7.5 wins (-120). “With Tom Brady gone, the NFC South could not be more wide open. The Buccaneers are rebuilding, the Falcons still appear to be a middle-of-the-road squad, and the Saints are taking a spin on the veteran quarterback carousel. The Panthers could be the team in the NFC South that rises above the rest. They actually gave the Bucs a run for their money last year despite firing their head coach midseason and suffering through quarterback inconsistencies. This offseason, Carolina scored head coach Frank Reich, quarterback Bryce Young with the No. 1 overall pick, a new running back in Miles Sanders, and some weapons in D.J. Chark, Adam Thielen, Jonathan Mingo and Hayden Hurst.”
Jordan has a total of five team totals that he likes right now, and you can check out all of them by clicking here.
6. Extra points: Dalvin Cook open to teaming up with DeAndre Hopkins
It’s been a busy 24 hours in the NFL, and since it’s nearly impossible to keep track of everything that happened, I went ahead and put together a roundup for you.
- Dalvin Cook open to teaming up with DeAndre Hopkins. During an interview with Adam Schefter this week, Cook got pretty excited when he was asked about the possibility of playing on the same team as DeAndre Hopkins, “If we end up on the same roster, that would be something epic for the NFL,” Cook said. For a look at Cook’s full comments, including his possible timeline for signing with a new team, be sure to click here.
- Jordan Love sounds confident with Packers offense. If Love is feeling any pressure as he looks to replace Aaron Rodgers, he does’t seem to be showing it. “I think we’ve got a great team,” Love said, via the Wisconsin State Journal. “I think we’ve got playmakers on offense. I think all the weapons we have at receiver, tight end and running back, we’ve got guys who can make plays. … I think once everybody gets rolling, gets comfortable with the offense and being where they need to be every play, the sky’s the limit for us.”
- Lions alternate helmet coming tomorrow. The Lions have worn a silver helmet for almost all of their history, but that could be changing tomorrow. The team will be unveiling an alternate helmet on Wednesday, and right now, there’s a lot of speculation that the helmet could end up being blue. Here’s a mock-up of what a blue helmet could end up looking like.
- Justin Jefferson downplays need for new contract. The Vikings receiver is currently eligible for a new contract, but it doesn’t sound like he’s going to hold out if he doesn’t get one before training camp. “Will I be here? Oh yeah,” Jefferson said of training camp. “(The contract) is not really something I’m really worrying about. It’s really about doing what I need to do to get this team to where we want to go.” For more details on Jefferson’s situation, be sure to go here.
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Author: John Breech
June 20, 2023 | 1:02 pm
