Zaire Franklin Scouting Report + Breaking Down the Packers/Colts Trade!!!

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1:02Make sure to use our links so they know we sent you ruzzi at dot com slash packers. Hey, it's Howie Mandel, and I am inviting you to witness history as me and my Howie do it gaming team take on Gilly DeKing and wallow 267's million dollars gaming in an epic global gaming league video game showdown, four rounds, multiple games, one winner plus a half-time performance by multi-platonomartis, Travis McCoy. Watch all the action and see who wins and advances to the championship match against Neo. Right now at globalgaming league dot com, that's globalgaming league dot com, everybody games. What's going on Packers fans, welcome in to an all new episode of the Packer Day podcast. I'm your host, Andy Herman.

2:02You can follow me on Twitter at Andy Herman NFL, and of course, the podcast at Packer Day podcast. Thank you so incredibly much for joining me today. It's a fun one. We've got a trade, Zaire Franklin is coming over from the Indianapolis Colts, the Green Bay Packers are sending Colby Wooden to the Colts. It's an interesting trade certainly helps the linebacker position some how much we'll go over that today, but it definitely hurts the defensive line as well. We're going to break this down in great detail anytime there's a trade. It's always exciting. You always perk up a little bit, not exactly the same connotation and excitement and me driving back from Illinois to cover a micro Parsons trade, the last trade that the Packers made, but still exciting nonetheless. Anytime you hear the word trade, there's always a little bit of, it just gets your heart racing. Get a little bit excited from it. And again, today we're going to have a lot of fun breaking this one down. Before we get into all of that, we've got some news and notes that I want to kind of jump into first. First of all, free agent frenzy 11 a.m. right here on the Packet A podcast.

3:03I'm going to go live as soon as the legal tampering period starts 11 a.m. Central time on the YouTube channel. And we're going to break down all the deals that happen, special guests, I'm sure going to stop by. Maybe it'll just be me. We'll see. But I'll go maybe for an hour, two hours, three hours as long as we've got stuff to talk about. I'll go for as long as I possibly can. So that should be a ton of fun 11 a.m. Central time on Monday right here on the Packet A podcast YouTube channel. Of course, there were some news and other transactions that were taking place across the league as well. Conor McGovern Center for the Buffalo Bills is staying with the Buffalo Bills. This was one of the top centers on the market. In fact, the second best center on the market to only Tyler Linderbaum. I was somebody that was a big proponent of Green Bay potentially going after Conor McGovern. I thought he'd be a great addition to the interior that offensive line and be a real big time starting center for them, but he is staying with Buffalo. That leaves, in my opinion, probably three truly, you know, sort of good options for Green

4:06Bay at center and your mileage may vary on the word good here. The first one is Tyler Linderbaum, which would probably be more than good. It'd probably be awesome, great, wonderful, spectacular. I still would be pretty stunned if Green Bay got into that price range. I think he's going to get over 20 million per year. I don't think Green Bay can quite get to that. They could theoretically, I don't think they're going to want to get to that level for a starting center. So I'd be pretty surprised. I would do not expect that to happen. The second one is the one that I've been talking about all off season is Cade Maze. I do think he fits well. He is Green Bay's type of player. He could be somebody that they look at as it's still, I would think, a slight upgrade to maybe Sean Ryan and certainly Elton Jenkins where they were at. I don't love the idea. I didn't love Cade Maze and the tape that I saw. He's fine. He's good, but I think it's going to be an overpay. But he would probably be still a solid addition to the team. And then Sean Ryan is probably your third other, again, quote unquote, good option. Just bringing him back, letting him have a full off season as the starting center, maybe bringing in some competition via the drafter, just letting Jacob Montgomery with them, however

5:10you want to do it. Those are really kind of your only three legitimate options remaining at center for Green Bay. Other options could be trying to find someone in the draft. I guess bringing back Elton Jenkins, I can't see that happening in any way, shape or form. And he was so just uninspiring at center a season ago. And quite frankly, just bad. I can't imagine that that's what Elton or Green Bay wants at this point in time. Lloyd Kushenberry was a really good center a few years ago for the Denver Broncos. The Tennessee Titans brought him in as a big free agent acquisition to be their starting center. And he struggled mightily over the last two seasons in Tennessee was at a Tennessee thing where everything seems to go to die and could he get back to playing the way that he did in Denver before that. It was really just kind of a one year flash in the pan from Kushenberry in his final year in Denver. And then he kind of fell back to earth in Tennessee. That's a scary one. He also had some injuries in Tennessee. I would probably stay away. But it would be, it'd be an interesting one if they could get him playing like he was in

6:13Denver. James Daniels was cut by Miami. Don't love that. In fact, I kind of like him a little bit more as a guard. So I guess it's an option, but it's not a good one Austin Corbett older journeyman is played with a couple teams. This played guard has played center. I actually think he can still be a pretty decent starting center, but has also had some injury history. Probably could have him on the cheap rock offman has started some games at center for the Dallas Cowboys. He and Cooper BB a couple times over the last couple of years have kind of rotated back and forth until BB took that job over. And I think it was Micah Parsons who kind of spoke glowingly about rock offman a little bit ago on social media and he, but Dallas didn't even give him a restricted free agent tender. That's what they thought of rock offman that they didn't even want to get him back on a $3.5 million deal. So if Dallas wasn't good for that, it's hard to say like, yeah, bring that guy in as the starting center and then Luke Fortner is the other one. If you had to put another one on this list, you know, maybe right behind Sean Ryan, Fortner

7:13might be it. He went over to New Orleans at a pretty good year last year, but it's certainly nothing that gets you super excited. So center is going to be something to really keep an eye on with what Green Bay does here. I think it is something that they've got to find a solution and there's just not a lot of great solutions out there. Unless they make a significant run at Tyler Linda, Bob, and again, is that really the way that you want to spend maybe $22 million on a three or four year deal? That's a lot of money for a center that quite frankly is pretty average in past pro and is really, really good in run blocking. He would help Josh Jacobs in the interior of that offensive line of bunch from that standpoint, but it would be it would be an overpay, but he's a really good center and certainly the best option out there. But we shall keep an eye on it and see what Green Bay ultimately does at that position. Meanwhile, they did make another move at linebacker, Nick Neiman, their special team's ace is back on the team. And so we'll talk about Zeyer Franklin and what he can bring to the team in just a moment. We know that they have Adrian Cooper. They still have Tyrone Hopper, they have Isaiah McDuffie, and now Nick Neiman slots in right

8:15after that. They still have Jamie Johnson as well. So Neiman though, a core special team's player, and I'm sure Cam Ackord is probably very, very excited about this move. We'll see what the contract actually looks like. My assumption will be that Nick Neiman will probably still have to battle for his spot in training camp, but I love to have him back. And I do think he did a really nice job on special teams this season ago and kind of and we'll talk about this a little bit, but kind of rounds out that linebacker group. I'm not sure that they're going to have to do much else at the position at this point in time. Some miscellaneous moves throughout the league, Cleal Mac is back with the chargers on one year deal. There was a little bit of buzz of him potentially going back to Chicago. So kind of nice to see him sticking with the chargers. The Vikings restructured TJ Hockinson, got his price tag a little bit down, but took a year off the deal. So an interesting move there, but Hockinson stays in Minnesota. Tyler Huntley resigned with the Ravens. I know some people were thinking that maybe Tyler Huntley could be the backup quarterback in Green Bay, but he sticks with Baltimore. Jordan Davis, the massive defensive tackle for the Eagles is sticking with the Eagles.

9:19He wasn't a free agent, but they signed him to an extension there. The Vikings are now minus 295 to sign Kyler Murray. So the huge betting favorites to get Kyler Murray in Minnesota, that's an interesting one. And then Brandon Aubrey gets a second round tender from the Dallas Cowboys. So if you were hoping that the Packers were going to somehow find a way to sign Brandon Aubrey, just know that it's going to take a record setting kicker deal that Dallas does not match. And you would then have to give up your second round pick for Brandon Aubrey and send that second round pick this year for a kicker. I don't see that happening. So any dreams of Brandon Aubrey that were dancing in your head, you can probably move on from those right now, can't see that happening for the time being. All right, let's talk about our main event here, our main topic, Zaire Franklin for Colby Wooden. Let's go over some basics of Zaire Franklin first. Six foot to 35. He will turn 30 years old in July, 30 years old. They acquired a 30 year old player.

10:20Can you believe it? Not super surprised at that overall, but it is a little bit out of green based character to say the least they have not gone after 30 plus year old players at all in recent years. So going after one right away in this off season is again, not shocking. It's not oh my god, but it is a little bit noteworthy nonetheless. He was a seventh round pick in 2018 at a 9.64 relative athletic score coming out of school where he went to Syracuse. He was a back of the roster player who eventually became a starter, really worked his way up. It was a really cool story. And then all of a sudden won a second team, all pro award in 2024 was a pro baller in 2024, lead the league in tackles in 2024 was also a 2023 Walter Payton man of the year nominee. He has been a team captain, including last year. He wore the green dot. So he called the plays that's something that Green Bay needs. He plays a true Mike linebacker role has been a key leader for the Indianapolis Colts,

11:21including last year when they needed somebody to be that vocal leader on defense for them. He's durable. He's dependable. He has not missed a lot of games. He does play with an intensity and with an edge. He has had some untimely penalties that have come along with that. Not a ton, but certainly some that are out there. He's been with the Colts his entire career. He did coincide with Jonathan Ganon when he was with the Colts from 2018 to 2020. Now, that was before Zaire Franklin really became a full time player, but they did coincide together in Indianapolis from 2018 to 2020. Effort has never been an issue. He has been a special teams guy. He has been somebody that's had to work his butt to get in that starting lineup and then become a really, really good starter and again, pro baller, all pro, et cetera. Effort has never been an issue with Zaire Franklin since 2022 per PFF. He is the sixth linebacker when it comes to stops. So six most stops from for any linebacker since 2022 and tied for fifth in tackles for

12:22loss for any linebacker since 2022. However, his average tackle this past year was four yards downfield. So despite having a lot of tackles, it's a little bit Blake Martinez as square and even AJ Hawk asked where a lot of these tackles were coming past the line of scrimmage, well past the line of scrimmage. So he was more of kind of unclean up duty and still getting those tackles and making sure they weren't becoming explosive runs. But he did have a lot of tackles for loss in the last few years as well. So I don't want to mitigate that. But his average spot on the field where he would get a tackle was four yards downfield. And for the most part, if you're looking at Colts Twitter or some of the Colts message boards today, you are seeing that they are for the most part very happy that Zaire Franklin is gone. That doesn't mean a ton, but it is a little bit noteworthy nonetheless. From a PFF standpoint, in 2018, he had a 53.9 grade, but only on 193 snaps barely played, only played two snaps in 2019, 61.3 grade, only played 86 snaps in 2020, 69.3 grade,

13:26and then 201 snaps in 2021 with a 71.3 grade. And then the last four years is when he became a true starter for the team, 2022 at a 57.0 grade on 1136 snaps in 2023 at a 60.9 grade on 1090 snaps in 2024 that all pro proble year, only a 61.0 grade on 1157 snaps. And then this past year, again, noteworthy here, a 38.4 grade on 1112 snaps. He played a lot of snaps in the last four years, but as you saw, his PFF grade dropped tremendously this past year. In fact, out of 88 eligible linebackers for PFF, he graded 87th overall in 2025 ahead of only former Green Bay Packer third round pick, or in Berks, who came in at number 88. In case you're wondering, Koi Walker came in at 76th last year for PFF again. He was 87th, meaning Ziya Franklin was 87th out of 88 eligible linebackers in their ratings.

14:33Regardless of what you think of the PFF rankings, or if you're looking at stats or quite frankly, go and look at the film as well. He is coming off very arguably and sort of easily the worst year of his career. His 80 tackles were down from 116, 132 and 115, the three previous years. He has had 20 plus mistackles in four consecutive seasons and an 11.9% career mistackle percentage. So he misses 12% of his tackle opportunities throughout the course of his career. I'll say that last stat one more time, 20 plus mistackles in four consecutive years. So he's had over 80 mistackles in the last four years. He has given up a quarterback rating of 103.2 plus when targeted. And he has had a one oh, sorry, let me say that one more time, a 103.2 plus quarterback rating allowed for four consecutive years. So those same four years as a starter, he has given up a 103.2 or worse, I guess better

15:36if you want to view it that way, a quarterback rating higher than 103.2 for four consecutive years. In 2025, he was targeted 75 times. He gave up 58 completions for 610 yards, 10.5 yards per completion with two touchdowns and no interceptions. So again, teams had a ton of success throwing at him in his career. In his career, he's been thrown at 346 times 278 completions, 80.3% completion percentage, 2858 yards, eight touchdowns, three picks, a 105.2 quarterback rating. So he is statistically struggled in coverage when he's been the closest defender quite a bit as mentioned. So he's had mistackle issues and he said coverage issues. That's some of the just overarching things. I'll get to some of my notes on tape in just a moment. The other big thing here is contract.

16:38Oakland is going to make just over $7 million in 2026. He's not super cheap. It's not expensive, but that is a mid-tier starting linebacker sort of salary. It's workable. It's doable. But we're not talking about some like vet minimum sort of salary here. We are talking about $7 million in 2026. It is all non-guaranteed until he plays week one in which the case he's a vested vet. So the entire contract would become guaranteed. But between now and opening week, it is not guaranteed unless they restructured in any sort of way. He will have a team option, what I consider a team option, in 2027 for $9 million. So if he plays well enough this year to earn the $9 million contract in 2027, they can do that. If they do not, they can cut him and will owe him $0 again unless they restructure his contract this year to push out some signing bonus and things like that. Which they will already have paid it, but it'll count towards the cap. But yeah, team option for $9 million in 2027, but this year he's set to make $7 million

17:41overall against the cap. We'll be right back. Big thanks to our sponsor, Betta Help, for partnering with us for this important conversation about mental health. This is Steve Smith here, former NFL Y receiver and host of the 89 show on YouTube. So having a counselor and working with Betta Help, that gives you an opportunity to really start to unpack, but people don't understand when you unpack things. You also open up a box that you're not always sure what's inside. And so I think that's why seeing a professional is extremely important. If you need someone to open up to visit BetterHelp, that's better, H-E-L-P dot com slash 89 to get started. That's how we, Mandel, and I am inviting you to witness history as me and my how we do at gaming team take on Gilly DeKing and wallow $267 million gaming in an epic global gaming league video game showdown, four rounds, multiple games, one winner, plus a halftime performance

18:44by multi platinum artist, Travis McCoy. Watch all the action and see who wins and advances to the championship match against Neo. Right now at globalgaming league dot com, that's globalgaming league dot com, everybody games. A restructure is possible because it's all based salary. So if they wanted to get that number down and kick some of the money into the future, they could do so. We'll see if green Bay has any interest in doing that. It would, you know, restructuring him and giving him any sort of signing bonus and getting that number down would basically guarantee his spot on the 53 man roster. And just a really quick note on that while after making this deal and bringing in Zaire Franklin and clearly to be the starter next to Adrian Cooper, let's just be real. Right now, if they don't do any restructuring of his contract, it's not impossible that if they get him in camp and are just like, ooh, this was not what we were expecting. And he doesn't play well, he's again, $0 guaranteed. So if you get to camp and hopper and, you know, Cooper and McDuffie and, you know, who

19:47know, maybe there's an undrafted linebacker, Jamie Johnson, everyone else is just out performing him. You can get out of the contract and cut it and save all the money. So you're not, you're not bound to him at this point in time. But again, if you're making this trade, your, your goal is to have him start next to Adrian Cooper. That's what he's being brought in for my assumption is that's what will happen. But it is just a little bit noteworthy that at this point in time, unless they restructure something, they can get out of all of it as long as they cut him before week one of the regular season. We mentioned that he had his worst year in 2025. He did come off an ankle procedure that he had done in the 2025 off season, which could have affected him in 2025. Also the cold said a new defensive coordinator and a new defense in 2025, and it did seem like there was a little bit of just not maybe being on the same page. It didn't feel cohesive between Franklin and Lou Otter, or I can never say his last name. The new defensive coordinator and Indianapolis, I'll just put it that way to make it easy. It's 342 in the morning as I'm recording this.

20:48So my apologies to Lou a cold defensive coordinator for mispronouncing his last name, but they did seem like there was maybe a little bit of a disconnect and it just didn't fit quite as well this past season. That could have been part of the reason why he didn't play as well. Also, let's get into the film study because I did watch three full games of Zaire Franklin from this past year. I watched week one against the dolphins when he kind of first came back from that injury. I watched the middle of the season game against Atlanta and Bajon Robinson and Tyler Al-Gierre and to see how he kind of did against that. Then I watched his week 18 game against Houston Texans to see how he did in the final game and to see if he was maybe a little bit healthier at that point in time. The answer was he did look a little bit better by the time week 18 rolled around and he did look a little bit more spry and he arguably, to me, that was of the three games that was his best game against Houston at the end of the year. So maybe a little bit of signs for optimism there. But those were the three that I watched and hear were my notes from watching the film.

21:48I did think he was a little bit stiff. No two ways around it. I didn't love his change of direction. Didn't seem to have the same athleticism as he had even earlier in his career against struggling space and with change of direction. I thought he was best playing downhill in the run game where you would kind of send him on run blitzes or just let him go. But even in those scenarios, he would have some missed tackles. He would kind of come in a little bit too hot and running back to be able to sidestep and we're kind of run through an arm tackle from time to time as well that happened against Bajan Robinson, Bajan Robinson is tremendous. But that definitely happened on film as well. But that is by far and away his best ability is coming downhill and playing the run and using them almost into run blitzes and things like that. He does a really good job of that. He's not afraid to take on blocks, but he does struggle to shed them because he's not the biggest guy in the world. He's not consistent with run angles or how he attacks on any given play. He does do a great job of rallying to the football. He will put together some really impressive reads on certain plays like you will see him

22:49like almost know where the play is going to go ahead of time and jump it and then get into the backfield and that's how he gets a lot of those tackles for loss. So he does have some good instincts and just I don't know if it's a tell that he picks up from from watching tape or whatever it is, but you will see him read a play get their shooting to the backfield and go and make a play which when it happens is really, really fun. As mentioned earlier, Green Dot calls the play. He's a true Mike. He's very communicative before the snap making sure everyone's aligned correctly. He always understands his assignment from what I saw it again, so it's always impossible to tell for sure. But it always seemed like he was in the right spot. Again, there never seemed to be a gap alignment issue or anything like that. Plays with a little bit of piston vinegar, which is what you want to see. We've talked about that this defense in general, even the team in general, you know, there's always the relative athletic score, RAS relative athletic score. You guys know I've talked about this before. You need a little bit more relative A whole score on this team. And Franklin on the field has that don't don't take away.

23:50Yes, I know he was, you know, Walter Peyton, man of the year nominee and team captain and things like that. He plays fiery and there's zero question about it. Green Bay has needed more players that have that type of fire and Franklin has it. Now I don't know if his overall play is justifiable enough at least in 2025 to be like, well, we got another guy who can play with fire. Well, you need to play well still while playing with fire, but they did get a guy that plays with that type of fire. And I do think that's something that this team needs a larger injection of. I think Franklin can provide some of that. He did look better in the final game, curious to see if that ankle is recovered. And if it affected him in 2025 and maybe he can be, you know, just clean of that in 2026 and that can help him. I did watch a little bit of 2024 and he did look up, you know, from what I saw significantly better in 2024. He's good as a blitzer when skimmed up, but when you get him on a offensive lineman tight end or running back, more often than not, they shut him down. So if you skim him up as a blitzer and he kind of gets a free look, he does finish those

24:55well and you can certainly use him in that way. But if he does get matched up with somebody and it's not like, oh, we got him. We fool them. Well, he doesn't usually get off those blocks well enough to be utilized consistently as a really good blitzer. There's no special aspect about his game. He's not great in run defense because of the mishackle issues. He's definitely not great in coverage and, you know, he's just, he's not somebody that stacks the box when it comes to, you know, interceptions, turnovers, force fumbles or anything like that. So if you're looking for him to be this like master of something or even just really good at everything, that's, that's not what I saw on tape from Zaire Franklin. I do question his sideline to sideline ability. Again, it didn't seem like he had the same athleticism this past year. Again, maybe that ankle injury was the reason why, but I didn't see sideline to sideline speed from Franklin. He's 30 years old coming off his worst season, struggles in coverage and struggles with tackling.

25:55That's not a great combo. There's not a high end trade to his game again. I will say he does come downhill again and play the run pretty well. That's his best trade, but I don't think it's like a, oh my God, it's unbelievable. Like, wait till you see this sort of trade. It's good, but it's not anything otherworldly. He has had some podcasting distractions and some dumb penalties. In fact, the coach of Indianapolis has had to talk about, you know, how, you know, maybe he needs to, you know, just focus on what words he's saying on the podcast. And I think they said something to the effect of, yeah, it's great that he's starting to work on this for a post career sort of thing, but, you know, he needs to be more careful of what he's saying on podcasts and things like that. So that is something that has come up in Indianapolis. I will say this. I'm not a huge quaguy, all right. And I don't think I would in any world they probably would have brought quaguy back for the contract that he's about to get. But quaguy in 2025, I know that the PFF scores were not great for either of them.

26:57Quaguy in 2025 was a solid step ahead of what I saw from Franklin in 2025. Now, Franklin in 2024, from the little I've seen and from what I've read and all pro and everything like that, I think was a step ahead of quaguy in 2025, but the 2025 versions of each other, I do think quaguy was a step ahead. In fact, I would probably, from what I saw on tape in 2025, say that I would rather have Isaiah McDuffie than Franklin, to be honest, I thought McDuffie probably played a little bit better, at least it's close, which is again, interesting and probably not what you're hoping for when you acquire a linebacker via trade, who's probably going to come in and be your starter. One way that they could utilize him is as more of a base down run oriented linebacker. There's some complications here. The first thing I'll say is with Jonathan Ganon, he played a lot of base and he played a lot of dime. He played less than nickel than most defensive coordinators and he added a more dime and added a more base. If you use him as like a three, four inside linebacker on base downs and rundowns, Franklin

27:59will help you and I do think he can help Green Bay in that situation. I do think he pairs with Edger and Cooper pretty darn well. If you're going to play dime and take Franklin off the field and let Cooper be the lone linebacker and maybe put Bullard or Xavier McKinney or even a Catanol adapo, somebody like that as that player next to Cooper in that situation. You actually have 60b. How that would work? You have four rushers up front. You've got Edger and Cooper and a box safety. Let's just say ol' adapo for the fun of it as your other safety or actually you could even use, let's use Javon Bullard. Let's use Javon Bullard and Edger and Cooper sort of playing linebacker together in a dime obvious passing situation within, as of now Nate Hobbs in the slot, Keeshawn in Valentine on the outside and then you've got Evan Williams and Xavier McKinney at safety. There you get 60b's, right? You've got your really three safeties, three corners, one linebacker for defensive lineman

28:59and that's really a dime defense. It's kind of moonlighting as a nickel with Javon Bullard or again, you could use a Catanol adapo or even a Xavier McKinney or even an Evan Williams as sort of the extra linebacker in that position, but that gets Franklin off the field in situations that he doesn't do well in in those more coverage oriented situations, allows Cooper to be on the field where it gets complicated is if Franklin's going to be the one wearing the green dot, you really kind of want your full time linebacker out there wearing the green dot. In this case, if you know Cooper's going to be in a base, you know he's going to be in a nickel and if he's the lone guy in dime, then you just say, well, give him the green dot. I don't know that they want him calling plays. He seems like somebody that you don't want to put extra stuff on his plate. He's already struggled a little bit in his first couple of years with always aligning correctly and making sure he's been assigned and sure and things like that. I think you want to get him to play and the less thinking that you can have Cooper do the better. That's not anything. I just think you want him playing fast and free and not even to think about anything else. So I don't know that you want Cooper with the green dot.

30:00Could you use his Aver McKinney with the green dot or something like that? Sure. You could do something like that. Or could you, you know, when you're in obvious dime, could you just, you know, use signals for Cooper or something? There's ways to get around it, but it's a little bit complicated. But that is one way sort of accentuate Franklin's strengths while mitigating some of his weaknesses and not having them in some of those obvious passing down plays. He also does have special teams experience and with Green Bay playing more starters on special teams. And maybe if he's just a based down linebacker only, you could put him on more coverage units and have him help out there as well. If he'd be willing, now, it sometimes is a little bit hard to get a former proble and all pro linebacker to go back and play more significant special teams on coverage units, but he certainly has the ability to do it. And that's where he kind of cut his chops originally. So if, you know, you do need him to do that, theoretically, he should be able to do that at a high level as well for the ones that are really concerned over this next thing. I've got some good news. I don't know what number he's going to wear for sure, but he wore number 44 with Indian

31:02apolis. And that is one of the only numbers that is completely free on the Packers roster right now. So nobody has been wearing number 44. So you would think that he has a great chance to carry that number over with the Green Bay Packers. Now, from a Colby Wooden standpoint, this was a player for player swap. There were no draft picks. There were no conditional picks. There was no nothing. It was Colby Wooden for Zyre Franklin Wooden was on the last year of his deal, which is noteworthy. So they had one year left of Colby Wooden. Maybe they were feeling like they weren't going to extend them. But what I will say is we don't know exactly what Green Bay thought of Wooden. Maybe there were some locker room issues. Maybe they were looking to move on from Wooden anyway. We just don't know. I'm not saying that there were locker room issues. But what I will say is I actually really liked Colby Wooden in 2025 and what he was asked to do. This is a player who put on significant weight for last season to be a more run-stopping defensive tackle. And then TJ Slayton leaves in free agency and Kenny Clark gets traded before the season.

32:07And eventually Devante White goes down with injury and Colby Wooden really went from somebody who had been a rotational kind of number five defensive tackle. To once Wyatt went out, he was defensive tackle number one. And even when Wyatt was in, he and Wyatt were the starters at defensive tackle. He put on weight, became a run-stopping oriented defensive tackle. I wouldn't say quite like a true nose tackle, but closer to it. And I had to play that position all year. And if you look early in the year, like first six to eight weeks, he played it really well. I'm not saying he was pro-ball caliber, but he was a starting caliber defensive tackle. And then you could just tell he hit a wall. He was not used to playing a full season of snaps. He had been a rotational guy the previous two years. They asked him to do a ton of heavy lifting. He put on all that weight. Now he was having to hold up against double teams for a 17 plus game season, 18 game season. And you could just tell his body wore down through the course of the year. Now I'm not saying that or even advocating that Colby Wooden should have come back in that same role.

33:08But especially if you're going to 3-4, I think you could have been a really good 3-4 defensive end that could also move into nose tackle when you needed him to. And if he is year like more rotational defensive tackle, your third, fourth, fifth guy, I think he's perfect in that role. And they just got a big jump from him this past year and developed him. And I think he would have been a really solid player for Green Bay in 2025 along that defensive line. And you were already thin on that defensive line. He was the closest thing you really had to a good nose tackle or good runstopper. And now he has gone from the team. So you took a already thin unit and made it even more thin. And so there's a ton of need at the defensive tackle, nose tackle defensive end position now in Green Bay and in wooden exacerbates that issue. And so that's noteworthy. Again, I also really liked him if he could have been the number 3-4 guy. I think that would have been a perfect role for Colby Wooden. So I really liked, again, what he was set up to be assuming that they were going to get

34:10a couple players ahead of him this off season. But yeah, it's disappointing to me. If this would have been like Carl Brooks for Zyre Franklin, I think I would have even been probably a little bit better, especially because, you know, Brooks got that contract bump because he played enough snaps and went up to 3.5 million. Wooden was on a one-year cheap deal. He was just over a million dollars. So you added about, you know, just under six million dollars, about five and a half million in salary by taking on Franklin and moving on from Wooden. Yeah, it's just, it's weird. I'm surprised that Wooden was the guy that they traded and that Franklin was the guy, Franklin, upon intended, that they traded for. We'll be right back. Has the news been getting you down? I'm Megan McCartle, and I'm here to help. I'm the host of a news show from Washington Post Opinion called Reasonably Optimistic. And it's an antidote to the pessimism that's riddling America right now.

35:13Every Wednesday, I'm going to talk to people who see a path forward. People seem to me that there is some awakening of a desire to act together, to solve problems where they are. I am a believer in America and it's worth fighting for. Join me Wednesdays on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, it's Howie Mandel and I'm inviting you to witness history as me and my Howie Do It gaming team take on Gilly DeKing and wallow 267's million dollars gaming in an epic global gaming league video game showdown, four rounds, multiple games, one winner, plus a halftime performance by multi platinum artist, Travis McCoy, watch all the action and see who wins and advances to the championship match against Neo right now at global gaming league dot com. That's global gaming league dot com everybody games. A couple of their news or notes, I should say surrounding this. This will do it for quay. The quay is obviously gone at this point in time. They're not going to resign quay after making this trade. Tom Pellicero did say the Packers tried aggressively at the end to work out a contract and it just

36:14didn't work out. Quay will find a job elsewhere on a significant contract, but this will seal the quay walker experience in Green Bay. And as I mentioned earlier, this might just make them done at linebacker because they're probably keeping five. And I know justice is set if they're moving to three, four, maybe they'll keep four. I think Neiman's going to make it as a fifth as a special teams guy, but you could easily see a world in which it's Cooper and Franklin as your top two hopper and McDuffie is your backups. And then Neiman as your special teams guy, Jamie Johnson on the practice squad. This is a deep linebacker draft that wouldn't stun me if they draft somebody and added some more competition to that room. But they could theoretically just wipe their hands of it and say we're pretty good at linebacker right now. We're not going to do anything else significant in the draft or free agency. And that's kind of what I expect unless they get somebody kind of on on day three of the draft to come in and compete as well, unless a really good linebacker falls to them in around two or three and they just can't pass it up. But I think they kind of can be done for the moment at linebacker again, if they want

37:15to draft somebody to compete and be ready for 2027 shirt, they absolutely could, but they don't need to at this point in time now that this trade is done. My overall thoughts. First of all, there's more salary cat moves that are going to have to come because of this. They will have to open up more space because they were just barely under. And now with Franklin, they are over the cap once again. So they will have to make more moves ahead of Wednesday when the new league year officially starts. I'll just say this one is a bit of a head scratcher for me. If you would have told me that the packers would have been able to get Zaire Franklin after the cults released him and they got him on a one year, $2.5 million deal. But like, yeah, that seems really smart. I really like that. It kind of a Christian Kirk's tea type thing. I would have been, yeah, like that makes sense bringing, you know, get some competition. Yeah, obviously I have some experience with Jonathan Ganon can play inside in a three, four matches pretty well with Adrian Cooper.

38:17Cool. I totally, totally unborn, but it's not that. They gave a clue, but it will be what in which is it's not the end of the world. Colby's not an unbelievable defensive tackle or end or anything like that. He's a solid rotational piece that's got one year left on his deal. He's probably not going to get resigned the following year. You lost one year, like probably what 400, you know, replacement level snaps from Colby Wooden. It's fine. But you had a rotational defensive end that you traded away on a cheap contract and you took back Franklin on a seven plus million dollar deal this year. That's not an insignificant amount of money for a team that's still pretty tight up against the cap. That to me is like all of it together just is weird. I think they gave up quite frankly, the better player in Colby Wooden. I think they had to take on the salary. Also, if you would have told me this, if you would have said that they had to take on the seven million dollar salary from Zeyer Franklin and they gave up Colby Wooden, I would have said, well, clearly the cult sent like a fifth or six round pick to take on that

39:17salary as well. No, they didn't. They didn't need to give up a pick because they could have just released them, but if they wanted something to return, this one is weird to me. Not to mention, he's 30 years old. He's coming off his worst season by far. Wooden's coming off his best season and is more ascending and younger. It's tough. He doesn't have ideal heightweight speed and there's not an aspect of his game that is perfect. I don't love his overall skill set and his body of work in 2025 was shaky at best. Turn on his tape in 2025. It is, it gives you real cause for concern. I didn't feel great really about anything as I was watching his tape if I'm being honest. So again, I haven't watched a ton of 2024. I'm excited to go back and watch 2024 in a little bit more detail to see if there's something that I think, oh, he can rediscover that.

40:18There's always that possibility. He is shown in the NFL. Just we're not talking about in like 2021, just not last year, but the previous year in 2024, he was really, really good. And so if he can get back to that, that's huge. And so while this deal doesn't quite fit my fancy and it doesn't get me super excited and I'm kind of questioning why they decided to do this. I will end with some reasons for optimism. The first, as I mentioned, he was a much better player just two years ago. There's always, always hope that he can get back to playing at that level. He's done it in the league. If he's done it once, he can do it again. He has to go out and prove that, of course. I do think that they get somebody with some piston vinegar and tenacity on this defense. They needed more of that. They really, truly needed more of that. And he is going to bring that to the table. He is a true Mike, which they truly needed. He is a green dot calling the plays, which is something that they needed. He is a team captain, Walter Payton, man of the year nominee, the Packer type player, right, locker room fit.

41:18That's going to be good. I think that that matches up well with what they like. He did have that ankle injury in 20, you know, prior to the 2025 season, should be going into the 2026 season healthy, knock on wood. He will get a defense that I think fits him well in this Jonathan Ganon three, four defense that it could fit him better than what he had this last year in a four, three in Indian apolis and a new defense that he didn't seem to fit well in. I do think he fits well alongside Edger and Cooper. And there's always that opportunity for a change of scenery, especially after you've spent so much time in one place, just a new weight room, some new friends, a Micah Parsons, a new defensive coordinator, a new defense, just sometimes it raises your energy level. You can kind of get caught in a rut, sometimes in the same spot for so long. Maybe this brings him a little bit of energy and rewakens what we saw from Zaire Franklin in 2024. Like I said, I'm looking forward to going back and watching a little bit more of his tape in 2024. I will at some point go through in grade every single snap from 2025. Just to see how it would have, you know, related to Quay and Cooper and everyone else in

42:22that linebacker room. If I have time, I might go back in grade every snap from 2024, grading 2000 plus snaps of Zaire Franklin is not exactly the easiest thing in the world. But if I have time and if I get to it, I'll try to do both years. But for sure, I will grade every snap of 2025 just again to kind of get a correlation from where he was this past year and again, kind of related to where the grades came in for the rest of the Packers defense and specifically the linebackers. For me, overall, at the moment, one of Goody's more perplexing moves tough to get completely on board in this one. But I hope I'm just wrong. And he comes in and kills it and he adds some of that piss and vinegar to the defense that they so badly need. It's back to playing like he was in 2024 is a key run defender for them. Fits well next to Adrian Cooper and things go swimmingly and we look back and say, really good move for Brian Gutecans. And I think that's, you know, it's fair to be questioning in a little bit like, what was this? I'm not sure I like this, but there's always the possibility that it works out and you never quite know until somebody gets to town and you see exactly how they perform.

43:23One last thought or just note here, Zach Morley did a great episode with Zach Kicks who does a fantastic job covering the Indianapolis Colts, both as a writer and a podcaster, analyst, et cetera. So if you want to get this from a Colts point of view, go and check out that in interview with Jacob Morley and Zach Kicks. That is on both the YouTube channel and on the audio station so you can check that out as well. But that's a great tag team partner to today's show, getting it from the horses mouth and they'll pun intended with the Colts that, you know, to see how he played in Indianapolis, not only this past year, but through the course of his career. So go check out that episode as well. That is going to do it for me today. Always appreciate you guys joining. Thanks so much for your time. I will see you guys back tomorrow. We are getting closer and closer to free agency again, 11 a.m. central time on Monday. For that live free agency show, shout out to our all-prone Hall of Fame members, PJ Win, Brandon Paleta, boom, handle, Donald Lee, Lori Lord, baby, QB, David McClusty, Alex Swang, Peter Ritaka, Jay Zimmerman, B Brown, Puerto Rican Packer, Dan Guestford, Chris

44:25Reiger, Izzie Roberts, Ian Ewing, Willie Winkels, Sinkle, the Gabelstorm, Packetack, Cast, Chris Weiss, Craig John DeMitropoulos, Hannah Rodomsky, Devin Lane, Alexander Newell, Richard Morales, Les Nino, Beast Bumblebee, Benjamin Sargent, Steve Bates, John Mark Lydell, Nemo, Donald Decker, Damon Hartley, Ziltson, Zillertsson, large Charles and Jake Conor. See you guys tomorrow. Until next time, and as always, go Packo. Hey, it's Howie Mandel, and I'm inviting you to witness history as me, and my Howie Doet

45:32Gaming team take on Gilly DeKing and wallow 267's million dollars gaming in an epic global gaming league video game showdown, four rounds, multiple games, one winner, plus a half time performance by multi platinum artist, Travis McCoy. Watch all the action and see who wins and advances to the championship match against Neo. Right now at globalgamingleague.com, that's globalgamingleague.com, everybody games.