NFL Preseason Primer: Overreaction Monday with Rich & Chris Brockman

Rich flew home from Canton and got a metaphor for free.

He arrived at his connecting gate two minutes after the plane to Canton had pushed back, standing there with five other people from the Los Angeles leg, watching it go with empty seats on it. That is exactly what Bill Belichick did this year, except the plane was a Hall of Fame class and the gate agents were the voters.

Chris opened Overreaction Monday by calling Belichick's absence a gigantic miss. Rich escalated.

"It just makes no sense to me in this day and age that every Canton class isn't filled to capacity," Rich said. "You can still vote more than five people in. It just didn't happen for various reasons."

The ceremony ended at five minutes to three. Fifteen or twenty more minutes buys a Belichick speech, and another stretch buys a Robert Kraft speech. Tom Benson Stadium had plenty of open seats that Patriots fans would have filled, and the buzz would have followed. Belichick is a first-ballot Hall of Fame coach, and when he does not go in, somebody like Mike Shanahan watches the plane push back too. Then next year, when Belichick does go in, another coach waits. Trickle-down, ripple effect.

None of which takes anything away from what happened. Drew Brees told the story of being called out by his Chargers coaches for not seeing his receivers and realizing his height was an excuse he had to stop using. Larry Fitzgerald, once a Vikings ball boy because his father covered the team, had his gold jacket put on him by Cris Carter. Roger Craig waited 28 years and used his speech to tell everyone he has early onset dementia, that it will not define him, and that his story should push people to get checked. Luke Kuechly went in at 35, with only Gale Sayers ever younger. Adam Vinatieri went in as the all-time leading scorer.

Deep roster. It just needed one more row of seats. Not an overreaction.

The fight of the segment came over the MVP, where Chris planted a flag: with contracts now done for both Bijan Robinson and Jahmyr Gibbs, both finish top five in the voting.

Rich did the arithmetic out loud. Two running backs in the top five leaves only three quarterbacks as finalists for what he insists on calling the most valuable quarterback award. Chris made it worse by adding Myles Garrett at 30 sacks.

"What if each of these guys have 1,800 rush yards and 20-plus touchdowns with 75 catches?" Chris asked.

Rich started listing quarterbacks instead. Josh Allen having a Josh Allen year. Joe Burrow having a massive one. Lamar Jackson with a new coordinator. Caleb Williams taking a step. Dak Prescott throwing for a gazillion. He also floated a theory about the source of Chris's conviction, which is that Chris took Gibbs with the second overall pick in the best ball league after TJ grabbed Robinson. Verdict: overreaction.

Chris closed with his five most interesting teams of the preseason, running Vikings, 49ers, Chargers, Giants, Chiefs, with Kansas City on top because of Patrick Mahomes' preseason usage, Travis Kelce's future, Rashee Rice's conditioning and the question of who the real number one receiver is.

Rich accepted the Chiefs and vetoed the list anyway. The Rams are number one, and it is not close. Melbourne to open, then the Giants on Monday night, then Denver, then Philadelphia, with the first three nationally televised across Netflix, ESPN and NBC.

Every game the Rams play is going to be a Super Bowl. Chris countered that this is an August list. Rich was not moved.