Speaker 1: Welcome into the Ravens Press Pass podcast. Today of the
Speaker 1: Ravens made another move in the NFL Draft, selecting linebacker
Speaker 1: Trenton Simpson with their third round pick. Trenton Simpson is
Speaker 1: a run and hit linebacker who's a versatile player. You
Speaker 1: can use them all over the field on defense and
Speaker 1: on special teams. He talked with the local media soon
Speaker 1: after the pick was announced, and you could tell that
Speaker 1: Simpson was fired up to land here in Baltimore.
Speaker 2: Hey, Trenton, congratulations. It seems like when everybody sees you play,
Speaker 2: you play all over the field. Where do you feel
Speaker 2: is your strongest position?
Speaker 3: I say my strongest position is in the box. But
Speaker 3: God has blessed me with so many talents to be versatile.
Speaker 3: So whatever the Ravens need me to do any given week,
Speaker 3: I'm available, and I'm a flexibility and I wouldn't adapt
Speaker 3: to any scheme and just be a playmaker.
Speaker 4: That's all I proud myself is making plays with the university.
Speaker 5: Ryan Mink, Trenton, we saw you, you know, emotional moment
Speaker 5: when you're drafted. What is it about the Ravens that
Speaker 5: really appeals to you? It makes you so excited? And
Speaker 5: did you have a good sense that they could be
Speaker 5: a team that was interested in you.
Speaker 4: Oh, yes, sir.
Speaker 3: In my heart, man, I knew that that was a great,
Speaker 3: great opportunity for me. My agent had let me know
Speaker 3: like that that was the place that was best for me.
Speaker 3: And they they're already they have a winning program. So
Speaker 3: I've come from Clemson with winning pedigree. So man, I'm
Speaker 3: just continued excited to bring my talent and my mind
Speaker 3: set to the team.
Speaker 4: And this is just a blessing.
Speaker 6: Man.
Speaker 3: My emostion is poured out because I've been grinding at
Speaker 3: this football things since i was six years old. So
Speaker 3: just to be in the National Football League and have
Speaker 3: my family there and my mom by my side mit
Speaker 3: the world to definitely.
Speaker 4: Charles Walker.
Speaker 7: Yeah, heye, Trenton, congratulations. Obviously, the Ravens have a history
Speaker 7: of great linebackers and and two really good ones right
Speaker 7: now in ro Quand Smith and Patrick Queen. What do
Speaker 7: you what do you think about possibly fitting in with
Speaker 7: those guys?
Speaker 5: Oh?
Speaker 3: Man, I'm excited, man, ro Cound Smith, Patrick Queenan I
Speaker 3: watch those.
Speaker 4: Guys highlight like I just I love the way they play.
Speaker 4: They play like me.
Speaker 3: They play fast, physical football, and they hitting anything that's
Speaker 3: moving and that's my mindset. So I'm excited to come
Speaker 3: in the linebacker room and bring my talents, come in
Speaker 3: there willing to learn from the Vets.
Speaker 4: And continue to just have a great career and be
Speaker 4: a Raven Kevin Richardson, Hey, Trenton, and welcome to the
Speaker 4: Baltimore Ravens.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 6: Going through the draft process, what is some of the
Speaker 6: criticism from some of the draft experts have talked about
Speaker 6: your game that they may have been wrong about.
Speaker 3: I say, just just not knowing what's what scheme I
Speaker 3: can fit in. I can fit in any scheme. I'm
Speaker 3: the most versatile linebacker in this draft, and I'm ever
Speaker 3: gonna believe that. And we're gonna see this this in
Speaker 3: this career transcemption, y'all gonna y'all not gonna regret this pick,
Speaker 3: and I'm gonna maximize every opportunity man and trans Simpson
Speaker 3: gonna go down as one of the great for Baltimore Ravens.
Speaker 4: Believe that.
Speaker 8: Jeff Surebac, did you have a sense of where you
Speaker 8: were gonna get picked? Were you on the board longer
Speaker 8: and you expected and what was sort of it like
Speaker 8: when when you got that call.
Speaker 3: I was definitely on the board longer than the way,
Speaker 3: longer than I expected. But it was always God's Tommy,
Speaker 3: and and I believe in God with all my heart.
Speaker 3: And this was the place he wanted me at and
Speaker 3: the pick he wanted me to go at. So I'm
Speaker 3: just blessed. Man, This this is a dream come true.
Speaker 3: I'm just blessed. I'm excited. It was definitely longer, but
Speaker 3: this is well worked the way to be a Baltimore
Speaker 3: raven going there with the guys you have, guys already
Speaker 3: have in the locker room, and.
Speaker 4: To add me in my mindset, we're gonna be great.
Speaker 4: We're gonna we're gonna win some championships. Definitely.
Speaker 9: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Congratulations man, you had twelve sacks uh in your college
Speaker 3: career and really, God after the quarterback.
Speaker 4: You feel like that's something you can bring the Ravens.
Speaker 3: And why do you think you were so adepted being
Speaker 3: able to cause a pass rush? Oh yes, sir, I
Speaker 3: definitely feel I can bring that to the Ravens. I
Speaker 3: just say, guys, bless me with a lot of speed
Speaker 3: and ability and just with my technique and my hard
Speaker 3: work and just trusting my coaches and practicing hard.
Speaker 4: I definitely feel I can bring that to the Ravens.
Speaker 3: I feel like I'm gonna be a great asset to
Speaker 3: the team on the first, second, and third down. So
Speaker 3: I'm excited to see how they're gonna use me. Got
Speaker 3: a lot of talent and I'm ready to work. We'll
Speaker 3: go to Kyle Barber and congratulations. Were there any linebackers
Speaker 3: that you were looking up to growing up and who
Speaker 3: do you muddel your game after?
Speaker 4: Man, Definitely ro CORYN. Smith Man. I grew up.
Speaker 3: I'm from Columbus, Georgia, and just seeing him at Georgia
Speaker 3: he won a buckets tore man like it's it's gonna
Speaker 3: be a pleasure playing with him, and I know I'm
Speaker 3: gonna be able to take a lot from him and
Speaker 3: his mindset.
Speaker 4: He's a dog. He plays hard, he plays the right way, and.
Speaker 3: It's the reason, it's the reason why he's the highest
Speaker 3: paid lineback in the NFL right now. So, man, I'm
Speaker 3: just blessed to be in a room with a guy
Speaker 3: like that. So because i know I'm gonna pick up,
Speaker 3: I'm willing to listen and I'm gonna put the work
Speaker 3: in and whatever he do whatever workouts he's doing.
Speaker 4: I'm willing to come and join. I'm ready to work.
Speaker 4: I'm right and round it out with Ryan MANK.
Speaker 5: Just wondering your best as a military kid kind of
Speaker 5: bounced around a little bit with your dad being in
Speaker 5: the military. How did that shape you as a person.
Speaker 3: I feel like that's where I get my adaptability from
Speaker 3: and just being able to adapt to anything. I've learned
Speaker 3: so much from my family and just being a military
Speaker 3: kid and just understanding sacrifice and just working hard.
Speaker 4: So I'm blessed man.
Speaker 3: My family has instilled everything in me to be a
Speaker 3: great young man, discipline, great character, and God put a
Speaker 3: lot of talent on my boy at this football thing.
Speaker 3: So now I'm excited. I'm blessed and to be a
Speaker 3: Raven Man is truly a blessing. And I promise you
Speaker 3: we're gonna have a great career here.
Speaker 10: Yes, sir, all right, Well, very good, Trenton, very much
Speaker 10: so appreciate your time, Thank you, and congratulations again.
Speaker 4: We look forward to meeting you in person soon. Yes, sir,
Speaker 4: thank you so much for having me. Y'all have a
Speaker 4: good one.
Speaker 1: Now you're listening to the Ravens Press past podcast feed.
Speaker 1: In addition to hearing from Trenton Simpson after the second
Speaker 1: and third round of the NFL Draft, we also had
Speaker 1: a chance to hear from head coach John Harbaugh, general
Speaker 1: manager Eric Decassa, and Director of player Personnel Joe Hortez.
Speaker 6: Well, we're excited to uh to take to a draft
Speaker 6: Trenton Simpson from Clemson. We felt, like, you know, clearly
Speaker 6: for us at that time, he was the best available player,
Speaker 6: running hit linebacker, very very explosive, outstanding. I mean, Chris Horton,
Speaker 6: one of the happiest guys in the building, one of
Speaker 6: his favorite players, Zach Orr, that was his number one
Speaker 6: linebacker in the draft this year.
Speaker 9: And so you know, we got wiped out.
Speaker 6: To be honest, in the third It was a long
Speaker 6: day as I as I feared it would, and I
Speaker 6: just kept thinking about, you know, Roquand. In fact, at
Speaker 6: one point we actually facetimeed with Roquand, believe it or not,
Speaker 6: and that is true, we did.
Speaker 9: So that was cool.
Speaker 10: I was just to remind the whole room when we
Speaker 10: did have a second round pick, Yeah, yeah, here's your
Speaker 10: second round pick.
Speaker 6: But we were very excited to get Trenton. Things going
Speaker 6: to help us in a lot of different ways. We
Speaker 6: see him as a four down linebacker eventually, tremendous potential
Speaker 6: and upside, and he's a great kid.
Speaker 2: Questions, So, John, how do you because it seems like
Speaker 2: he's played a lot of snaps inside lineback out there,
Speaker 2: even if I'm at corner, where do you project that?
Speaker 9: That's the point?
Speaker 10: Kind of think he's versatile. He's a running hit linebacker,
Speaker 10: and Joe talked about that just a few minutes ago.
Speaker 10: He can play really across the board. You know, you
Speaker 10: play from the slot all the way back across to
Speaker 10: the will ading play on the edge of the line,
Speaker 10: So that's kind of nice. He's fast, He's the kind
Speaker 10: of straight line, covered ground kind of guy. He can
Speaker 10: he can actually rush. I think when we blitz will
Speaker 10: help us. And then special teams, you know, he's going
Speaker 10: to definitely be a part of that. He already started
Speaker 10: talking about that on the phone. He's going to be
Speaker 10: on all the special teams stuff. So it's always good.
Speaker 10: Great to add speed and kind of that. You know,
Speaker 10: he's a missile, you know. They add that kind of
Speaker 10: mindset to our defense and our special teams is a
Speaker 10: big plus.
Speaker 8: What do you mean by way when you were wiped
Speaker 8: out or you guys, your third round grades on other
Speaker 8: than Simson pretty much all gone.
Speaker 4: Is that company?
Speaker 6: Well, I mean you have players in every round that
Speaker 6: you you aspire to take. You know, you look at
Speaker 6: you look up there and being man, that would be
Speaker 6: a great pick, that would be a great pick. And
Speaker 6: at one point, fairly part of the third round, we
Speaker 6: probably had seven or eight names and by the end
Speaker 6: we had one.
Speaker 9: That's you know, so you have to you know, you
Speaker 9: pick the best player. That's what we do. You know.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 6: Interesting, it was interesting just as an aside, you know,
Speaker 6: thinking about looking at the receiver position starting that round,
Speaker 6: there were a lot of really good receivers available, and
Speaker 6: you know, at one point this you know, this process fall,
Speaker 6: I'm thinking maybe we would have a chance to draft
Speaker 6: a wide out in the third round, and it just
Speaker 6: got annihilated in the span of about ten picks. And
Speaker 6: so we're very thankful that we got to say.
Speaker 4: Eric, is you know drafting simpthing? Does that have any
Speaker 4: impact one on in future?
Speaker 3: All?
Speaker 6: Yeah, So that's something, as I said yesterday, you know,
Speaker 6: will address at some point.
Speaker 9: We love Patrick. I love Patrick.
Speaker 6: Patrick is in my mind one of the better will
Speaker 6: linebackers in the league. He's smart, he works his butt off,
Speaker 6: he's got a bright future. I think he's a Pro
Speaker 6: Bowl linebacker in the making. And so you know, in Trenton,
Speaker 6: we get a guy that was, honestly, I mean, the
Speaker 6: very best player available at the time. That's our philosophy,
Speaker 6: that's how we build our team.
Speaker 11: Uh.
Speaker 6: The fact that he's an outstanding special teams player factored
Speaker 6: in because that's you know that that that transcends positional
Speaker 6: defensive football. That guy is gonna be on the field
Speaker 6: force helping us win games, and that's a huge thing
Speaker 6: for us. We love his mentality, we love his background,
Speaker 6: his family, and it was an easy pick for us
Speaker 6: to make.
Speaker 12: Just to be clear with the Patrick is the drafts
Speaker 12: by that two days? That line that you guys to.
Speaker 6: Repect the deadline is what the first four pm. It's
Speaker 6: probably when we'll make it. I would say, by.
Speaker 2: That, Joe, when when what kind of stood out when
Speaker 2: you're watching the film and throughout I'm just gutting crosses balls.
Speaker 11: Yeah, you know it's been mentioned twice, the versatility he
Speaker 11: came in as a really an outside backer nickel type
Speaker 11: player for them. You mentioned to Jamison where he was
Speaker 11: playing some corner Even so, the athleticism, the speed when
Speaker 11: you put the film on the you watch him go
Speaker 11: from sideline to sideline. He can close ground very quickly
Speaker 11: in pursuit. He's very active on film. And then, like
Speaker 11: Eric mentioned, his characters is off the charts. The Eric Clemson,
Speaker 11: they rave about him. Uh, you know, we get a
Speaker 11: lot of information from them about their players, and and
Speaker 11: he comes from a great program and a great place,
Speaker 11: and and so it just put everything together. It's just
Speaker 11: feels like a good pick.
Speaker 10: Eric, Joe.
Speaker 4: We've talked to you guys a lot about the cornerback.
Speaker 7: Is that a position that there's still gonna be good
Speaker 7: value when you guys are picking in the fourth and tomorrow?
Speaker 6: I think so, yeah, I know, we look at the
Speaker 6: board now, yeah, of course you've got to be you know,
Speaker 6: there's always an element of luck involved and team's taking
Speaker 6: other players. But as we look up there in this
Speaker 6: coming round, you know, we see some guys that we
Speaker 6: would consider taking in the fourth round. For sure, definitely,
Speaker 6: And I'll tell you that's an important position. There's no
Speaker 6: team in the league with probably there are other teams,
Speaker 6: but as you guys all know you've seen us like
Speaker 6: we realized the value of that position, and we'll continue
Speaker 6: to address that via the draft, via other means. You know,
Speaker 6: there's a lot of opportunities out there for us to
Speaker 6: get better at that position, and the draft is certainly
Speaker 6: part of that. And I think we have a board
Speaker 6: where we see players that we would take in the fourth,
Speaker 6: fifth and sixth round.
Speaker 9: Definitely, were you at.
Speaker 4: All tempted to trade up?
Speaker 8: Did you tempt it at any point and it was
Speaker 8: just too rich or you just knew.
Speaker 4: The draft capital that you had that was probably.
Speaker 12: Gonna be unlikely.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean, you know, in another year draft, we
Speaker 6: probably might have traded.
Speaker 9: You know, we had twelve picks. See maybe us.
Speaker 6: Trying to trade up potentially this year Hamstrong. By the
Speaker 6: picks that we have, it was probably prohibitive.
Speaker 8: Uh.
Speaker 6: You know our trade was, as I said, Roquan, that
Speaker 6: was our trade up this year.
Speaker 9: Basically, we gave up a two and a five for
Speaker 9: an all all pull linebacker. That was our trade.
Speaker 6: And you know, we kind of went into the process
Speaker 6: knowing that we did consider trading Back in the round,
Speaker 6: we fielded a couple of calls. The value wasn't there
Speaker 6: for us to do that, and so we decided to pick.
Speaker 9: In that three.
Speaker 12: You know, round two video you got to put up
Speaker 12: on a social media and you said that you guys
Speaker 12: planned a half five players in the next twenty four hours.
Speaker 12: At that point, you you only have four fixed. Was
Speaker 12: that just a plugging of the words or you expected.
Speaker 4: Video? Did you see a video?
Speaker 6: No, you never know, You never know.
Speaker 9: You never know. John.
Speaker 12: There's a lot of talk about since that's a personal linebacker,
Speaker 12: you envision him competing Bard or playing primarily inside or
Speaker 12: outside or.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I think it started. He'll be an inside back
Speaker 10: and they probably could go out to the edge. We
Speaker 10: do move those guys out there quite a bit. You know,
Speaker 10: we'll kick we'll kick our our in our even front package,
Speaker 10: nickel package. We'll kick our week side end down to
Speaker 10: a three technique and bring the will linebacker up on
Speaker 10: the last scrimmage to do that lot with Malik. So
Speaker 10: those guys are versatile doing that. Patrick does that a lot.
Speaker 10: So it'll be involved in all those type of things
Speaker 10: in that same being.
Speaker 5: Just how valuable is this, you know, kind of the
Speaker 5: positionless defense and being able to match up against today
Speaker 5: ends with linebackers like that, like, just how much versatility
Speaker 5: does that give you?
Speaker 10: In light? Yeah, Mike talks about it all the time.
Speaker 10: And really when we draw our defenses up, a lot
Speaker 10: of times we put we do do excess, you know,
Speaker 10: a lot of times we do do numbers. You know,
Speaker 10: we'll talk about we number our coverages, you know, in
Speaker 10: terms of not just man coverage, but also his own coverage.
Speaker 10: So sometimes it's even defensive tackles dropping out into coverage,
Speaker 10: or it's guys blitzing in certain gaps. It can really
Speaker 10: be anybody that does it. And we try to build
Speaker 10: a defense in that way. We have since twenty eighteen.
Speaker 10: That's how we when we reorganize the whole defense. So
Speaker 10: the idea is for guys to be all around. So
Speaker 10: they say where do they play, Well, really, they all
Speaker 10: play everywhere most of the time. I don't really think
Speaker 10: he's gonna play corner though, Joe's so yeah, it's not
Speaker 10: part of the plan, but you know, that's how we
Speaker 10: really want all the guys to be able to play
Speaker 10: that way.
Speaker 8: Do you guys call Patrick or at this point that
Speaker 8: you guys are doing something that'll be something you could
Speaker 8: you do in the coming days maybe after the draft,
Speaker 8: or you don't think it's necessary period.
Speaker 9: What do we mean.
Speaker 4: We call Patrick?
Speaker 12: Call Patrick en?
Speaker 10: Oh yeah, I mean we talked to him, Joe, I exact, sorry,
Speaker 10: talked to him. I talked to Patrick yesterday or the
Speaker 10: day before. Patrick's good. I mean, he'll be more good
Speaker 10: players we can have on our team, the more our
Speaker 10: guys should be happy. So this guy, you know, when
Speaker 10: this guy comes in, all of our players, our linebackers
Speaker 10: is gonna love him. I know has already talked to him.
Speaker 10: I'd be surprised if Patrick hasn't talked to him yet.
Speaker 10: You know that's not Patrick. But he's he's gonna be
Speaker 10: great in our room. He's gonna be great for our team.
Speaker 10: Patrick's gonna love him. You know, that's a role.
Speaker 4: How was the linebacker that he looked up to? And
Speaker 4: he's a orge guy? Was that something you talk to
Speaker 4: you guys about it all?
Speaker 5: When you know what he.
Speaker 9: Did?
Speaker 11: He speak to us about looking at the Roquan No
Speaker 11: to us, to me personally, no, but you know he's
Speaker 11: definitely a proud Georgia player, you know, and and most
Speaker 11: of those guys are, so I'm not surprising that he
Speaker 11: mentions that tell you, guys, Eric, I know.
Speaker 4: You may not know this for sure, but you're on
Speaker 4: the clock over the poem rings. But would you still
Speaker 4: like to get more picks here? Do you like what's
Speaker 4: could be on the board tomorrow and feel like you
Speaker 4: need more picks to kind of take full advantage of that?
Speaker 6: Well, you know, we just we look at the board.
Speaker 6: But yeah, we can always get more picks, I mean,
Speaker 6: getting picks. I gotta say, like it's it's not that
Speaker 6: hard to get picks, you know, I mean, but you
Speaker 6: got to have players to pick too, you know, and
Speaker 6: so you have to look at the board figure out,
Speaker 6: like you know, all the analytics guys upstairs do a
Speaker 6: great job of figuring out, you know, the range of
Speaker 6: players that we're going to be picking from. And I
Speaker 6: mean even you know today Ozzie said, you know, who
Speaker 6: should I look at? And we had a range of
Speaker 6: players and you know, honestly, Trent and fill smack dab
Speaker 6: in the middle of the ten player range of players
Speaker 6: based off of you know, twenty five years of draft history,
Speaker 6: we had a certain spot. But you got so you
Speaker 6: got to have good you know, you have to see
Speaker 6: the players that you might look at that you like,
Speaker 6: for us, we're trying to get players typically that are
Speaker 6: in our top one hundred and twenty five on our board,
Speaker 6: and so if we trade back and we don't feel
Speaker 6: like we're going to be able to get those kind
Speaker 6: of players, it's probably not worthwhile doing it.
Speaker 9: But you know, you can always trade back.
Speaker 6: Teams are always calling, especially as you get into the
Speaker 6: third day of the draft, because other teams covet you know,
Speaker 6: they want to move up.
Speaker 9: Teams always want to move up.
Speaker 6: You know, it's that bias, you know, that consensus bias,
Speaker 6: and they want to move up and take and get
Speaker 6: those players, and so they want to do it. But
Speaker 6: you got to you got to have players. And as
Speaker 6: we've said, you know, we think our roster is pretty good. Jeff,
Speaker 6: it's gonna be hard for guys.
Speaker 9: To make the team.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 9: Uh, we've had a lot of draft picks in the
Speaker 9: last three.
Speaker 6: Or four years, and so you know, we we went
Speaker 6: into this year really not thinking that we wanted ten picks.
Speaker 9: Joe, do you guys.
Speaker 12: See more value at outside quarterback or flat cornerback with
Speaker 12: the guys that are still out there for Day.
Speaker 11: Three packs Yeah, I'd say there's a combination of both
Speaker 11: on the board right now. First, you know, again we
Speaker 11: mentioned versatility all the time, and we can project players
Speaker 11: inside that may not play outside or that may not
Speaker 11: play inside in college, but they're moving skills, their toughness
Speaker 11: or instincts. So there's some guys on the board that
Speaker 11: may not have the experience playing inside that we feel
Speaker 11: that can move inside.
Speaker 1: Thanks again for listening to the Ravens Press Pass podcast.
Speaker 1: Make sure that you subscribe to this podcast feed. Also,
Speaker 1: if you haven't done so already, go ahead and check
Speaker 1: out the Lounge podcast for all the analysis of Draft weekend.
Speaker 1: Also make sure you rate and review both podcast feeds
Speaker 1: as well. The NFL Draft continues on Saturday, as the
Speaker 1: Ravens will make a few more picks in building this
Speaker 1: roster for the twenty twenty three season.