Speaker 1: This is the OTP presented by Farm Bureau Health Plans.
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Speaker 1: dot com. My name is Mike Keith and this is
Speaker 1: Amy Wells, and we're actually together. We are in the
Speaker 1: Bay together MGM Studio.
Speaker 2: It feels good.
Speaker 1: It's good to have you back. You're technically in the
Speaker 1: Snickers hot seed, but not really because you know I'll
Speaker 1: take it, but you're the co host, so you can't be.
Speaker 2: I can't be in the hot seed. I suppose.
Speaker 3: I mean, I guess I could be the jars a
Speaker 3: little far, but I'll find a time to get a
Speaker 3: snicker there. You go throughout the program really satisfies, it
Speaker 3: really does.
Speaker 1: That's what I've heard. So last week was quite the
Speaker 1: adventure for the Tennessee Titans and the Titans staff and
Speaker 1: Titan fans for that matter. The week began with the
Speaker 1: Titans doing a couple of interviews, and the second one
Speaker 1: was Brian Callahan. Brian Callahan was in in the afternoon
Speaker 1: and in the one of sixty four Brian Callahan interviews
Speaker 1: that has been done since that time, you have probably
Speaker 1: heard the story that he walks in to the head
Speaker 1: coach's office and sits behind the desk to see what
Speaker 1: it's like, and they offer him the job and he's
Speaker 1: very excited and it's really a cool story, but kind
Speaker 1: of leading from there, it got interesting. And that's what
Speaker 1: we want to take you through on this edition of
Speaker 1: the OTP, pull back the curtain just a little bit
Speaker 1: and take you through what went next because this lady
Speaker 1: Amy Wells, Ashley Ferrell, a couple other members of our staff,
Speaker 1: Donald Page and Gray made a trip that you're probably
Speaker 1: just now becoming aware of. That added sort of a
Speaker 1: special element, an extra special element, if you will, to
Speaker 1: the Brian Callahan piece. So Monday night, the word gets
Speaker 1: out Brian Callahan is going to be the coach. The
Speaker 1: Titans have offered him the job. He's accepted. Now all
Speaker 1: the things have to happen, settling on a contract. And
Speaker 1: that's why the Titans don't release it because while it's
Speaker 1: reported and nobody's denying it, which is always your hint.
Speaker 1: If people start denying it, then it's not true. But
Speaker 1: if the media is reporting it, if several sources are
Speaker 1: reporting it, it's out there. But what you're learning from
Speaker 1: the time in between the report and the time in
Speaker 1: between the release. Is there a lot of things that
Speaker 1: have to happen.
Speaker 2: Right, And that's standard practice.
Speaker 3: I mean the Tennessee Titans always operate in that fashion,
Speaker 3: and most organism zations operate in that fashion where it
Speaker 3: might be out there but until things are signed, sealed and.
Speaker 1: Delivered unless your owner, because he was not.
Speaker 2: All teams operate him in this manner.
Speaker 1: He would normally tweet out he likes to be on.
Speaker 3: The very very very beginning of breaking news. He likes
Speaker 3: to break the news. But a lot of organizations operate
Speaker 3: in the manner where it's until the ink is dried
Speaker 3: on paper, we are not going to confirm anything because,
Speaker 3: in keeping with the cults theme, they got in a
Speaker 3: situation a couple of.
Speaker 2: Years ago where Josh McDaniel, yeah.
Speaker 3: It was mostly done, but it wasn't completely done, and
Speaker 3: then some things got harry on.
Speaker 2: The back end.
Speaker 3: So you want to be sure sure, And we do
Speaker 3: this in a lot of different ways with player acquisitions,
Speaker 3: with a free agency, and there's all kinds of things
Speaker 3: where you hear about it, you see it, but it's
Speaker 3: not done, done done Because there's so many things that
Speaker 3: have to happen.
Speaker 1: Well, and we talk about this on the OTP and
Speaker 1: the ot people know, if you've listened for a long time,
Speaker 1: you understand what we're really discussing here, and that is that, Okay,
Speaker 1: he's got an agent. Brian Callahan has an agent, and
Speaker 1: the agent hasn't said yes yet. So you've got to
Speaker 1: work that out. What are going to be the details.
Speaker 1: Here's the other part of it. You got to call home, right,
Speaker 1: You've got to the family. You probably you probably want
Speaker 1: to tell your wife. I accepted the job with the
Speaker 1: Titans in nineteen ninety eight before I had consulted with
Speaker 1: my wife.
Speaker 2: You did that.
Speaker 1: It was a huge mistake. Let me just it was
Speaker 1: not bold, it was it was very stupid. It was
Speaker 1: really a dumb move. You really did I've really did that? Whoa,
Speaker 1: I really did that. And the worst part was I
Speaker 1: didn't have a cell phone.
Speaker 2: Can't tell her till you get home.
Speaker 1: No, I had to pull off and use a payphone
Speaker 1: in Crossville. So fortunately Brian Callahan's a lot smarter than me.
Speaker 1: He called home and just made sure that I can't believe.
Speaker 2: You did that.
Speaker 1: I know. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So Brian Callahan wins in that regard.
Speaker 1: He really did.
Speaker 2: He told his wife.
Speaker 1: But you do that, You've got some calls to make.
Speaker 1: You're certainly going to call the Bengals. If you're him,
Speaker 1: you want to call Zach Taylor and let him know
Speaker 1: what's going on so he can put things in place.
Speaker 1: You're going to call I would imagine the Brown family
Speaker 1: who owns the Bengals, and just to let them know
Speaker 1: out of respect. So there are all these boxes that
Speaker 1: have to be ticked off. Well, Amy and Ashley had
Speaker 1: come up with this great plan to do a story,
Speaker 1: and it was to go with the new Titans head
Speaker 1: coach back to where they were from and to do
Speaker 1: kind of the story coming out of where they were
Speaker 1: from as they make the trip to Nashville. Now, it
Speaker 1: worked particularly well because Cincinnati is not that far away.
Speaker 2: It's not at all. It's a very easy drive.
Speaker 1: If you had had if the Titans had hired a
Speaker 1: coach from say Seattle, might not have been doable. But
Speaker 1: so Tuesday, you're just waiting on official words so you
Speaker 1: can leave for Cincinnati. Yep, we what time were you
Speaker 1: prepared to leave?
Speaker 2: I was ready to leave at nine am on Tuesday.
Speaker 1: I actually got the rental car at seven.
Speaker 2: Yeah, especially got the rental car at seven am, so
Speaker 2: you're ready. I was ready to go.
Speaker 3: They were going to swing by my house and pick
Speaker 3: me up on the way out of town. Nine o'clock.
Speaker 3: My bag's by the front door. I'm waiting. I'm ready
Speaker 3: to go. But there hadn't gotten word yet.
Speaker 1: There's no there's no official announcement.
Speaker 2: Attempt, no official announcement.
Speaker 1: Not that there's anything wrong, it's just it.
Speaker 3: Hadn't gotten the go yet. We need a green light. Yeah,
Speaker 3: that's all we needed. And so we waited, and then
Speaker 3: it seemed like, well it might be a little while.
Speaker 3: There's still some stuff going on. So I throw my
Speaker 3: bag in the trunk, get all of my things. I
Speaker 3: just leave from the office. That's fine.
Speaker 1: So you come indoor, you come to Ascension Saint Thomas
Speaker 1: Sports Park, yep.
Speaker 2: I do, and sit down at my desk.
Speaker 3: Don't even really get my computer out for a while
Speaker 3: because I think I'm just here for a minute. And
Speaker 3: we wait, and we wait, and we wait and we
Speaker 3: wait some more.
Speaker 1: So it's five o'clock and I've had a conversation with Amy.
Speaker 1: I'm actually technically on vacation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well not.
Speaker 1: Technically no, you are actually on Vaca on vacation. And
Speaker 1: so I get notifications shortly after five that the Titans
Speaker 1: are going to make the announcement at nine to fifteen
Speaker 1: Central on Wednesday, and I relay this immediately to Amy
Speaker 1: and you are standing where when I called you.
Speaker 3: At five eleven PM, I get notification from Mike Keith
Speaker 3: as I am putting my hand on the handle of
Speaker 3: my car in the parking lot.
Speaker 1: So you're the home, You're the US go home. You're
Speaker 1: in the parking garage. You just figure this and Tom
Speaker 1: we'll try gear.
Speaker 2: They're figuring everything out. I am getting ready to go home.
Speaker 3: He I got a text message from you, Mike that
Speaker 3: said we're a go, and I just turned around and
Speaker 3: walked back in the building.
Speaker 2: Like, okay, now what do we do?
Speaker 3: So at that point we kind of huddled the group together,
Speaker 3: had a conversation about what we were going to do,
Speaker 3: what the new plan was, what our new timeline was
Speaker 3: going to be, and then we left the next morning
Speaker 3: and I.
Speaker 1: Went in Charleston, South Carolina and got a rental car.
Speaker 2: You did, and Mike got a rental car and hit the.
Speaker 1: Rom h Well hit the road the next morning as
Speaker 1: did you, guys, you didn't have to leave so early.
Speaker 2: No, we didn't.
Speaker 1: So so Brian Callahan and Alison Callahan, his wife, say, yeah,
Speaker 1: we'll do this feature, and the plan is to do
Speaker 1: it at their home.
Speaker 4: Yes.
Speaker 3: So what we wanted to do was we wanted to
Speaker 3: document what is a historic event for any organization, the
Speaker 3: higher of a new head coach, and we wanted to
Speaker 3: do the best that we could to introduce this person
Speaker 3: in a very different way. You don't usually have the
Speaker 3: opportunity to see a head coach outside of the facility.
Speaker 2: Sure, it's just in general.
Speaker 3: You get to know them over the years, you get
Speaker 3: to know their personalities, that kind of thing, but you
Speaker 3: don't get to see.
Speaker 2: Much of their lives outside of football.
Speaker 3: And so we wanted to start off right from the jump,
Speaker 3: really get to know this person and get to know
Speaker 3: this personal away where they're really comfortable, and that's around
Speaker 3: their family, in their home. That felt like the best
Speaker 3: way to get to know him. That felt like a
Speaker 3: good way to kind of get things started off. And
Speaker 3: he was gracious enough to allow us to do that.
Speaker 1: All right, So you get in the van, you drive
Speaker 1: from Nashville to Cincinnati. Does he actually live in Cincinnati.
Speaker 2: He lives in Cincinnati, Yes.
Speaker 1: So not like Florence, Kentucky or where he's in.
Speaker 3: No, he lives about five minutes from the Bengals stadium.
Speaker 1: Okay, so you drive up to his he answers the door,
Speaker 1: Brian Callahan answers the door.
Speaker 2: He answers the door.
Speaker 3: We walk up to his. How there's four of us,
Speaker 3: So we troop up the front stack.
Speaker 1: Now he knows.
Speaker 2: That we're coming.
Speaker 3: I had text with him back and forth, but I've
Speaker 3: never met this person.
Speaker 2: Sure, and.
Speaker 3: We get to the front door, and what strikes me,
Speaker 3: which is so strange because he's in his own house.
Speaker 3: But my first thought was he's not wearing any shoes.
Speaker 3: I've never seen a head coach not wearing shoes before.
Speaker 3: But I mean, he's at home. A lot of people
Speaker 3: don't wear shoes in their own house. But it just
Speaker 3: felt in that moment, I realized, like, oh, we're actually
Speaker 3: gonna pull this off. This is going to be a casual,
Speaker 3: comfortable thing. He's not even wearing shoes. I don't know
Speaker 3: why that's a thing that's stuck in my head, but
Speaker 3: it felt very intimate somehow, you know, it felt very personal.
Speaker 3: You don't see very many people without I've never seen
Speaker 3: you without shoes on, Like it's just a way you
Speaker 3: don't see people outside of work.
Speaker 1: I guess that's true.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's for whatever reason.
Speaker 3: It just oh he is in his house. He's even
Speaker 3: wearing shoes, so that struck me. He was very kind,
Speaker 3: greeted everybody, invited us in. You know what the first
Speaker 3: thing he did was, no, he offered us sandwiches.
Speaker 1: What kind of sandwiches? I don't know.
Speaker 2: I never had a sandwich.
Speaker 1: You didn't accept a sandwich from the new head coach.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: It was one of those things where it was like,
Speaker 3: you know, we're good, right now, let's get our stuff down,
Speaker 3: unload the car and everything. And then I never circled
Speaker 3: back to the sandwiches.
Speaker 1: But you didn't want a sandwich, not at that moment.
Speaker 1: I mean, don't you think there's stuff I'm not thinking
Speaker 1: back about it, and I think the ot people might agree.
Speaker 1: I think it's rude that you didn't accept a sandwich.
Speaker 3: You know, honestly, when I left, I was thinking that
Speaker 3: because if I had food and beverages for people who
Speaker 3: were coming into my home and no one accepted them,
Speaker 3: and then I had just like four sandwiches sitting in
Speaker 3: my house. I'd be annoyed. So Coach Callahan, I apologized,
Speaker 3: I didn't take a sandwich.
Speaker 2: I'll take one now.
Speaker 3: But it was another one of those gestures that was
Speaker 3: just welcome to my home, can we feed you?
Speaker 1: That is so nice?
Speaker 3: It was very nice. It was incredibly hospitable. He's going
Speaker 3: to fit right in in the South. I mean it
Speaker 3: was the most Southern gesture to offer someone a sandwich.
Speaker 3: But really it was just another moment where I was like, oh,
Speaker 3: this is this is really like how he is as
Speaker 3: a person in his home.
Speaker 2: He offers you food and drink.
Speaker 1: So Alison is his wife. Yes, she's originally from New Jersey.
Speaker 1: She is she lived in Denver. Yeah. What was she like?
Speaker 2: She's delightful.
Speaker 3: They have two young kids, and so she is a
Speaker 3: mom who is keeping up with two young kids and
Speaker 3: is so excited for her husband and was just the
Speaker 3: most delightful person. She was incredibly accommodating of the things
Speaker 3: that we need. I mean we basically walked into their
Speaker 3: home and were like, can we rearrange some of this furniture, Like,
Speaker 3: because you're trying to get.
Speaker 1: A shock, So what room were you in?
Speaker 2: We were in the living room, living room.
Speaker 1: How would you say the house is decorated beautifully? Okay, well,
Speaker 1: I mean I mean yeah, I would think you could
Speaker 1: say that, But you have a style.
Speaker 2: I don't know the words, like a moderate. I don't
Speaker 2: watch it as you do. It was nice. The couch
Speaker 2: was white.
Speaker 1: It was nice. I don't that's gutsy to have a
Speaker 1: white couch with kids, especially with a six year old boy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, as someone who just unloaded a white couch because kids,
Speaker 3: I mean proud of them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like that's incredible, strong place.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it really is a strong play.
Speaker 3: They're really good parents if they can keep a couch
Speaker 3: that look nice like that. But I mean really they
Speaker 3: were super hospitable. Come in, What can we do? How
Speaker 3: do we make this shot work? Can I move this
Speaker 3: plant across the room for you? What if we move
Speaker 3: these six chairs to a different location, like the most accommodating.
Speaker 1: So you're in the New Titans head coaches house, rearranging
Speaker 1: his furniture. He's offered you a sandwich, and so what
Speaker 1: would you say. We're gonna play the interview. We're gonna
Speaker 1: let the OT people hear this interview. That no one
Speaker 1: else has because it was in Cincinnati at his home
Speaker 1: and what.
Speaker 3: And they gave it, showed us around. He showed us
Speaker 3: some of the memorabilia that he has throughout his house.
Speaker 1: I mean, how many pictures of Peyton Manning? None?
Speaker 2: Maybe one? Maybe one? But it wasn't overly paid.
Speaker 3: There's probably more pictures of Peyton Manning in your house
Speaker 3: than is I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't think I have. I mean, I have a
Speaker 1: couple of autographs. Yeah, he signed a couple of footballs
Speaker 1: that that I have. Very nice.
Speaker 2: You all have any pictures of Peyton Manning?
Speaker 1: Why any pictures? I don't know that I have any
Speaker 1: pictures of any athletes in my house.
Speaker 2: Surprising to me.
Speaker 1: I have. I have things.
Speaker 2: Yeah, most of my I mean mementos.
Speaker 1: Well, ninety percent of the stuff out in my house
Speaker 1: is Titans. A football, the racing helmet I got to wear,
Speaker 1: the Mario Andretti size. That's my favorite piece of memorabile
Speaker 1: outside of my football. That every first round pick as
Speaker 1: a Titan has signed. Oh yeah, except you know who didn't.
Speaker 1: The only one, pac Man Jones.
Speaker 2: He didn't sign it.
Speaker 1: I'd never had a chance to get him to sign it.
Speaker 2: That's disappointing.
Speaker 1: I think I'm going to have to rectify that at
Speaker 1: some point. Speaking of Cincinnati, I think at some point
Speaker 1: I'm going to have to rectify that. No, I don't
Speaker 1: think I have any pictures of anybody.
Speaker 2: Huh. That's surprising to me.
Speaker 1: Maybe Dyson scoring on the Music City Miracle. Ye don't
Speaker 1: have to look around my house. Maybe I should go.
Speaker 2: There, just go home and just survey see what you got. No,
Speaker 2: I mean, and his house was does.
Speaker 1: He have like a a man cave?
Speaker 3: So No, he has kind of an like a wreck
Speaker 3: room area where they had some different things, and it
Speaker 3: was one of those like rooms we thought we'd use
Speaker 3: more than we do. Like everyone has in their home,
Speaker 3: like the aspirational entertainer room that you really never used
Speaker 3: and just put stuff in.
Speaker 2: That's kind of what they have.
Speaker 1: They're just like real people.
Speaker 3: They are one hundred percent regular, normal people. And that's
Speaker 3: what I walked away from this whole experience with. I mean,
Speaker 3: there's a million stories I could tell, but what really
Speaker 3: struck me is you are like I felt very comfortable there.
Speaker 3: I felt very like these people could be friends of mine.
Speaker 3: We have a lot in common.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you could go to church with them. You could do.
Speaker 1: They could be friends of yours from your kid's school.
Speaker 2: That that's yeah, I mean very much. We're talking about
Speaker 2: like kids clothes.
Speaker 3: That he left in the middle of the interview because
Speaker 3: he had to go take his son to get a haircut.
Speaker 2: He was gone for about forty five minutes.
Speaker 1: So is that before after the interview.
Speaker 2: Before the interview he left. He welcomed us into his home.
Speaker 3: We were there for a while and then he looks
Speaker 3: as watch and goes, I gotta take Ronan to get
Speaker 3: his haircut. That's his son, Ronan, and who stole the
Speaker 3: show at the press Cotton.
Speaker 1: Ronan is going to be a fan favorite.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's going to be a mainstay around Ascension Saint
Speaker 3: Thomas Sports Park, I believe, and Nora as well, their daughter, Yes,
Speaker 3: but both, I mean just the most delightful children. And
Speaker 3: but yeah, Ronan needed to get a hair his haircut.
Speaker 3: So headball coach leaves about forty five to an hour.
Speaker 1: So you sit down to do the interview. Yes, which
Speaker 1: we're going to hear. This is the back cell. You
Speaker 1: gotta love this. I'm setting it up. Are you nervous?
Speaker 3: You know I was not, because I felt incredibly comfortable
Speaker 3: in that space.
Speaker 1: Did you write down the questions?
Speaker 2: I did.
Speaker 3: I had about four pages of questions, so we had
Speaker 3: to I had to rein in my excitement a little bit.
Speaker 3: I have my questions, you know, for a standard interview,
Speaker 3: I've got my notebook, I'm ready to go. But it
Speaker 3: we have been talking this whole time and having conversation,
Speaker 3: so it didn't feel weird to be doing an interview,
Speaker 3: and honestly, I was thankful for it, because you know,
Speaker 3: there's those questions that you want to ask somebody, but
Speaker 3: you want to be polite, and well, surely they don't
Speaker 3: want to talk about football, so I'm not going to
Speaker 3: ask him, you know, about putting together a staff or
Speaker 3: this and that. But for an interview, I'm able to
Speaker 3: ask those questions. So it was it was things that
Speaker 3: in polite conversation I probably wouldn't have asked. But because
Speaker 3: I was doing an interview for a football team and
Speaker 3: this is what's top of his mind, I got to
Speaker 3: ask those questions that I think people want to know.
Speaker 3: But if you and I just meet at a party,
Speaker 3: I'm not going to ask you too many questions about
Speaker 3: your job, because that's not what we're what we're doing,
Speaker 3: you know.
Speaker 2: So I was thankful to have.
Speaker 3: The opportunity to do the interview because I got to
Speaker 3: ask him the things that were on my mind. And
Speaker 3: it's like, oh, I'm sorry, I have to chos for
Speaker 3: my job, which I was great. I always do, and
Speaker 3: he was just it was a great interview. He is.
Speaker 3: He's just very well spoken. He's very thoughtful with the
Speaker 3: things that he is trying to get across. You can
Speaker 3: tell that this is something he's been thinking about for
Speaker 3: a long time. He's one of those people that you know,
Speaker 3: as he's been doing his job, he's been observing and
Speaker 3: thinking about how he do it when he got his chance,
Speaker 3: and now that he has his chance, this is something
Speaker 3: he takes very seriously and is very excited about and
Speaker 3: is really really ready for.
Speaker 1: All right, we're ready for the interview, but first we
Speaker 1: have to make sure and give everyone a chance to
Speaker 1: get Duncan. Go to Duncan and grab a coffee and
Speaker 1: kick off the action. Whether that's drinking a cup of
Speaker 1: coffee on your way to the game or grabbing one
Speaker 1: to go before watching Amy's interview with Brian Callahan. Duncan
Speaker 1: is always there to help you get your game on.
Speaker 1: Just like the pros. We need to be at our
Speaker 1: best come game time or interview time, which is why
Speaker 1: Duncan is the most important part of your game day
Speaker 1: ritual because it's always the best call for football America
Speaker 1: runs on Duncan. So from the OTP amy Wells, Cincinnati, Ohio,
Speaker 1: at the home of New Titans coach Brian Callahan enjoyed this.
Speaker 4: So, I guess the.
Speaker 3: Best place to start is telling you or reminding you.
Speaker 3: I should say that you were the head coach of
Speaker 3: an NFL football team.
Speaker 5: That doesn't feel real yet, right, It doesn't.
Speaker 4: That's the question.
Speaker 3: Has this sunk in that the last twenty four ish
Speaker 3: hours have actually happened and you are now stepping.
Speaker 4: Into this role.
Speaker 5: No, I haven't been able to process at all.
Speaker 6: It's been such a you know, because I went in,
Speaker 6: I interviewed, and then I get the job, and I
Speaker 6: go to dinner, and I wake up. The next morning,
Speaker 6: I leave and I come home and then there's just
Speaker 6: like this forty eight hour period. I got to get
Speaker 6: a bunch of stuff ready to really get to work.
Speaker 6: When I get back and do the press conference, and
Speaker 6: you're starting the staff hiring process. It's it's like infancy stages,
Speaker 6: but it's starting, and so it's just a it's a
Speaker 6: whirlwind of things that I probably won't ever fully process
Speaker 6: it until I'm in front of the team that first
Speaker 6: time or the first OTA practice where you're it's like
Speaker 6: you're out there and you're on the grass coaching football.
Speaker 6: The rest of it up until that point feels very
Speaker 6: much like office work until you get to go coach
Speaker 6: football again. So yeah, I have not been able to
Speaker 6: really process all of it in the factory in my
Speaker 6: living room with a camera talking about it.
Speaker 5: This feels even stranger.
Speaker 3: It definitely is, I'm sure, a whirlwind, and there's not
Speaker 3: a moment to catch your breath and really think about
Speaker 3: it until.
Speaker 4: You're reflecting on it.
Speaker 3: So in the spirit of reflecting, because you don't have
Speaker 3: time to reflect on this, let's reflect.
Speaker 4: On your entire career.
Speaker 5: Sure I can do that.
Speaker 3: You have really started your career from in coaching, I
Speaker 3: should say, from high school coaching high school players.
Speaker 4: You've gone all the way up.
Speaker 3: You've seen every facet of this game, and now you're
Speaker 3: finally here where you want it to be as a
Speaker 3: head coach. At what point in your career. Did you
Speaker 3: think I could go all the way with this, I
Speaker 3: could be an NFL.
Speaker 5: You know, I had a good example. My dad was one.
Speaker 6: So just like anything you see that, it's possible, and
Speaker 6: I was able to envision that for myself. At some point,
Speaker 6: I didn't probably really want to go down that path
Speaker 6: until after I was a graduate assistant at UCLA. At
Speaker 6: I wasn't sure which direction I wanted to head. I
Speaker 6: wanted to be in athletics. I enjoyed being around football,
Speaker 6: and I didn't know which what that was going to
Speaker 6: look like for me. And so eventually I went to
Speaker 6: go do the high school that I coached high school
Speaker 6: for two years, and that part really was enjoyable and
Speaker 6: it made me want to continue to do that. And
Speaker 6: then I just the opportunity came to get in the
Speaker 6: NFL two years after I started, and I was like, oh,
Speaker 6: I'll see where this takes me. But I was uncertain
Speaker 6: of what that was going to look like when I
Speaker 6: was first starting out. Then once I got in the NFL,
Speaker 6: I felt like, you know, I could do this. I
Speaker 6: could end up in this seat that I'm.
Speaker 5: In right now.
Speaker 3: Coaching is not the most glamorous of jobs. Once you
Speaker 3: get to the head roll, it looks very glamorous. But
Speaker 3: football families, especially you mentioned that your dad was a coach,
Speaker 3: still is football families sometimes do not romanticize the the
Speaker 3: sport as much because.
Speaker 4: It's taxing on the whole family.
Speaker 3: Yes, I did that influence your career choice at all
Speaker 3: that you've seen how this really works.
Speaker 6: I just knew what I was entering into and when
Speaker 6: I when I first told my mom that I wanted
Speaker 6: to coach football after I was finished playing. I was
Speaker 6: gonna be a graduate assistant. And that went two years
Speaker 6: and I said, you know, I think I want to
Speaker 6: do this for real, and she wasn't very happy with me.
Speaker 6: She's like, you got you have two groups from UCLA,
Speaker 6: you can go do whatever you want. Why would you
Speaker 6: do this? And I don't know. I just love doing it.
Speaker 6: But her point was, there's so many other things you
Speaker 6: could do. Why would you choose to enter this volatile
Speaker 6: of a profession. And I just loved being around football
Speaker 6: and being around players in that part is what That's
Speaker 6: what I enjoy about it. The rest of it is
Speaker 6: the work part. You know, all the time and effort.
Speaker 6: It's a ton of work. There's really no shortcuts, and
Speaker 6: if you don't do that part, you're gonna have a
Speaker 6: hard time being successful. And so there's a lot of
Speaker 6: sacrifice that gets made. But ultimately it's you know, I
Speaker 6: have a great wife and great family that that helps
Speaker 6: the process move smoothly. But I wouldn't say that there's
Speaker 6: a lot of glamour involved in it. For the most part.
Speaker 6: It's a lot of hard work and a lot of sacrifice,
Speaker 6: just like any jobs where you're trying to do something
Speaker 6: really cool and do something collectively that we're trying to
Speaker 6: do with the Titans, and there's no other way I
Speaker 6: know how to do it. But it is not the
Speaker 6: easiest and it is not glamorous. I can promise.
Speaker 3: You've had the opportunity to work in a lot of
Speaker 3: different places with a lot of different people. Have you
Speaker 3: given any thought to what your head coaching style is
Speaker 3: going to be, Like what pieces and bits you're going
Speaker 3: to grab from each place and kind of put together
Speaker 3: there to create what will be the coach Callahan way.
Speaker 6: I think that's where I am now. I feel like
Speaker 6: I've been very prepared for this moment. There's a lot
Speaker 6: of people that have that invested a lot in me
Speaker 6: over over the years, and because of that, I've probably
Speaker 6: taken bits and pieces of them throughout without even really
Speaker 6: thinking about it, just things that I've liked. But I
Speaker 6: think what you see now is what you're going to get.
Speaker 6: I'm not going to really try to be anybody else
Speaker 6: but but me and I feel really confident in that
Speaker 6: I feel good about where I am and who I am,
Speaker 6: and so that part feels really easy for me. And
Speaker 6: I'm pretty genuine and pretty authentic and that that's not
Speaker 6: going to change. You're gonna You're gonna get that every
Speaker 6: day for me here. So I don't know that there's
Speaker 6: any other you know, the influences are are probably more
Speaker 6: in the work as opposed to the personality, and I
Speaker 6: think I'm I'm gonna be be be me. It's the
Speaker 6: best I can explain it.
Speaker 3: Having worked your way up through the NFL, you haven't
Speaker 3: taken any shortcuts, you haven't done anything the easy way
Speaker 3: to quote unquote easily.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Do you think that makes you uniquely qualified for a
Speaker 3: role like this?
Speaker 6: I feel qualified for it because of that. I don't
Speaker 6: know if anybody else feels that way or not, but
Speaker 6: I do think there is something to be said for
Speaker 6: for taking those steps in the journey, and the journey
Speaker 6: is certainly not over yet for me. But doing those
Speaker 6: things in the matter, in the in the sequence that
Speaker 6: they've happened for me, I think is prepared me to
Speaker 6: be here. I feel like I've earned my way here,
Speaker 6: and I'm proud of the work I've done in all
Speaker 6: the places I've been. But there's no point where I've
Speaker 6: ever felt like it was easy, but it but it
Speaker 6: matters to me, and I'm proud of that. And I
Speaker 6: think I'm here today because of that journey I've had
Speaker 6: thus far.
Speaker 4: What do you learn from being a high school football coach?
Speaker 6: Yeah, there's a lot you learn from me in a high
Speaker 6: schoo football coach. In particular, I was I was the
Speaker 6: freshman offensive coordinator, so I get I call Patrick Wallah's
Speaker 6: the head coach at Sarta High School and he's one
Speaker 6: of my mentors. He coached me at Delasyle High School
Speaker 6: when I was in high school. And he'll be at
Speaker 6: the press conference too, by the way, which'll be cool.
Speaker 6: He said, I got a job for you, and I said,
Speaker 6: I need a teaching job. I can't just coach football.
Speaker 6: I need to work at the school. I have my
Speaker 6: master's in education, like it fits, this will be great.
Speaker 6: So I get a job at the school and he says, well,
Speaker 6: only job I have for your coaching is the freshman
Speaker 6: offensive coordinator. And after playing Division one football and being
Speaker 6: a graduate assistant, that was a little bit of a
Speaker 6: humbling offer. That was the only offer I had, was
Speaker 6: to go be the freshman football coach. And when you
Speaker 6: get a bunch of fourteen year olds that probably have
Speaker 6: never put shoulder pads on, don't know how to buckle
Speaker 6: their helmet, it really makes you refine how you teach
Speaker 6: and how you communicate with your kids, how clearly you tell.
Speaker 5: Them what to do.
Speaker 6: And so it really changed the whole foundation of what
Speaker 6: coaching is for me, and it really brought it back
Speaker 6: to it's about teaching, it's how you teach, and that
Speaker 6: hasn't changed in fourteen years in the NFL and at
Speaker 6: all the stops I've been, the best coaches I've been
Speaker 6: around are great teachers. And that was probably the most
Speaker 6: foundational and influential part of my early journey was coaching
Speaker 6: a bunch of fourteen year olds and trying to get
Speaker 6: him to getting a three point stance and know how
Speaker 6: to get an athletics stance in general and how to
Speaker 6: communicate that. And so that part was a really invaluable
Speaker 6: experience for me as a really young coach, like I
Speaker 6: don't know everything, and I better figure out how to
Speaker 6: talk to these guys or they're not.
Speaker 5: Going to have anything either. And so it was a
Speaker 5: huge part of my journey.
Speaker 3: It has to be if you can get a fourteen
Speaker 3: year old to run a play, you can probably communicate
Speaker 3: with a professional athlete.
Speaker 4: How to maybe do it at a higher level.
Speaker 6: Yeah, And that's always going to be the key to
Speaker 6: all of it is how well do you communicate individually?
Speaker 6: How old do you communicate as a leader of a unit,
Speaker 6: and how old do I communicate as the head coach
Speaker 6: with everybody in the building, everybody on the team. When
Speaker 6: you refine those communications styles and techniques with your teaching
Speaker 6: as well, and so when you when you communicate well,
Speaker 6: you're a good teacher. I think everybody would would think
Speaker 6: back to whatever teacher they had that they that made
Speaker 6: an impact on him, and it's because they were probably
Speaker 6: great communicators at what they were looking for. And so
Speaker 6: I pride myself on that, and it's you know, you
Speaker 6: can again get you can get a fourteen year old
Speaker 6: to do it. You certainly could get a professional athlete
Speaker 6: that's paid a lot of money to do that job.
Speaker 3: As a coach, you obviously you've been quarterbacks coach, You've
Speaker 3: been an offensive coordinator, and you've had the opportunity to
Speaker 3: work with some pretty incredible quarterback But kind of across
Speaker 3: the spectrum, you've been in some different situations working with
Speaker 3: someone like Peyton Manning. So by the time you get
Speaker 3: to him, he's pretty much got his routine set. Yes,
Speaker 3: Peyton Manning knows what he wants to do by the
Speaker 3: time he comes to the Denver Broncos.
Speaker 4: What did you learn from working with.
Speaker 6: A player like that, Well, that was a unique situation
Speaker 6: because he was coming from a place he had been
Speaker 6: for fifteen years in Indianapolis. He had run a variation
Speaker 6: of the same offense for most of that time, so
Speaker 6: he was in transition. He was learning some of the
Speaker 6: things that we did in Denver, and we were trying
Speaker 6: to learn some things that he did. We're trying to
Speaker 6: meld the system of offense to one that was what
Speaker 6: we did and what he did, and to make it
Speaker 6: our system in Denver and that was unique because he
Speaker 6: had never had to do that before. Everything was always
Speaker 6: how he had done it, and so we worked really
Speaker 6: hard to meld the systems. But when you talking about
Speaker 6: learning from a guy like Peyton, outside of helping a transition,
Speaker 6: was the preparation part, how intense it was. It was
Speaker 6: more me learning what a Hall of Fame quarterback looks like,
Speaker 6: what their process looks like, what their preparation on a
Speaker 6: weekly basis is supposed to be. And it was like
Speaker 6: a PhD in quarterback play. And that part was the
Speaker 6: most probably most foundational piece of what I've done since then,
Speaker 6: is all those things I learned with Peyton in those
Speaker 6: four years in Denver, and it was it was a
Speaker 6: lot of fun every day to go to work. It
Speaker 6: was hard and he demanded a lot, but it made
Speaker 6: me a really good coach and I learned a whole
Speaker 6: lot about how what it looks like to play NFL
Speaker 6: quarterback at a high level. And I think I hopefully
Speaker 6: use those things to help a lot of guys along
Speaker 6: the way.
Speaker 4: I want to fast forward a little bit.
Speaker 3: You've worked with a lot of great quarterbacks, but Joe
Speaker 3: Burrow was a name that everyone knows, right now and
Speaker 3: a very different situation to where he's a young guy
Speaker 3: who's trying to learn how to exist in what is
Speaker 3: the National Football League? Do you have to resist taking
Speaker 3: some of that and overwhelming him?
Speaker 4: Do you almost have to back off a little bit?
Speaker 3: How do you manage that because it's such a different
Speaker 3: situation completely on the opposite side.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's a.
Speaker 6: That's a that's a great question because you know, you
Speaker 6: have a guy in Peyton that knows what he wants,
Speaker 6: how he wants it, and there's not there's only a
Speaker 6: there's nobody that's Peyton.
Speaker 5: You know, there's Tom Brady and Peyton Manny and Drew.
Speaker 6: But like those guys exist in their own stratisy year
Speaker 6: player and they're all different, but they're not replicable. You
Speaker 6: can't replicate Peyton Manning. I didn't go to Detroit and
Speaker 6: try to get Matthew Stafford in his ninth year to
Speaker 6: be Peyton Manning.
Speaker 5: He's Matthew Stafford. He does things his way.
Speaker 6: And I learned that quickly as you deal with different players,
Speaker 6: that they're all going to be who they are, and
Speaker 6: you try to impart some lessons and some things that
Speaker 6: might have worked for somebody in it. You know, we'll
Speaker 6: work for Peyton and always work for Matthew, and will
Speaker 6: work for Matthew and always work for Derek Carr. And
Speaker 6: that's how you learn how to cater to the player
Speaker 6: that's there, and you find their strengths and try to
Speaker 6: highlight those. Joe is probably the closest you know in
Speaker 6: terms of just personality ability to do the things that
Speaker 6: Peyton did. But he is also was a twenty one
Speaker 6: year old, twenty three year twenty two, twenty three year
Speaker 6: old rookie quarterback that had never played an football before.
Speaker 6: As great as he was as a college player, he
Speaker 6: had never been in that arena yet, and it was
Speaker 6: really fun to be a part of his development and
Speaker 6: from you know, first overall pick, Heisman Trophy winner, a
Speaker 6: great player, still hadn't played it down in the NFL,
Speaker 6: and to be a part of his growth from that
Speaker 6: spot as a rookie starting quarterback on a bad football
Speaker 6: team into starting in the Super Bowl and back to
Speaker 6: back AFC Championship games and being the highest paid player
Speaker 6: in football was an unbelievable progression to be a part of.
Speaker 6: And there was a lot that was so much different
Speaker 6: than these veteran quarterbacks because there was a lot he
Speaker 6: was learning, and he was trying to figure out what
Speaker 6: worked for him and what didn't work for him, and
Speaker 6: so that process to refine what he wanted to be
Speaker 6: and what he wanted to look like playing quarterback was
Speaker 6: really fun to be a part of.
Speaker 3: Having that experience of working with so many different people
Speaker 3: in so many different organizations must give you a sense
Speaker 3: of maybe ease or calm walking into being responsible for
Speaker 3: an entire locker room of different personalities and different abilities
Speaker 3: and different strengths and weaknesses.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 6: Absolutely, there's something to be said for working for a
Speaker 6: lot of different people, being a lot of different ways
Speaker 6: of doing things. There's no cookie cutter way that equal
Speaker 6: success in the NFL, there's a lot of ways you
Speaker 6: can win football games, and being a part of a
Speaker 6: lot of different places it just shows you all the
Speaker 6: ways that it can happen. And for me, I've taken
Speaker 6: bits and pieces and dealing with different types of players
Speaker 6: and different places in their career. I feel about as
Speaker 6: comfortable as you could feel dealing with with any player
Speaker 6: in the locker room at any point, any stage in
Speaker 6: their career where they're at from an undrafted rookie college
Speaker 6: free agent to you know, a ten time Pro Bowl
Speaker 6: player that is the face of a franchise. I've seen
Speaker 6: all of it in between. And I think one of
Speaker 6: my strengths as a coach is I've always been able
Speaker 6: to connect with players and regardless of where they're at
Speaker 6: in their journey or in their path, I've I've been
Speaker 6: able to connect and form great relationships and be able
Speaker 6: to really coach effectively because of it. So there's a
Speaker 6: lot of benefit to being a lot of places and
Speaker 6: having experience. Even though I'm you know, I'm thirty nine,
Speaker 6: I've lived a long time in the NFL and I've
Speaker 6: seen a lot, so it's like dog years, you know,
Speaker 6: it's fourteen years in the NFL feels like thirty.
Speaker 5: So I feel very prepared for it.
Speaker 4: Great teams have great cultures.
Speaker 3: Yes, for you, what does a winning culture look like?
Speaker 4: What is that?
Speaker 5: It's a great question to me. The culture.
Speaker 6: The schematics is probably only about twenty or thirty percent
Speaker 6: of what makes a good team, and the culture is
Speaker 6: the rest of it. And you want to guys that
Speaker 6: are mentally tough. You want people that want to come
Speaker 6: to work every day, they want to be around the team.
Speaker 6: They want to be around the building. They want to
Speaker 6: play for each other. And one of the greatest things,
Speaker 6: the most difficult things about when you look at good
Speaker 6: teams across all sports, is a bunch of guys that
Speaker 6: want to be a part of something bigger than themselves.
Speaker 6: They want to be a part of that team and
Speaker 6: play their role. And the best teams that I've been
Speaker 6: on have all shared that quality. The best teams that
Speaker 6: you look every year, these teams that are still playing,
Speaker 6: they share that quality. And when you get into these
Speaker 6: moments where the talent is equal, because you get to
Speaker 6: that point where everyone's good, that's the difference is how
Speaker 6: hard these guys play for each other, how much they
Speaker 6: love playing football and being in the building together. And
Speaker 6: you want that sort of culture in your building where
Speaker 6: it's fun, it's enjoyable.
Speaker 5: Guys love it.
Speaker 6: They play hard, they play for each other, they play
Speaker 6: for the city. It means something to them. That's what
Speaker 6: That's what we hope to hope to be here in Nashville.
Speaker 3: What's the best piece of advice you've ever sived? It
Speaker 3: can be coaching or otherwise.
Speaker 6: Oh man, there's a lot in coaching, a very more
Speaker 6: specific to coaching advices. You know, turn, I think the
Speaker 6: best way to phrase it, but worry about the job
Speaker 6: that you have and do the best, be the best
Speaker 6: you can be, whatever your role is. My dad gave
Speaker 6: me that advice early in my career because in football,
Speaker 6: you know, you become ambitious. You want to be a coordinator,
Speaker 6: a head coach, so you're trying to find ways how
Speaker 6: do I get there? Uh, And my dad said early
Speaker 6: on in my career, just just worry about the job
Speaker 6: that you have and be great at it. Uh, and
Speaker 6: the rest of those things take care of themselves. And
Speaker 6: so I've always tried to live that way. Is when
Speaker 6: I was a quality control coach in Denver, I was
Speaker 6: trying to be the best at that, And when I
Speaker 6: was an office coordinator here in Cincinnati, I try to
Speaker 6: be the best at that and not worry about everything
Speaker 6: else that comes after that. And uh, that's really helped me,
Speaker 6: I think, be really good at my job and stay
Speaker 6: really focused on what's in the moment and what's important
Speaker 6: as opposed to thinking about what's what could be or
Speaker 6: what should be or where I should be after that.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, when you were offered the job as a coach
Speaker 3: of the Titans.
Speaker 4: Who was your first phone call? Who'd you call?
Speaker 1: Oh? My wife?
Speaker 5: Absolutely, yeah, he was by father first. That was the
Speaker 5: first one. She was not expecting it, nor was I.
Speaker 6: I wasn't expecting it either, but that was that was
Speaker 6: a really cool moment to be able to share because
Speaker 6: she's been through all of this and the moves and
Speaker 6: the back and forth and new job here, new job here,
Speaker 6: that part. You know, I'm gone a lot, I work
Speaker 6: a lot, She's got the kids all the time, and
Speaker 6: so for her to be able to share some of
Speaker 6: that joy was was a pretty awesome moment. And then
Speaker 6: obviously right after that, I called my parents and those
Speaker 6: are my first two phone calls when I after I
Speaker 6: got the job. Is the most important people to me
Speaker 6: are my my family and my mom and dad.
Speaker 4: So what was your dad's response.
Speaker 5: He's proud, he's proud, he's excited.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 6: It's I was talking in the car. I don't know
Speaker 6: how many fathers and sons I've been head coaches in
Speaker 6: the NFL. I know, it's not a long list. And
Speaker 6: so that's a that's very that's a very prideful thing
Speaker 6: for for him and I to be a part of
Speaker 6: and yeah, he was ecstatic. He was just you know,
Speaker 6: it's one of those things as a dad, as I
Speaker 6: have my own son, it's like to see your.
Speaker 5: To see your your kids have success and whatever they
Speaker 5: want to do.
Speaker 6: Uh, And I chose to do coaching, and I think
Speaker 6: there's something about that that he has a lot of
Speaker 6: pride in and really cool moment to see me be
Speaker 6: the head coach of the Tennessee Titans.
Speaker 4: You mentioned that you have kids you too.
Speaker 3: What's it like being able to share this with them
Speaker 3: and being able to bring them along for what is
Speaker 3: bound to be a crazy ride.
Speaker 6: Yeah, you know, they they don't quite get it. They
Speaker 6: don't really. I don't think they understand like the gravity
Speaker 6: of you know, my dad's a head coach and there's
Speaker 6: only one of He's one of thirty two in the
Speaker 6: world that's that's in these positions, and so they don't
Speaker 6: get that part. They just think it's cool that they
Speaker 6: see dad on TV. Sometimes when I'm when I'm up
Speaker 6: in the box, they get to see that. They try
Speaker 6: to see me on TV and they get their friends
Speaker 6: talk about it at school, But they don't really, they
Speaker 6: don't understand the weight of what this is and how
Speaker 6: much this means, and how much of a career pinnacle
Speaker 6: this is for me. Someday they will, but right now
Speaker 6: they don't quite understand, and they enjoy it. There's a
Speaker 6: lot of commotion to it, but they're not quite old
Speaker 6: enough to really understand the whole process yet.
Speaker 3: But it's got to be cool to be able to
Speaker 3: bring them to games and have.
Speaker 4: To maybe get a little bit more involved in the game.
Speaker 4: Is a football fan.
Speaker 6: He's getting there. He's at six. He's starting to kind
Speaker 6: of be more interested. And I've always felt like that
Speaker 6: peak set around like nine or ten or eleven, where
Speaker 6: like boys are just dialed into sports and they know
Speaker 6: all the players, and so he's starting to learn players.
Speaker 6: This year he kind of got to. He would start
Speaker 6: asking about Joe Burrow and Jamar Chase and the guys
Speaker 6: that he'd watched on TV, and they talk about at school.
Speaker 6: And he likes being around and I like having real
Speaker 6: They love coming to the office, they love being on
Speaker 6: the practice fields, and they love coming to training camp.
Speaker 6: And so I want him around as much as possible.
Speaker 6: That's how I grew up and to have them be
Speaker 6: a part of that is really cool because That's how
Speaker 6: I spend my time of them too.
Speaker 4: Other than Super Bowls. How do you measure your success
Speaker 4: as a head coach?
Speaker 6: Oh, you know, I think you know, we're always going
Speaker 6: to be judged on on wins and losses ultimately, But
Speaker 6: do we have a team of people of guys like
Speaker 6: I said that, that want to play for each other,
Speaker 6: that when we go out on Sundays, you know that
Speaker 6: they put a product in the field that people are
Speaker 6: proud of, that they're excited to watch, that the city
Speaker 6: in Nashville can rally around and really have a lot
Speaker 6: of pride in what's occurring. Usually that means you're playing
Speaker 6: well enough to win games, but sometimes you.
Speaker 5: Still play well and lose.
Speaker 6: But I do think if you have a team of
Speaker 6: high character guys that really love playing football that the
Speaker 6: city identifies with, that to me is a success. On
Speaker 6: a more personal level, it's forming great relationships with the players,
Speaker 6: you know, making sure those guys are are developing as
Speaker 6: a whole person. They're still really young. Most of those
Speaker 6: guys are are, you know, in their early twenties, and
Speaker 6: so to be there for them to form those relationships
Speaker 6: where I can help them grow and develop. It as
Speaker 6: people is another part of it too, So I do
Speaker 6: wish we were judged on more of those things, but
Speaker 6: we're not.
Speaker 5: But I think that's the mark of a of a
Speaker 5: good coach and a.
Speaker 6: Good team is a is a bunch of guys that
Speaker 6: that have great character, that love playing together, and there's
Speaker 6: a there's a product in the field that the city
Speaker 6: and state can be proud of.
Speaker 4: What are your interests outside of football? You don't time?
Speaker 6: No, No, I don't and and outside of the free
Speaker 6: times usually spend with my kids and my wife.
Speaker 5: But I like to play golf a little bit.
Speaker 6: That's That's about my my relaxation hobby. I've played ice
Speaker 6: hockey my whole life, so I love watching ice hockey games. Uh,
Speaker 6: I'm excited to go see the Predators play, but I've
Speaker 6: I've always been in the ice hockey is like my
Speaker 6: second love and so I grew up playing it. I've
Speaker 6: I've played all the way through college and I love
Speaker 6: watching it. So that's that's kind of my other thing
Speaker 6: I like to to to go watch and do. I
Speaker 6: watch a lot of F one racing. I don't know
Speaker 6: a lot about it, but I enjoy it. Other than that, though,
Speaker 6: it's it's really you're gonna find me in the office
Speaker 6: at the complex, with with the with the people in
Speaker 6: the building, or I'm gonna probably be at home with
Speaker 6: my kids and out doing stuff with them.
Speaker 4: You excited to come to Nashville.
Speaker 5: I can't I can't wait. I can't wait.
Speaker 6: It's uh, it's got a it's got a great it's
Speaker 6: got a great energy to it. And you could feel
Speaker 6: the energy when you walk there. I felt the energy
Speaker 6: getting into the city. I felt the energy in the building.
Speaker 6: And I feel that there's there's just something about Nashville
Speaker 6: that appealed to me.
Speaker 5: It felt like it fit me.
Speaker 6: And and what a what an unbelievable, unbelievable city to
Speaker 6: be a part of. And and hopefully we can win
Speaker 6: a lot of games and have a lot of fun
Speaker 6: doing it.
Speaker 4: You ready to get started?
Speaker 6: I was ready. I'm ready, Trust me, I've been. I've
Speaker 6: been on the phone a bunch, and I'm ready to
Speaker 6: get get get settled, get started, and and and hit
Speaker 6: the ground running here and build us a build us
Speaker 6: a really good football team. And I can't wait to
Speaker 6: get You know, RAN's been great. I love working with
Speaker 6: Ryan and to build that together is going to be
Speaker 6: something really really cool.
Speaker 5: It's I can't wait to get started.
Speaker 1: Well, that was something. Also gives me a chance to
Speaker 1: mention that seat geek is now the official ticketing partner
Speaker 1: of the Tennessee Titans. Whether you're buying or selling tickets
Speaker 1: to Titans games or any live event in Nashville, seat
Speaker 1: geek is the place to do it. Seat Geek the
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Speaker 1: fans can fan. It was really good.
Speaker 2: You took my line.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, but I was thinking about I was. I
Speaker 1: wanted to make sure I complimented you. Thanks, Mike, and
Speaker 1: you clearly weren't nervous. I was nervous. When I interviewed
Speaker 1: him the next day.
Speaker 2: Were you Oh, yeah, you didn't seem nervous.
Speaker 1: I was nervous.
Speaker 2: You're a professional.
Speaker 1: No, I didn't have anything. Usually I have the you know,
Speaker 1: the handy dandy clipboard with my questions or at least
Speaker 1: just some topics or whatever. But I decided to go
Speaker 1: into it because he had just done the press conference,
Speaker 1: and I sat down with him and I just said,
Speaker 1: I want to see where it goes.
Speaker 3: You know, And I told Ashley Ferrell this. I was
Speaker 3: very thankful that I was the very first person who
Speaker 3: was doing an interview with him after he had got
Speaker 3: this job, because there was no question that he had
Speaker 3: been asked thirty times, right, Yeah, I mean now there's
Speaker 3: six or seven questions that he has been asked three hundred.
Speaker 1: Different ways which people should do. That's their job.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that's how it goes, and that's what happens
Speaker 3: with everyone. But in preparing for this interview, I didn't
Speaker 3: have to be like, well, I want to stay away
Speaker 3: from this because he's talked about it a lot.
Speaker 2: I got to just is the.
Speaker 1: That the pad that you're holding right here on the set?
Speaker 1: Is that? Are those the questions?
Speaker 2: This is it? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I have what what do you think? Your people have
Speaker 1: just heard it? But what do you think your best
Speaker 1: question was? What were the question? What was the question
Speaker 1: you liked the best?
Speaker 2: Well, there were a couple that he said, that's a
Speaker 2: great question.
Speaker 1: Don't you love it when people say I love it?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 3: Man, There's no better feeling in the world than when
Speaker 3: someone says that's a great question, unless they're being a
Speaker 3: jerk about it, which sometimes I just yeah, but I
Speaker 3: think he was being I think it was like a
Speaker 3: genuine like he was like, oh, that's a that's a
Speaker 3: great question. Let me think about it. And so like
Speaker 3: those were my favorite ones because then you're like, yes,
Speaker 3: hit it, you get a little like it endorphins, you
Speaker 3: get a little something good.
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So those are my favorite questions. But I mean
Speaker 3: just being able to talk to him about kind of
Speaker 3: his journey and the people that he's worked with. He
Speaker 3: loves to talk about the quarterbacks that he has worked with.
Speaker 1: It's remarkable.
Speaker 3: And when you talk to him about just guys that
Speaker 3: he has formed relationships with and guys that he's worked with,
Speaker 3: the Peyton Mannings and Matthew Stafford's, i mean, Joe Burrow,
Speaker 3: all of them, he gets so like excited. Yeah, it's
Speaker 3: like bragging on his kids. You know, He's just excited
Speaker 3: to talk about it. And I thought that that was
Speaker 3: so interesting because sometimes people get annoyed by the like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 3: they're gonna ask me about the time I worked with
Speaker 3: Peyton Manning, But he genuinely is excited to talk about
Speaker 3: those things.
Speaker 1: And Peyton Manning was excited to talk about.
Speaker 2: Him, which is also so cool.
Speaker 1: Mm hmm, yeah, called from the golf course.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, to give us quotes, which I.
Speaker 1: Mean had an eight iron in his hand.
Speaker 2: Well, of course, but.
Speaker 1: He really did. That's what he said on the phone.
Speaker 3: I mean, what does that say about Brian Callahan that
Speaker 3: Peyton Manning would stop golfing to.
Speaker 2: Call and give quotes.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's pretty great.
Speaker 3: I mean you want to talk about a resounding recommendation
Speaker 3: right there.
Speaker 1: I have a feeling Peyton Manning is going to be
Speaker 1: here a few times. Oh yeah, well yeah, because Brian
Speaker 1: Callahan's the head coach now, So you don't think he
Speaker 1: shows up at training camp or something.
Speaker 2: Well, I don't know. You talked to him more than I.
Speaker 1: I don't talk to him, But I'm just saying, I
Speaker 1: bet he. I bet he does.
Speaker 2: I think you're probably right.
Speaker 1: So tell the OT people what the flight. So you
Speaker 1: drop off the rental car. Yes, it was a one
Speaker 1: way rental car. It was a van, right, it sure was.
Speaker 2: We took the mini van from Nashville to Cincinnati. It
Speaker 2: was just.
Speaker 3: Luxury all the way, the old mini van. And then
Speaker 3: we drop it off at the rental place. This is
Speaker 3: on Thursday morning. Drop it off at the rental car place.
Speaker 3: Plane trains and automobiles to get from the rental car
Speaker 3: place to where we needed to be at the airport,
Speaker 3: and you're.
Speaker 1: Getting to fly at the owner's plane.
Speaker 3: We flew in the owner's plane, which is pretty delightful.
Speaker 3: Accommodations do you.
Speaker 1: Get like juice?
Speaker 2: Well, there was coffee, coffee, Yeah, I mean Danish.
Speaker 3: There was no Danish snacks. There were lots of snacks,
Speaker 3: which the kids really enjoyed. At that point, all I
Speaker 3: needed was caffeine. Okay, that's that's really what we were
Speaker 3: looking for. But I mean flying on the owner's plane
Speaker 3: does not suck. It's pretty great.
Speaker 1: And what's the conversation? Like, I mean, I don't want
Speaker 1: you to tell every story because you don't want to
Speaker 1: give it all away. But what's it? What's it like
Speaker 1: talking to the to the head coach and his wife
Speaker 1: is I mean he's going to become the head coach
Speaker 1: and you and Ashley and Todd and Donald are there
Speaker 1: with it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there was a little bit of the so how
Speaker 3: much sleep did you get? Not a ton conversation? You know.
Speaker 3: He spent a little time kind of working on the
Speaker 3: remarks that he was going to make at the press conference.
Speaker 3: Definitely took some time to like just kind of take
Speaker 3: it all in, especially when we were driving from once
Speaker 3: we landed in Nashville, when we were driving to the stadium,
Speaker 3: or when we were driving to Ascension Saint Thomas Sports Park,
Speaker 3: we drove past the stadium and so that was kind
Speaker 3: of a moment. And there were just little moments where
Speaker 3: like he realized that this was really happening. But then
Speaker 3: you're also having convers stations about so, what neighborhoods should
Speaker 3: we look for a house in, where's the schools, what's traffic,
Speaker 3: like any good restaurants around there? Like, there are also
Speaker 3: these conversations that are happening now.
Speaker 1: But to back up to Wednesday night, he sent you
Speaker 1: guys to a good restaurant, I did. Brian Callahan sent
Speaker 1: you to his favorite restaurant in Cincinnati.
Speaker 2: He did. It's a burger joint. It was really good.
Speaker 2: I don't remember what it was called.
Speaker 3: That's okay, but I guess we don't work for No,
Speaker 3: they don't place in Cincinnati. Yeah, they are getting free
Speaker 3: pub from us, that's it, but send us there. It
Speaker 3: was really good food, just a cool place to hang out.
Speaker 3: And they put on their social media that they were
Speaker 3: going to miss the Callahan family when he got the job,
Speaker 3: because they are pretty consistent regulars there.
Speaker 1: That's great, But.
Speaker 3: I mean knew the cool places in town to send us,
Speaker 3: knew the places to oh, oh yeah, you might want
Speaker 3: to try and get this, try this place if you
Speaker 3: like Italian food. There's that if you want to do this,
Speaker 3: and that these are the places to hang out. So
Speaker 3: I mean, he's definitely someone who's plugged into the community
Speaker 3: there and wasn't gatekeeping his favorite restaurants like oh no,
Speaker 3: go try this place. So I am excited now for
Speaker 3: them to be here in Nashville and hopefully we can
Speaker 3: return the favor. And I know that this community is
Speaker 3: going to love this family.
Speaker 1: And I thought that was one of the most special
Speaker 1: parts of Thursday, was just the whole family. M M.
Speaker 1: I guess it's because my kids are grown, yeah, but
Speaker 1: to see the little ones again and that they were
Speaker 1: literally hiding in the cabinets in his office and jumping
Speaker 1: out at people, and Ronan was up and down the
Speaker 1: halls and they they are at home. They had a
Speaker 1: big time.
Speaker 2: They had a big time.
Speaker 1: That's how it. I mean, you think about it because
Speaker 1: you think about Nora and Ronan and wherever they go
Speaker 1: and whatever they do. I mean, these memories will be
Speaker 1: somebody because they're old enough that they will remember all
Speaker 1: of this well.
Speaker 3: But and the thing that strikes me is that Coach
Speaker 3: Callahan is a coach's kid, right, and so for him
Speaker 3: to be able to have these moments now with his kids, Yea,
Speaker 3: it's important and it's special to him to make sure
Speaker 3: that they're incorporated in this because he was incorporated with
Speaker 3: his dad, and so passing that along, making sure that
Speaker 3: that's a priority. He understands the family piece of it.
Speaker 3: He knows the things that they'll remember from these moments
Speaker 3: and from the spaces that they're able to be in
Speaker 3: and you realize you have moments where you realize how
Speaker 3: crazy this business is and what a big deal it
Speaker 3: is to be able to do what it is you do.
Speaker 3: He mentioned a couple times that there's only thirty two
Speaker 3: people in the world who do this job and he's
Speaker 3: now one of them. And having that realization always kind
Speaker 3: of strikes me because it's true and that's such a
Speaker 3: small number of people when you think about the whole world. Sure,
Speaker 3: and so he wants to be able to have that
Speaker 3: experience for himself but also pass it down to his
Speaker 3: family and make sure that they're able to have those
Speaker 3: moments as well and really enjoy.
Speaker 2: What it is that he does.
Speaker 3: And I think that that's really special, and I think
Speaker 3: that his perspective on it is so unique.
Speaker 1: Pretty good for you.
Speaker 2: Oh it, I mean, I had the time of my life.
Speaker 1: Welcome back.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is. It is really really good to be back.
Speaker 1: But to be back like that, to get the first
Speaker 1: interview with Brian Callahan, that's pretty good work.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's not a bad first week back. Maybe a
Speaker 3: little rusty, but we'll shake that up.
Speaker 1: I think it's interesting that he and Ran Carthon are
Speaker 1: not going to the Senior Bowl, sort of following a
Speaker 1: different trend. We're starting to see fewer and fewer headcat
Speaker 1: coaches go to the Senior Bowl. And I think in
Speaker 1: this case, however, it's largely about putting the staff together.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I think this is a timing thing more than anything else.
Speaker 3: That because of when he was hired, not that it
Speaker 3: was earlier or late, just how it falls on the calendar.
Speaker 3: He's got some things that he wants to take care
Speaker 3: of that feel more time sensitive, and there's enough people
Speaker 3: going down there that he trusts that he doesn't necessarily
Speaker 3: need to be boots on the ground. There are other
Speaker 3: people who can evaluate scout, do the things that they're
Speaker 3: to do, and they still get another shot of a
Speaker 3: shot at a lot of these guys and the combine
Speaker 3: in a couple that's right. So just the timing of
Speaker 3: how things lined up. I don't think that he's anti
Speaker 3: Senior Bowl. I think it's just the way that everything
Speaker 3: lined up. But I think you're right that we're starting
Speaker 3: to see different emphasis being put in different places when
Speaker 3: it comes to some of these kind of all star
Speaker 3: balls and some of the different scouting opportunities, And I
Speaker 3: thin I think a lot of that has to do
Speaker 3: with just how many things are digital now, or how
Speaker 3: many things are televised, and just the way that things are.
Speaker 3: He was talking about workouts even at the Combine, and
Speaker 3: he said, there's so much stuff that's on TV now.
Speaker 3: You're not seeing anything different on TV than what we're
Speaker 3: seeing in the building. You know, it's the same stuff.
Speaker 3: So that makes it a little less not that guys
Speaker 3: aren't at the combine or anything like that, but it's
Speaker 3: not imperative that you are in your seat at a
Speaker 3: certain time in that moment because it's all recorded and
Speaker 3: it's all televised. So it's just the way that the
Speaker 3: world is. So many things are more available. You don't
Speaker 3: have to physically be there for every moment of every
Speaker 3: event at every time. So just because someone physically isn't
Speaker 3: in a space doesn't mean they're not working. They're definitely working.
Speaker 1: Good Angle, Thank you so much for your work.
Speaker 2: It was fun.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I am just I'm excited about the future. I'm
Speaker 3: excited about this human. I'm so glad he's leading the Titans.
Speaker 2: I'm excited to do best.
Speaker 1: Brabby wells I Mike Keith thanking you for this. Nig
Speaker 1: to the O T