Speaker 1: The Season with Peter Schreeger is a production of the
Speaker 1: NFL in partnership with iHeartRadio. What's Up, everybody, Welcome to
Speaker 1: another episode of the Season with Peter Schreger. I'm Peter
Speaker 1: Schreeger recording this on a Monday, November sixth, and I've
Speaker 1: got my lovely producer, Aaron wan Kaufman here, Aerin. I
Speaker 1: thought yesterday, with four games that were kind of billed
Speaker 1: as premiere games, was one of those great NFL Sundays.
Speaker 1: And yet what happens when you do that, when you
Speaker 1: hype certain games, you get these other sneaky ones. And
Speaker 1: I wanted to start this podcast off by talking about
Speaker 1: Josh Dobbs and the Minnesota Vikings and what an amazing
Speaker 1: story that is. I'm personally close to this. Josh Dobbs
Speaker 1: and I have become friendly over the years. He was
Speaker 1: a Tennessee quarterback and then he obviously goes to Pittsburgh.
Speaker 1: Steevens is the third stream quarter record as well, like
Speaker 1: those beloved guys in the league. But why I have
Speaker 1: a connection to Dobbs. He did this thing where he
Speaker 1: did an externship with NASA and it was in the
Speaker 1: off season a couple of years back where he was
Speaker 1: in I think an aeroscience major or arow is that
Speaker 1: even a thing?
Speaker 2: Aaron aeroscience?
Speaker 1: Is that? I think aeroscience engineering major in college. I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: clearly this was not my forte And in our off
Speaker 1: season shows for Good Morning Football, it's like, who's doing
Speaker 1: something cool this offseason in the world of football?
Speaker 2: Who wants to come on as a guest? And Josh
Speaker 2: Dobbs came on.
Speaker 1: I would say it was a summer of twenty twenty
Speaker 1: or twenty twenty one, probably three to four times. And
Speaker 1: then he and I struck up a friendship over text
Speaker 1: and like always just wish Josh Dobbs well.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 1: Then he goes to Cleveland. Then he goes to last
Speaker 1: year on like short day notice, like maybe like a
Speaker 1: random like fifteen days like heads up. He goes to
Speaker 1: Tennessee where he ends up starting at their final game
Speaker 1: of the regular season and almost beating the jar and
Speaker 1: a winning in game played very valiantly, and I was like,
Speaker 1: you know this dude, like good for him, Like Josh Dobbs,
Speaker 1: that's awesome. Then this year, with eight days you know,
Speaker 1: left before the start of the regular season, he's traded
Speaker 1: to the Arizona Cardinals, and he starts Week one for
Speaker 1: the Cardinals, and a couple of weeks later, he's beating
Speaker 1: the Cowboys in a game, and we had this really
Speaker 1: funny moment on the show where he was like, Dobbs
Speaker 1: was at the Arizona Cardinals team store and they had
Speaker 1: all the different team jerseys, and he did a little
Speaker 1: Instagram video where he's like, I can't even get my
Speaker 1: own jersey. They don't sell my own jersey. I'm the
Speaker 1: starting quarterback of the team. They don't steal a Dobbs jersey.
Speaker 1: And we had such a fun time with that, And
Speaker 1: then I reached out to Mark Dalton, who's the PR
Speaker 1: guy for the Arizona Cardinals, and I'm like, you got
Speaker 1: to get me a Dobbs when you start selling those
Speaker 1: Dobs jerseys. Sure enough, Mark gets it to me. I'm
Speaker 1: rocking a Dalton a Dobbs jersey multiple times in the
Speaker 1: past few weeks, almost as a goof, but also because
Speaker 1: we got love for this guy. Sure Enough, Cousins goes
Speaker 1: down with the injury and my phone starts buzzing on
Speaker 1: the trade deadline day that you know, the the Vikings
Speaker 1: are making calls. I thought they were gonna sign Colt
Speaker 1: McCoy Culte. McCoy had played for Kevin O'Connell for three
Speaker 1: years in Washington. He's a free agent. I thought that
Speaker 1: would be the move. Instead, they trade for Josh Dobbs.
Speaker 1: I don't send a note to Dobbs. I'm like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I can only imagine the whorld winning this guy. As
Speaker 1: it comes out later that he still hadn't moved into
Speaker 1: his place in Arizona yet, he has unpacked bags and
Speaker 1: several shipments that still were coming for the Arizona house. Well,
Speaker 1: now he moves to Minnesota and they're like, we're starting
Speaker 1: Jaren Hall, who's a fifth round pick and has been
Speaker 1: the backup and they really like him. And he's out
Speaker 1: of BYU and he's got Jaren Hall, and what I think,
Speaker 1: what mighte be? Like? The second drive runs around like
Speaker 1: a chicken with his head cuddle. It gets Clawbern and
Speaker 1: I'm laughing, but like.
Speaker 2: Right away, oh, we got Dobs. Has the play? Tops
Speaker 2: has the play? Now? I know Dobbs just got there.
Speaker 1: Now everyone who's listening might say, yeah, well, Baker Mayfield
Speaker 1: did this last year.
Speaker 2: Here's the difference.
Speaker 1: Baker Mayfield got there on a Tuesday to the Rams
Speaker 1: and beat the Raiders on a Thursday. Very very incredible
Speaker 1: quick turnaround, get it. But also Baker was the number one,
Speaker 1: so Baker took the number one snaps in practice, Baker
Speaker 1: had a chance to do a crash course.
Speaker 2: Baker was there all night with McVeigh. Josh Dobbs not
Speaker 2: the number one.
Speaker 1: Jaron Hall this week took the number one snaps. He
Speaker 1: just got there on Wednesday. He had never taken a
Speaker 1: rep with the first team offense before they played this
Speaker 1: game on Sunday afternoon against the Atlanta Falcons. So he's
Speaker 1: thrown into the game and he saw the footage. He's
Speaker 1: on the sidelines and he's practicing the cadence with Garrett Bradberry,
Speaker 1: their starting center, and the rest of the offensive line.
Speaker 1: I was amazed by this watching this and then he
Speaker 1: goes out there, Aaron.
Speaker 2: He was awesome. He was awesome. This is against the
Speaker 2: number six defense in the league.
Speaker 1: It's against Arthur Smith coached offensive was hum and also
Speaker 1: with Heineke.
Speaker 2: And it also was on the road, so you're dealing
Speaker 2: with the road crowd.
Speaker 1: He had never taken a snap with any of these players,
Speaker 1: and sure enough. On a fourth and seven, wiggles out
Speaker 1: of the sack, runs, makes a play, gets the first down,
Speaker 1: moves the chains, and then throws a game winning touchdown
Speaker 1: to Powell. The Josh Doabs stuff is incredible. More and
Speaker 1: more stuff keeps on trickling out. I want to say
Speaker 1: it was Kevin Seffert from ESPN had a couple of
Speaker 1: really good tweets about how he didn't know all the
Speaker 1: names to all the players on his team and he
Speaker 1: hadn't taken and he's and he was like just freestyling
Speaker 1: it with with Kevin O'Connell. I called O'Connell yesterday. We spoke.
Speaker 1: I was like, just give me anything. Ye He's like, dude, no,
Speaker 1: it's it's unbelievable. It's unbelievable because as the game is going,
Speaker 1: what we did was for Josh to keep it simple.
Speaker 1: Was like, here is the most basic stuff, maybe ten
Speaker 1: to fifteen plays, like what you need to know, like
Speaker 1: the most pig and he ran the full playbook and
Speaker 1: he kind of did it on like an improvisational whim,
Speaker 1: like I am so blown away by what Josh did.
Speaker 2: Josh Jobs did yesterday. And then here's the crazy part.
Speaker 1: Now, the Vikings are five and four, and they're looking
Speaker 1: at the playoffs picture in the NAC The Giants done,
Speaker 1: the Rams look to be done. The Packers aren't scaring anybody.
Speaker 2: Who's team? Who's that six? There's seventh? You know?
Speaker 1: Okay, let's go through it, Aaron. You got Cowboys and Eagles, right,
Speaker 1: so there's two there. Let's say the Saints win the
Speaker 1: NFC South, so there's your third NFC North.
Speaker 2: The Lions is your fourth.
Speaker 1: You've got the five and the six being probably the
Speaker 1: Niners in the Seahawks.
Speaker 2: There's a seventh spot sitting there. I don't know.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be who the Buccaneers, the Falcons. Who's beat
Speaker 1: the Falcons? The Buccaneers, I don't know. Panthers aren't doing it,
Speaker 1: Giants are done, Commanders.
Speaker 3: Mike's selling players off at the deadline.
Speaker 1: Sure, I mean this Vikings team could be really, really fun.
Speaker 1: And Josh Jobs is a heck of a story. The
Speaker 1: other story I want to talk about is the Raiders.
Speaker 1: So again, we were piping up the Chiefs, Dolphins into Seahawks,
Speaker 1: Ravens into Eagles, Cowboys into Bill's Bengals. We hyped it
Speaker 1: up as like these are like the four premier matchups
Speaker 1: of the week.
Speaker 2: There's no reason to talk about the other games. They're
Speaker 2: so good. And then you had that.
Speaker 1: One in the early window, and then in the four
Speaker 1: o'clock window, here come the Raiders blow out the Giants.
Speaker 2: What a story that is.
Speaker 1: You saw the Jay Glazer report that you know, in
Speaker 1: my report in the morning, was that people were surprised
Speaker 1: that Ziggiler lost his job at the GM because he
Speaker 1: rebuilt the whole front office over the last off season.
Speaker 1: Now they have like a legitimate front office where you know,
Speaker 1: in years past, people would look at the Raiders front
Speaker 1: office and say, okay, well that's that's kind of a
Speaker 1: wild wild West situation out there. Now they you know,
Speaker 1: they hired from some of the best teams and Ziggler
Speaker 1: is really.
Speaker 2: Building it up. He gets fired. But also Mick Lombardi,
Speaker 2: who if you.
Speaker 1: Listen to Mike Lombardi, who's on a lot of these podcasts,
Speaker 1: does a GM shuffle couse that's his son, Mike, Mick Lombardi.
Speaker 1: He was a Belichick for years. He gets fired also,
Speaker 1: So you fire the head coach the GM and.
Speaker 2: The offensive coordinator.
Speaker 1: So the quarterbacks coach, Bo Haggerty, he takes over as
Speaker 1: offensive coordinator and calling plays. Sure enough, the team looked alive.
Speaker 1: They looked great. Antonio Pierce has those guys humming. They
Speaker 1: look awesome. They're moving the ball, like just really really
Speaker 1: inspiring stuff. Then after the game, they're smoking cigars, they're
Speaker 1: dancing in the locker room and Antonio Pearce, who's rocking
Speaker 1: two earrings, and I said, I'm good morning football. Think
Speaker 1: it's the first head coach in NFL history to wear
Speaker 1: two earrings on the sideline, says, you guys are off
Speaker 1: till Wednesday. And like you could see in that little video,
Speaker 1: DeVonta Adams nodding, smiling, like gosh, it was like a
Speaker 1: cloud was lifted. And I'll be completely honest. And our
Speaker 1: guests today as a long relationship with them too, Like
Speaker 1: I like Josh McDaniels. I don't play for Josh McDaniels.
Speaker 1: I'm a media guy and Josh mctaniels has always been
Speaker 1: great to me and I've had a good relationship. He's
Speaker 1: a family man. Like feels like a totally different team.
Speaker 1: And now suddenly they're alive. They're four and five, they're
Speaker 1: a real team. Raiders look good. I mean Devant Adams
Speaker 1: is still good. Josh Jacobs look good, Max Crosby look good.
Speaker 1: I look around the league and it's it's it's every
Speaker 1: week is different story. Because I was ready to come
Speaker 1: in and Aaron, I mean, like, we talked Seattle two
Speaker 1: weeks ago, like, oh my god, Seattle, well they just
Speaker 1: got the doors on off them. We talked the Niners
Speaker 1: the first five weeks, and they've now lost three in
Speaker 1: a row. And I'll tell you you, look at what's
Speaker 1: going on around the league. The team that I think
Speaker 1: might be the most exciting and the one that has
Speaker 1: me out of my seat the Houston Texans.
Speaker 2: Did you watch any of that game? Oh yeah, Houston Texans.
Speaker 2: Not only did c J.
Speaker 1: Stroud though for four seventy and five touchdowns, the most
Speaker 1: passing yards of ever buy a rookie, the most touchdowns ever
Speaker 1: buy a rookie, but they also had to go on
Speaker 1: a game winning drive in the final minute and he
Speaker 1: did the job and found Tank Dell Oh yeah, a
Speaker 1: fellow rookie for the score. So as we look at
Speaker 1: things here, this is kind of the halfway mark. There's
Speaker 1: eighteen regular season weeks. We're through nine of them. We
Speaker 1: got a Jets Chargers game tonight. I think the NFL
Speaker 1: is wide open. I would say my Super Bowl pick
Speaker 1: before the season was Chiefs over Niners. I'll stick with
Speaker 1: it as good as the Eagles. Look, Aaron, what was yours?
Speaker 3: Mine was Eagles over Bengals?
Speaker 2: And would you off it or would you stick with it?
Speaker 3: I'm actually kind of feeling okay with it right now.
Speaker 4: I mean, like you said, Niners have suddenly just hit
Speaker 4: this weird streak losing, and you know, Bengals last night
Speaker 4: like they're they're overcoming whatever ills they had in the
Speaker 4: beginning of the season. Yeah, and Higgins was, you know,
Speaker 4: like posting people up last night.
Speaker 1: For ten catches there tight ends that have not played
Speaker 1: many roles. Yeah, Tanner, Hudson, IRV Smith and Drew Sample, those.
Speaker 2: Guys were all the place.
Speaker 1: So I asked you about as a Bills fan, like
Speaker 1: you panic mode.
Speaker 4: I don't think panic mode. But it's in the last
Speaker 4: three weeks the Bills have not scored. They haven't scored
Speaker 4: like they should, like obviously, they're too many injuries. The
Speaker 4: defense is getting hurt all the time. I feel like
Speaker 4: every week I'm just texting my dad during the game,
Speaker 4: like how are we so injured every week? I love
Speaker 4: seeing Dalton Kincaid get some great work, but it's rough.
Speaker 4: And I do think the Bengals are a very good team,
Speaker 4: Like if the Ravens weren't there.
Speaker 1: Well they are, yeah, then this is good, like the
Speaker 1: Bengals of red hot. They've now swept the last three.
Speaker 1: They beat the Seahawks, they beat the Niners, and then
Speaker 1: they beat last night the Bills. Those are three real teams.
Speaker 1: They played the Texans this weekend and then they have
Speaker 1: the Ravens again. So they've got their they've got their
Speaker 1: slight ahead of them. Real quick quick story. My son
Speaker 1: is a big Tyreek Hill fan, and like everything is
Speaker 1: Tyreek Hill right now.
Speaker 2: I don't know, you know what.
Speaker 1: I was a Will Clark fan when I was a kid.
Speaker 1: Did you watch baseball as a kid? Like Will Clark
Speaker 1: was on the San Francisco Giants. I was on the
Speaker 1: Giants little league team and Will Clark was their first baseman.
Speaker 1: It was like late eighties, and he was will to
Speaker 1: throw and he was great, and he was lefty and
Speaker 1: he was great.
Speaker 2: And that was like my guy as a kid.
Speaker 1: And my brother was done maddingly and I was Will
Speaker 1: Clark like we had our guys. My son just loves
Speaker 1: Tyreek Hill and everything about him. Watches like YouTube highlights
Speaker 1: and he's only seven, like die Hard, right, So going
Speaker 1: in this is like a parenting corner type thing. I'm
Speaker 1: biting off Simmons, I guess. So going into this game,
Speaker 1: I want my son to watch the Frankfurt game. I said,
Speaker 1: I say, you know, I think the Chiefs are going
Speaker 1: to beat the Dolphins.
Speaker 2: And I gave them all my reasons why.
Speaker 1: I think the Dolphins, uh, you know, are coming in hot,
Speaker 1: but they struggle against.
Speaker 2: The best teams in the league.
Speaker 1: I also think the Chiefs such a veteran team, and
Speaker 1: I was really big on Spagnolo and the defense knowing.
Speaker 2: And I've been papping myself in the back on this one.
Speaker 1: So long story short, saying my son, I've never done this, Like,
Speaker 1: let's make a bet. So my son collects these toys
Speaker 1: called squeeze Mates. Okay, never had them as a kid.
Speaker 1: They are like literally there's these little toys, but they're
Speaker 1: really cool. They are all the different.
Speaker 2: Players in the league, all right.
Speaker 1: So it's like you collect them and each team has
Speaker 1: one and some of them are random, like the Bills.
Speaker 1: One is like Dalton Kincaid, I think, and like the
Speaker 1: the Colts.
Speaker 2: One is Michael Pittman Junior.
Speaker 1: But then you've got the Mahomes, and you've got and that,
Speaker 1: You've got like the the Jalen Hurts.
Speaker 2: They're really cool.
Speaker 3: Google Google Squeeze. You have the Max Crosby Squeeze Mates.
Speaker 2: They're ten bucks a pop.
Speaker 1: So they're like old starting lineup toys. With these old
Speaker 1: squeeze my son is obsessed. All he wanted for his
Speaker 1: birthday was Squeeze Mates. And like, what do you do
Speaker 1: with them?
Speaker 2: Nothing? You collect them?
Speaker 3: Yeah, you just have.
Speaker 1: Them, right, So I'm thinking, like a wait, and then
Speaker 1: my son comes to me and says, let's make a bet.
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh great, all right, all the promo codes
Speaker 1: we're giving out or paying off here, let's think a bet.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: Now, he's a picky eater, my son mel He'll eat
Speaker 1: pasta and butter every meal. He'll have pizza every meal.
Speaker 1: He'll have bagel and cream cheese every meal. That's what
Speaker 1: he eats, all right, doesn'ty vegetables, doesn't eat chicken, doesn't
Speaker 1: eat anything.
Speaker 2: I said, all right, here's the bet.
Speaker 1: If the dolphins win, I will get you a new
Speaker 1: Squeeze Mate next week. This is post birthday, post Halloween,
Speaker 1: more gifts, just what the kid needs. I said, if
Speaker 1: the Chiefs win, you have to have a steak dinner
Speaker 1: with me next week. Now does that sound like a
Speaker 1: punishment to you?
Speaker 2: Not at all?
Speaker 3: That sounds that sounds like quality time with dad.
Speaker 2: Steak dinner. Kids had steak one time in his life.
Speaker 2: He claims he hated it. We don't force it. I
Speaker 2: would love nothing more than a steak dinner.
Speaker 1: I mean, what world are you living in where if
Speaker 1: you lose, you get a toy and if you win,
Speaker 1: you get.
Speaker 2: A steak at dinner with Dad.
Speaker 3: Yes, sign me up for that bet.
Speaker 1: So sure enough, game's going on. I'm texting my wife.
Speaker 1: She's out with him. They're watching the marathon. Runners are
Speaker 1: on Fourth Avenue in Brooklyn and they're giving out water
Speaker 1: and they're slapping five and I'm like, it's twenty one nothing,
Speaker 1: tell mel I'm in LA And she's like, oh, that's
Speaker 1: gonna put him in a bad mood. I'm not telling him. Whatever,
Speaker 1: it's twenty one seven, then it's twenty one to fourteen.
Speaker 1: I'm like, get in front of a TV. Have mel
Speaker 1: watched this end of the game. It comes down to
Speaker 1: the final thing to out of a shotgun ball, snap.
Speaker 2: Fumble, japs wind.
Speaker 1: I FaceTime from la as I'm on my way to
Speaker 1: the airport, and I'm like, nol that just my son
Speaker 1: is distraught.
Speaker 3: I don't want to eat dinner.
Speaker 2: I want to have to get I'm just taunting. I'm like,
Speaker 2: we can do flas we get a rib, but.
Speaker 1: Truly the greatest thing, and like we're in New York City,
Speaker 1: Like I will take him anywhere for this, so we
Speaker 1: have like this tradition.
Speaker 2: Now maybe that we could do this.
Speaker 1: He was distraught and then he was so upset, and
Speaker 1: then I got home last night and whatever, and I
Speaker 1: talked to my wife and I'm like I should probably
Speaker 1: still get him the squeeze mate, right, And She's like, no, no, come,
Speaker 1: he can't just always win, and like he's got a
Speaker 1: steak dinner and like when are you going on this
Speaker 1: steak dinner?
Speaker 5: What?
Speaker 2: Like in my head, like it's like a fantasy land.
Speaker 1: We're just gonna take him to like Peter Lueger tomorrow night,
Speaker 1: table for two.
Speaker 2: Me and my son wearing Chiefs and Dolphins logos. End
Speaker 2: of the story.
Speaker 1: I will keep you up there, and I know everyone
Speaker 1: at home is very, very compelled to learn how this goes.
Speaker 1: But the Steak Dinner slash Squeeze Mate. Bet they sell
Speaker 1: Squeeze Mates online. But there is one toy store in
Speaker 1: Tribeca on it's like on like church and probably like
Speaker 1: Warren Street, like down there our church and somewhere they
Speaker 1: sell them. And they this random toy store a church
Speaker 1: and read like down there. Like my son knows it,
Speaker 1: he's like he wants to go back there. But steak Dinner,
Speaker 1: I will tell you how it goes. That's important stuff, Aaron.
Speaker 1: I think everyone needed to hear it real quick. Halloween,
Speaker 1: what'd you go at?
Speaker 3: We talked about the slash.
Speaker 2: You told me you went to parties with Halloween itself.
Speaker 2: Halloween proper.
Speaker 4: Oh, it's a little depressing.
Speaker 2: So I rushed Elliott Smith.
Speaker 3: I didn't dress up for how So I ran.
Speaker 4: I rushed home, and I like got out our big
Speaker 4: bowl I put in.
Speaker 3: We had a bunch of reeses.
Speaker 4: We had some leftover like gushers and all sorts of stuff.
Speaker 3: Some weird party we.
Speaker 4: Had typically Yeah, and I sat out there and no
Speaker 4: children came.
Speaker 3: Really as I was walking home from the subway.
Speaker 4: I saw a bunch of kids in costume going into
Speaker 4: bodega's and stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I gotta come. Yeah.
Speaker 4: And I got to the house, like, ran upstairs, filled
Speaker 4: the bowl and I sat there for probably thirty forty minutes,
Speaker 4: saw no one at all, And eventually I went back
Speaker 4: upstairs and I stayed by the window just in case nothing.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I dressed as a slice of pizza.
Speaker 3: Nice.
Speaker 2: My son, Mel was a slice of pizza.
Speaker 1: Okay, fits with his Yeah, I was a cheeseburger nice.
Speaker 1: My wife was she kind of she she was like,
Speaker 1: I'm getting dressed up, but she couldn't just put on
Speaker 1: my cattiers.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, it counts sixy cats.
Speaker 2: I don't know whatever it is.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And then my daughter was a unicorn. We left
Speaker 1: her at home with a babysitter. We went out, three
Speaker 1: of us. My wife lasted a few hours. Me and
Speaker 1: Mel were out late though. We were out till like
Speaker 1: seven eight o'clock, and we went to our favorite pizza
Speaker 1: place for Scotti, which is on Henry Street, Henry in
Speaker 1: between like Orange and Pineapple, probably down in Brooklyn. For
Speaker 1: Scotti cash only old school and usually there's not a
Speaker 1: huge line. We go in and I'm like to the guys,
Speaker 1: we're there all the time.
Speaker 2: Like, guys, look at Mell. They took a photo with mel.
Speaker 2: I'm like, I'm gonna frame it, gonna put it up here.
Speaker 1: Because when you go at a slice of pizza and
Speaker 1: you get to finish your night with at your favorite
Speaker 1: pizza place, that's pretty damn good. With no further ado,
Speaker 1: this is the general manager of the Houston Texans, a
Speaker 1: team coming off one of the coolest wins in the
Speaker 1: NFL during Week nine and of course having one of
Speaker 1: the great starts and surprising starts to the season, the
Speaker 1: Houston Texans, Nick Casario.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the season with Peter Schreger.
Speaker 5: Good morning, Peter, Thanks for having us.
Speaker 1: I love having you on. I've been trying to get
Speaker 1: you on for weeks last year. I tried to get
Speaker 1: You're like, we're building something.
Speaker 2: When the time is right, like.
Speaker 1: Let me and you did me the favorite to come
Speaker 1: on today after yesterday's miracle win. Now when we look
Speaker 1: at that game and we look back at it, you
Speaker 1: lose the kicker scores.
Speaker 2: You have c J.
Speaker 1: Stroud who has more yards and passing touchdowns and any
Speaker 1: rookie in the history of the sport. This is now
Speaker 1: twelve hours removed from kickoff last year. Last the twenty
Speaker 1: four hours move from kickoff, Like do you have a
Speaker 1: day to enjoy it or is it on to the
Speaker 1: next one.
Speaker 2: We've got to prepare because we've got a big game
Speaker 2: on Sunday. Yeah.
Speaker 6: I think when you get home at night, you kind
Speaker 6: of reflect and part of you know, a lot of
Speaker 6: coaches my process to go back through the game, kind
Speaker 6: of watch all three phases, kind of see some of
Speaker 6: the things that we did well, what are some areas
Speaker 6: that we can improve, whether some of the things that
Speaker 6: popped up, and that game there was an ab and
Speaker 6: flow to it. First half we probably didn't play as
Speaker 6: well as we either wanted to, kind of got off
Speaker 6: to a slow start, put ourselves a little bit of
Speaker 6: a hole.
Speaker 5: But in the second half we held into.
Speaker 6: The field goal and then we were able to go
Speaker 6: down and scoring get some points and then it was
Speaker 6: kind of back and forth here till the end. And
Speaker 6: in the end, it's about players making plays. So this
Speaker 6: is a player's game. It's about the players when they're
Speaker 6: on the field, and our players fought. The one thing
Speaker 6: about this team, and I think it starts with Demiko
Speaker 6: and his thought process and mindset is we're going to
Speaker 6: battle to the end and we're gonna do everything in
Speaker 6: our power to try to give ourselves an opportunity.
Speaker 5: And we talked about it at halftime a little.
Speaker 6: I mean, for as badly as we had played, it
Speaker 6: was a one score game, so let's just for all
Speaker 6: the things that have happened, kind of erased that and
Speaker 6: let's get ready for the second half.
Speaker 5: It's a one score game.
Speaker 6: So we kind of kept chipping away, and you know,
Speaker 6: those last couple series there, we scored. Dari makes the
Speaker 6: field goal, which was interesting. It was a discussion. He
Speaker 6: hadn't practiced that, but we were kind of looking at
Speaker 6: it as points were probably at a premium, So Tamiko
Speaker 6: and Frank talked about it and made a decision to
Speaker 6: go ahead and kick a field goal and then went
Speaker 6: up three. Then they scored and we got the ball
Speaker 6: back and we were able to capitalize there at the end.
Speaker 6: So there's certainly an emotional aspect to the game that's involved,
Speaker 6: but you have to decompress at night and then come
Speaker 6: in this morning. The coaches will go through the film
Speaker 6: and the reality is we're it's Dono Cincinnati. I mean,
Speaker 6: we're getting ready for Cincinnati against good football team next Sunday.
Speaker 2: That's interesting. On to Cincinnati, you've heard that one from
Speaker 2: that works. Let's go back to like.
Speaker 1: January, February March, and the Texans are in this really
Speaker 1: interesting time where you've got two picks in the first round,
Speaker 1: you've got a void at quarterback, or at least we
Speaker 1: thought so. I mean, there's a lot of rumors that
Speaker 1: you guys might take a defensive player and no quarterback,
Speaker 1: and you work out c J.
Speaker 2: Stroud.
Speaker 1: Now that it's you know, coming into fruition and he's
Speaker 1: having one of the greatest seasons we've ever seen from
Speaker 1: a quarterback as a rookie. What was the pre draft
Speaker 1: process with Cj? When did you fall in love with him?
Speaker 1: And when did you know that finally after a couple
Speaker 1: of years of not taking a quarterback on the front
Speaker 1: of the draft, this was the year and this is
Speaker 1: the guy.
Speaker 6: Yeah, we were positioned fairly well, as you alluded to,
Speaker 6: with two and twelve kind of going into the draft,
Speaker 6: so we knew we were going to have either a
Speaker 6: some flexibility or hopefully we're able to get some good
Speaker 6: players there at the top of the draft, we were
Speaker 6: pretty confident that we were going to pick somewhere in
Speaker 6: the top ten.
Speaker 5: However, when whether we moved back or we moved up,
Speaker 5: and you know.
Speaker 6: Once the season was over, you know, we had done
Speaker 6: quite a bit of work here as a scouting staff.
Speaker 6: It's say lip in the college scout staff do an
Speaker 6: unbelievable job during the fall accumulating information. And once you
Speaker 6: really the line of demarcation is once the juniors underclassmen
Speaker 6: actually declare, then you kind of know the pool of
Speaker 6: players that's going to be available. And those are the
Speaker 6: groups of people and players that you really have to
Speaker 6: spend the most time on or with because sometimes you
Speaker 6: have the least amount of information. But we had gone
Speaker 6: through the quarterback group pretty extensively. You know, I think
Speaker 6: it kind of separated itself there. There was kind of
Speaker 6: a couple of groups of players. There was probably a
Speaker 6: handful in one kind of category. Then there was a
Speaker 6: tier below that we really went through every player, whether
Speaker 6: it was an all star game combine thirty man visits,
Speaker 6: I want to say we had I don't know, however
Speaker 6: many it was a handful of quarterbacks in our building
Speaker 6: is a part of our it's part of our process.
Speaker 5: And then the zoom calls.
Speaker 6: So you're just trying to accumulate as much information as
Speaker 6: possible as many and give them different angles. Maybe you
Speaker 6: feed them some information, see how they absorb it, then
Speaker 6: follow up. Okay, we talked about this a little bit earlier.
Speaker 6: See what their recall was. I think the most important
Speaker 6: thing is with any player is they just have to
Speaker 6: be who they are. So whatever their personality is, you
Speaker 6: just want to see a consistency at every checkpoint from
Speaker 6: whatever interaction you had, whether it's in the school, whether
Speaker 6: it's at the combine, whether it's with one coaches, he
Speaker 6: act the same way with one staff member as he
Speaker 6: does with another staff member, because you would be surprised
Speaker 6: at times you find some gaps or they say one
Speaker 6: thing to one person and then they say another thing
Speaker 6: and you're like, wait a minute.
Speaker 1: Let's like in the movies where it's like that he
Speaker 1: treated the cafeteria people poorly, like that kind of stuff.
Speaker 5: In some respects.
Speaker 6: Yeah, but even you know, whether they make a commentary
Speaker 6: about something or their persona or their attitude, or how
Speaker 6: they interact with other players that are in the building.
Speaker 6: On the day, we usually bring in I don't know,
Speaker 6: four or five players or groups of players in on
Speaker 6: one particular day. We have a pretty extensive process from
Speaker 6: the time that they walk in the building to they
Speaker 6: meet with the entire group, and then we reconvene at
Speaker 6: the end of the day and kind of recalibrate what
Speaker 6: are our collective observations. You really get input whether it's
Speaker 6: a strength and conditioning coach, position coach, offensive coordinator, player development, scouting,
Speaker 6: training staff, medical, You're looking for consistency and behavior across
Speaker 6: I would say the different areas.
Speaker 5: So it's a pretty rigorous day.
Speaker 6: We're not on the you know, let's bring them in
Speaker 6: and bring him to a steakhouse like Yeah. In the end,
Speaker 6: you're trying to simulate as much as possible. What is
Speaker 6: it going to be like in the building on a
Speaker 6: day to day basis when you're around these people when
Speaker 6: in the end it's about football. There's nothing else they
Speaker 6: have to worry about. This is their primary focus, and
Speaker 6: some can handle that better than others. So I would
Speaker 6: say as we work through that process, things start to
Speaker 6: declare themselves there a little bit, you know, specific to CJ.
Speaker 6: I mean, I think his personality. You feel it, you
Speaker 6: feel his presence when you're in the room with them.
Speaker 6: There's a confidence, there's a competitiveness, there's an edge and
Speaker 6: a good way of what you want and he has
Speaker 6: I would say, he's It's that balance of confidence in humility,
Speaker 6: like you believe in yourself, but you also have to
Speaker 6: make sure that there are times when you take a
Speaker 6: step back and you know, you put your ego aside.
Speaker 6: So I'd say by the time we got to April,
Speaker 6: we kind of had an idea and then really the.
Speaker 5: Draft is about positioning.
Speaker 6: So really those last couple of weeks in April, you're
Speaker 6: having dialogue, you're looking at your options, you're getting more information.
Speaker 6: Let's say, you know, we did pretty extensive work and
Speaker 6: just kind of go back and just check and double check.
Speaker 5: And part of the.
Speaker 6: You know, part of this process is finding the right
Speaker 6: people to talk to that give you the true representation
Speaker 6: of really what you're going to get, you know, because
Speaker 6: then they can bottom line it for you and say, look,
Speaker 6: in the end, here are the things that are important,
Speaker 6: and each player is going to be a little bit different.
Speaker 5: So a lot of.
Speaker 6: Discussions, a lot of dialogue, and we felt confident by
Speaker 6: the end, and you know, we really didn't know where
Speaker 6: or how things were gonna unfold on draft day.
Speaker 5: You know, I know Demiko and I you know, we've talked.
Speaker 5: We talk every day.
Speaker 6: I'd say during that time, I mean we talked Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,
Speaker 6: went through scenarios, Hey, what are some different options, and
Speaker 6: he was great. And then I'd say by the end,
Speaker 6: we certainly had conviction. And then you know, when it
Speaker 6: came time to make the selection, then we you know,
Speaker 6: went ahead and did what we felt made the most
Speaker 6: sense for our organization. So it was pick and then
Speaker 6: you know, we were able to consummate the trade there
Speaker 6: with Mani and move up to three and then pick
Speaker 6: both players.
Speaker 5: And you know, here we are.
Speaker 1: Go back into your shoes because in the media, in
Speaker 1: my world, it was understood that Bryce Young was probably
Speaker 1: going one, and then there were stories that you guys
Speaker 1: were going to take Tyree Wilson out of Texas Tech.
Speaker 1: Then there was stories that you're gonna take Will Anderson second. Overall,
Speaker 1: then there was the S two cognition test stuff that
Speaker 1: can and all this stuff is going on, and it
Speaker 1: makes for great TV and good morning football when you're in.
Speaker 2: That building and I'll give you a great show. Thank you,
Speaker 2: great show, great show. We love that stuff.
Speaker 1: But when you're in that building and there's all this
Speaker 1: other stuff swarming, is it like we don't even pay
Speaker 1: attention to that stuff, all those rumors, or because I'll
Speaker 1: say it like it is, Nick, no one knew what
Speaker 1: Houston was doing two overall until that pick was in,
Speaker 1: and no one knew what was happening at three overall
Speaker 1: until that pick was in. So is that a source
Speaker 1: of pride that no one was on your tail? There
Speaker 1: is no leaks in this building and there's no one
Speaker 1: giving it away. Or is it one of those where
Speaker 1: it's like, this is what we were going to do,
Speaker 1: what we weren't going to do, We don't care what
Speaker 1: the media says.
Speaker 5: No, it's a great question.
Speaker 6: I think it's really a credit to a lot of
Speaker 6: the people that are in the building. And I mean
Speaker 6: Dimiko's really main message to the team, and the number
Speaker 6: one rule is protect the team. So we all have
Speaker 6: a responsibility to protect the team and do what is
Speaker 6: right by the team, not by one individual or not
Speaker 6: subject to i would say public perception or external factors.
Speaker 5: So part of your job, I mean, that's what you
Speaker 5: all do.
Speaker 6: I mean, there's a lot that you want to talk about,
Speaker 6: need to talk about because there's a gap. There's no
Speaker 6: football being played, so you have essentially when free agency
Speaker 6: is over, as you know, middle of March. Free agency
Speaker 6: is done the first or second week in March. You
Speaker 6: have four to five weeks or what else is there
Speaker 6: to talk about. There's no offseason program in no football,
Speaker 6: so you're going to talk about the draft every day.
Speaker 5: So I think the thing that you have to.
Speaker 6: Guard against more than anything is misinformation during the spring.
Speaker 6: And it goes back to trusting your work, trusting the
Speaker 6: time that you've put in, trust the people in the
Speaker 6: building that who have I would say invested a significant
Speaker 6: amount of time and effort, and just have constant dialogue
Speaker 6: and communication and quite frankly, you have to ignore the
Speaker 6: external factors. We're cognizant that it's there, that's out there.
Speaker 6: There's going to be a lot of discussion, what are
Speaker 6: the motives behind that?
Speaker 5: I mean, as you.
Speaker 6: Know, sometimes things get a little bit jaded or shifted
Speaker 6: a certain way and you try to pain or create
Speaker 6: a narrative. So we just have to make sure that
Speaker 6: we maintain our discipline and just do what we think
Speaker 6: is in the best interests of the organization. And frankly,
Speaker 6: and I've said this publicly multiple times, I mean, the
Speaker 6: draft's a fifty to fifty proposition.
Speaker 5: So there's going to.
Speaker 6: Be players that you think it's going to go one
Speaker 6: way and it works out the way you hope. There's
Speaker 6: going to be other players for whatever the reason that
Speaker 6: doesn't go the way that you would have hoped it would.
Speaker 6: So there's no experts in what we do. There's no
Speaker 6: experts in our field. There's no experts in our building.
Speaker 6: I think we have a lot of people with a
Speaker 6: lot of pride that care about their work and are
Speaker 6: invested fully in the process. And we have to trust
Speaker 6: each other, and we have to trust ourselves, and we
Speaker 6: have to trust the work that we put into it.
Speaker 6: So I'd say, really the draft is a culmination of
Speaker 6: the effort of so many people. And then really the draft,
Speaker 6: to a certain extent, you're prepared, but you have to
Speaker 6: be able to adjust and adapt and kind of bob
Speaker 6: and weave as you go because you have to be
Speaker 6: prepared for a marriag to different scenarios. So I think,
Speaker 6: more than anything, it's just a credit to the people
Speaker 6: in the building. And the reality is at some point
Speaker 6: the information is going to get caught off and there's
Speaker 6: going to be certain people that have access to the information.
Speaker 6: I mean, that's just part of running just a company
Speaker 6: or a good business.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and everyone needs to know all the details.
Speaker 6: Yeah, And going going back to what Demko says, I
Speaker 6: would say consistently is protect the team. So in the end,
Speaker 6: we're about protecting the team and doing what's right for
Speaker 6: the organization.
Speaker 1: You take CJ Stroud at too, and there's a couple
Speaker 1: of oohs and odds, and then didn'ting the Texans are
Speaker 1: back on the clock? Could you take us through those
Speaker 1: six minutes of you negotiating with money asen for it
Speaker 1: the first year GM, who is a former colleague of yours.
Speaker 1: Who is the Arizona Cardinals GM, and how you guys
Speaker 1: decided to make them move up to number three.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean, I'd say relationships are a huge part
Speaker 6: of this business. Have a tremendous respect and admiration for Moni,
Speaker 6: both personally and professionally. And we had added some constructive
Speaker 6: dialogues probably a week or two about probably about a
Speaker 6: week out.
Speaker 5: From the draft just going back and forth.
Speaker 6: You know, he was certainly weighing some things on his end,
Speaker 6: and then we're able to kind of get some i
Speaker 6: would say general parameters sort of in place if if
Speaker 6: this happened, here's what potential it would entail. Not knowing
Speaker 6: that whether or not it would come to fruition or not,
Speaker 6: so we didn't know. We went back and forth, so
Speaker 6: there was a gap there where quite frankly, you know,
Speaker 6: we didn't really know what was going to happen. And
Speaker 6: it happened quickly because there's what is it, ten minutes
Speaker 6: in the first round, So we make the pick and
Speaker 6: then okay, Arizona's on the clock, all right, so a
Speaker 6: minute or two go off, So then you're at five
Speaker 6: to six minutes and you don't have a trade. And
Speaker 6: then there's a lot of logistics that are involved, from
Speaker 6: agreeing to the compensation, agreeing to the trade, getting that
Speaker 6: information to the league, make sure the league confirms that
Speaker 6: you actually have the trade, and then you're on the clock,
Speaker 6: and then have to get a hold of the player
Speaker 6: and make sure the pick gets turned in via Microsoft
Speaker 6: teams or whatever technology is available. So there's a lot
Speaker 6: of that can happen so I think you just kind
Speaker 6: of have to maintain, you know, you have to take
Speaker 6: the emotion out of it. But when the trade was
Speaker 6: actually consummated, maybe the pick, you know, we were all
Speaker 6: excited an emotion because we felt I would say convicted.
Speaker 6: You're really about both players. So yeah, so it was exciting.
Speaker 6: It was an exciting time for the people that are involved.
Speaker 6: It's an exciting time for the organization, for ownership, and
Speaker 6: they're certainly supportive of what we're trying to do. So yeah,
Speaker 6: so you know, it was a cool moment just for
Speaker 6: everybody involved. And then you kind of take a deep
Speaker 6: breath and realize, all right, you're not picking until round
Speaker 6: because you don't have a second round pick.
Speaker 5: But I mean that's the way it goes.
Speaker 2: Stroud gets there Anderson gets there. It's a pretty cool deal.
Speaker 1: You've got now your cornerstone at quarterback, your defensive end
Speaker 1: for the future. Now, was there a moment this summer
Speaker 1: where you saw CJ. Stroud do something and say, oh boy, okay,
Speaker 1: we got something here.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think you're just looking from the time they
Speaker 6: walk in the building for improvement, because the reality is
Speaker 6: whoever you pick, whenever you pick them regardless of how
Speaker 6: talented or how productive they've been, they're really they're starting
Speaker 6: from scratch. So they're just kind of putting the foundation
Speaker 6: in place, learning the building, learning the people, learning, learning
Speaker 6: the terminology, learning how to prectice, going out there making mistakes,
Speaker 6: and then going back correcting do you not make the
Speaker 6: same mistakes a second time? So the bottom line is
Speaker 6: you're just looking for improvement from the time you start
Speaker 6: until an endpoint. So you really have called six weeks
Speaker 6: where you can evaluate. So you get into OTAs and
Speaker 6: then you get into mini camps. After four or five weeks,
Speaker 6: you say, all right, take inventory of where we are.
Speaker 6: All right, there's some things out have gone well, here's
Speaker 6: some things that we could certainly fix or improve. And
Speaker 6: I think CJ earned the job and earned the opportunity
Speaker 6: with his performance. And I think that started from the beginning.
Speaker 6: What the expectation was, like, nobody's going to be handing
Speaker 6: anything when they walk in our building. You have to
Speaker 6: earn it on a day to day basis with your attitude,
Speaker 6: with your behavior, and your performance. And the players that
Speaker 6: do those things, those are the players that we're gonna
Speaker 6: be able to rely on. That we're gonna be able
Speaker 6: to trust and then we're gonna we're gonna want to
Speaker 6: put on the field. So we came back from from
Speaker 6: the summer, I had a little bit of break there,
Speaker 6: came back in training camp. I would say, there was
Speaker 6: some good plays and kind of incrementally it got better,
Speaker 6: and I'd say after a week or two, you start
Speaker 6: to see some things and then try to give him
Speaker 6: a little bit more, see what he can absorb, see
Speaker 6: what we can handle. And then by the time when
Speaker 6: you know, I think we you know, got there to
Speaker 6: the end. I think we kind of knew the direction
Speaker 6: that we were going to go. And then you kind
Speaker 6: of hit the reset button once a training camp is over,
Speaker 6: and once the preseason is over, hit the reset button
Speaker 6: and you're really kind of going back to square one's
Speaker 6: Week one in Baltimore, which I would say not surprisingly.
Speaker 6: I mean, they're one of the best teams in the league.
Speaker 6: I think we knew it was going to be a
Speaker 6: pretty significant challenge going into Baltimore, playing on a road,
Speaker 6: playing against a really good team, and there were some
Speaker 6: things that I think we learned about our team, and
Speaker 6: not only CJ, but we've learned about our team. I
Speaker 6: mean you know, it was a one score game, seven
Speaker 6: to six at half time. The second half kind of
Speaker 6: got away from us, but you know, there were some
Speaker 6: things that we had to get corrected, corrected and fixed.
Speaker 6: And you know then we turn around the next week
Speaker 6: and we lose at home in the row and two.
Speaker 6: But I think the team stayed invested. The attitude was great,
Speaker 6: that morale was great, and it really it starts with
Speaker 6: Demko and his leadership at the top.
Speaker 1: Let's go to that higher because you guys had been
Speaker 1: through two different coaches who lasted one year, and it's
Speaker 1: kind of like, we got to get this one right.
Speaker 1: You guys brought in other people and you hired Demiko,
Speaker 1: Ryan's former player, who was a very well respected defensive
Speaker 1: coach and then coordinator for the Sanftisco forty nine ers.
Speaker 1: Did you have the history of Demiko at all? I
Speaker 1: know he was with the Texans and the Eagles for
Speaker 1: a little bit. Did you ever were you ever in
Speaker 1: front office where he was one of the players.
Speaker 5: Yeah, no, we never overlapped.
Speaker 6: We played against the Texans multiple times when I was
Speaker 6: in New England, but when Demiko was a player here
Speaker 6: as as a matter of fact, we played against Philadelphia
Speaker 6: when he played for I want to think he was
Speaker 6: playing for Chip. Yeah, we played them during the regular
Speaker 6: season there at one point. But as far as that,
Speaker 6: I mean, we didn't have any of it. Say, we
Speaker 6: knew of each other.
Speaker 2: Sure, but there wasn't some long relationship with twenty years.
Speaker 6: No, No, we didn't know each other. I'd say on
Speaker 6: a personal level. It was just more of kind of
Speaker 6: from afar and you respect. You know what a coach
Speaker 6: does when you watch their team play. You know, we
Speaker 6: played against San Francisco in twenty he was it twenty
Speaker 6: one when we played against them in my first year here,
Speaker 6: went out there and played against them. So then you
Speaker 6: just start to accumulate information. You know, we made the change.
Speaker 6: You know, we put a lot of say, thought and
Speaker 6: effort into it, and you know there are a number
Speaker 6: of people that are involved in that process, and you
Speaker 6: know we went through that process.
Speaker 5: And you know there was he was.
Speaker 6: He stood out amongst the would say a pretty good
Speaker 6: group of candidates for a myriad of reasons. I think
Speaker 6: the big thing and that there's a lot of people
Speaker 6: in this building that were around him as a player.
Speaker 6: I would say, who he is is you know, he's.
Speaker 5: True to who he is.
Speaker 6: He has a great mindset, he has a great personality.
Speaker 6: He's genuine, he's very competitive, he cares about people.
Speaker 5: He's good at his job. He was a good player.
Speaker 6: He's invested in the city of Houston, and he had
Speaker 6: success and he was a part of winning programs. I
Speaker 6: mean what John and Kyle have done out there in
Speaker 6: San Francisco. I mean, there's not too many programs that
Speaker 6: have had his much success. So you know, when to
Speaker 6: put all those factors together, you know, we made a
Speaker 6: decision that we did. There's a lot of excitement, and
Speaker 6: you know he deserves, you know, every amount. He deserves
Speaker 6: as much credit is anybody because he's put his imprint
Speaker 6: on this team with his message and his just consistency
Speaker 6: day to day, and the players respond. They want to
Speaker 6: play for him, they want to be here. He holds
Speaker 6: him to a high standard, he holds him accountable. He
Speaker 6: cares a lot about them, regardless win or lose. It's
Speaker 6: the standard of performance has been established, the mindset has
Speaker 6: been established. We know we're not going to win every game,
Speaker 6: but are we doing the things on a week to week,
Speaker 6: day to day basis that put ourselves into position and
Speaker 6: if we.
Speaker 5: Don't, then here's the reason why. Here's the things that
Speaker 5: we need to get fixed.
Speaker 6: So, I mean, I can't say enough great things about
Speaker 6: who he is not as a coach, but as a
Speaker 6: human being as a person, and those things certainly matter
Speaker 6: when you're running a football team, when you're around each
Speaker 6: other essentially on a day to day basis for multiple
Speaker 6: months out of the year.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then he brings in Bobby Slowick as the
Speaker 1: offensive coordinator, and you think about that forty nine ers tree.
Speaker 2: You know, we've already seen.
Speaker 1: Kyle have all the success here, but like now you've
Speaker 1: got Mike Lafleur has already been elsewhere as in OC twice.
Speaker 2: You've got Mike McDaniel now flourishing. And then here's this
Speaker 2: Bobby slow who.
Speaker 1: I got to be honest, I wasn't aware of what
Speaker 1: his offense would look like because he never was necessarily
Speaker 1: calling the plays in San Francisco. And then now he
Speaker 1: comes in. You've got to be overjoyed with the connection
Speaker 1: he's had with Stroud and these young receivers.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, I think there's a propensity
Speaker 6: to kind of attach trees and well, this is going
Speaker 6: to happen. And I think the reality is when you're
Speaker 6: running a program, when you're starting a program, when you're
Speaker 6: bringing somebody in, you sort of have to make it
Speaker 6: your own.
Speaker 5: So I think all of us have a foundation.
Speaker 6: I'd say that we were raised on or who we
Speaker 6: worked under, or who we learned under philosophies how that
Speaker 6: was built. But the reality is when you go into
Speaker 6: a building and start a program and bring people in,
Speaker 6: is you're trying to put your own spin on whatever
Speaker 6: that is. And it's usually a function of the players
Speaker 6: that you have in the building and the things that
Speaker 6: they do well. So your ability to adjust to adapt.
Speaker 6: You have a core foundation the principles that are important,
Speaker 6: but the reality is you're probably going to have to
Speaker 6: bob and weave a little bit and you know, make
Speaker 6: some adjustments as you go as reading something you know,
Speaker 6: in fact, we're playing you know, Cincinnati this week with
Speaker 6: Zach and Zach has made a comment how sometimes how
Speaker 6: the offense starts at the beginning of the year looks
Speaker 6: a lot different when you get midway, and really that's
Speaker 6: sort of emblematic of what this league is about. You
Speaker 6: really have to be able to adjust and make some modifications.
Speaker 5: And adjustments to your personnel, or.
Speaker 6: If something's not going well all right, maybe figure out
Speaker 6: a different way to do it or come up with
Speaker 6: another solution. So Bobby's a very smart person, works very hard.
Speaker 6: He has an interesting perspective because he was on the
Speaker 6: defensive side of the ball, and sometimes I would say,
Speaker 6: you know, I would speak from experience. When you work
Speaker 6: on the opposite side of the ball, it gives you
Speaker 6: a better understanding of what goes on on you know,
Speaker 6: their respective side side of the coin.
Speaker 5: There.
Speaker 6: So in Bobby's case, he kind of had a background
Speaker 6: in defense. Of course, his dad has been a very
Speaker 6: successful defensive coach. His brother's down here in Miami coaching
Speaker 6: on defense. So Bobby has a really unique background.
Speaker 5: Very smart.
Speaker 6: I mean, anybody goes to Michigan Tech, like you got
Speaker 6: to be pretty smart.
Speaker 1: So I think he also works for a pro football
Speaker 1: focus for a while, I'm not mistaken, Like he was
Speaker 1: on the analytics side doing research.
Speaker 2: That's different.
Speaker 6: So you learn a lot and then when you go
Speaker 6: anytime you go into a situation, you're trying to figure out,
Speaker 6: all right, these are things that are important. We want
Speaker 6: to start here are who are the players? What are
Speaker 6: we going to do and then you know, we're eight
Speaker 6: games into the season. Now I think we have a
Speaker 6: decent idea of some of the things that you know,
Speaker 6: maybe either quarterback does well or certain players do well. Understanding,
Speaker 6: we still have nine games out of us and there's
Speaker 6: a lot of good coaches out there, so you know,
Speaker 6: we've put together Dimico's put together a great staff.
Speaker 5: They work well together.
Speaker 6: It's a good combination of youth and experience and really,
Speaker 6: whatever your background is, that's kind of your your starting point.
Speaker 6: But the reality is you're trying to create your own
Speaker 6: image of what you wanted to look like.
Speaker 2: All right, Now, let's talk about you a little bit here. Okay.
Speaker 1: You're born in lind Hurst, Ohio. All right, you're going
Speaker 1: to have to lindn Hurst, Ohio. Okay, and you're from
Speaker 1: what I call the John Cairol Mafia. You go to
Speaker 1: John Carroll where all of you guys, I feel like
Speaker 1: ninety eight percent of the gms and coaches in the
Speaker 1: league quietly went to John Carroll. You know, John, But
Speaker 1: it's not a straight shot to New England. You start
Speaker 1: off at Saginaw Valley State as a grad assistant. You
Speaker 1: end up going to Central Michigan and then you end
Speaker 1: up with the Patriots as a coach and you're coaching
Speaker 1: them for a while before making the move to moving
Speaker 1: over to the director of pro personnel. So take us
Speaker 1: through your path a little bit. Let's go from from
Speaker 1: graduating college and what you wanted to do for a
Speaker 1: living and how you got there.
Speaker 6: Yeah, so when I got to college, you know, I
Speaker 6: thought I was going to major in political science, go
Speaker 6: to law school, kind of take that route and switch
Speaker 6: my majors a few times. I think I went from
Speaker 6: marketing to finance. I enjoyed finance, even going all the
Speaker 6: way back to when I was in my senior year
Speaker 6: of high school. University school, we had to do kind
Speaker 6: of a one month internship and I did an internship
Speaker 6: at Kidder Peabody, which is not defunct. And then eventually
Speaker 6: Smith Barney worked for a guy with the name of
Speaker 6: Jeff Rotsky. Jeff actually has been a really successful high
Speaker 6: school coach. So Jeff kind of had the balance of
Speaker 6: football business, you know, where he was basically a stockbroker
Speaker 6: by day, and then he ended up coaching multiple high
Speaker 6: schools in the city at Cleveland. So anyways, so as
Speaker 6: a finance major, So I finished football December nineteen ninety
Speaker 6: eight and then started working at Merrill Lynch.
Speaker 5: I was working for. Jeff was working in finance. We
Speaker 5: had a is that right?
Speaker 2: What were you doing? Were you like a press off?
Speaker 6: And he's doing research and we had a fee base
Speaker 6: product that we were pitching at the time, so I
Speaker 6: was kind of responsible for that. You know, where you
Speaker 6: match up certain money managers. Here's a product we offer,
Speaker 6: here's the uh, here's the fund, here's some of the
Speaker 6: holdings within the fund. Essentially try to pitch that to clients.
Speaker 6: So started doing that. In January, my best friend John
Speaker 6: Priestep and I started working together. So John and I
Speaker 6: are working together, living together. John played receiver for US
Speaker 6: at John Carroll. He and I established an unbelievable friendship
Speaker 6: from the time that he arrived on camp. So John
Speaker 6: and I were working together, so we kind of had
Speaker 6: a professional life making decent money.
Speaker 1: Had the picture in subway ads and billboards like here
Speaker 1: we are, this is the two guys, the two young
Speaker 1: bros selling stock tips and yeah exactly.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 6: So while we started working, you know, I think I
Speaker 6: had an itch for football and sport, and I'd say
Speaker 6: that my the root of that is, you know, my
Speaker 6: high school coach, my high school head coach and office coordinator,
Speaker 6: John Carroll Operella got rest his soul, had a tremendous impact,
Speaker 6: I'd say on my life. He helped me as a player.
Speaker 6: He helped me via calm the player that I developed into.
Speaker 6: I mean, I wasn't very good, but he got the
Speaker 6: most out of me. I'd like to think that I
Speaker 6: worked pretty hard at football and cared a lot about football,
Speaker 6: and I love being around the sport and being around
Speaker 6: the game. So at the time I was single, I
Speaker 6: didn't have any sort of connections to anybody or anything.
Speaker 6: So I went on the football scoop or whatever. They
Speaker 6: a graduate assistant job. So I literally I drove to
Speaker 6: Concordy University, which is outside of Chicago. They interviewed there,
Speaker 6: and then I took another day trip up to Saginaw Valley.
Speaker 6: Literally didn't know a coach, didn't know anybody on staff.
Speaker 6: Just wanted to be in football. So I drove to
Speaker 6: Saganaw Valley, met with coach or Randy Ori, I was
Speaker 6: a head coach at the time. I went over there
Speaker 6: over the summer, said coach, look, I just just want
Speaker 6: to be in football. I just want to be involved.
Speaker 6: I'll take whatever job you have available. They had posted
Speaker 6: a position. It was an offensive grad assistant position or
Speaker 6: whatever it was. And then by the and along with that,
Speaker 6: I was able to pursue an NBA you know, so
Speaker 6: I could coach. I could still work on some schooling.
Speaker 6: So it was kind of two for one. I'd say,
Speaker 6: two areas that I was fairly passionate about. So started
Speaker 6: Saganaw Valley.
Speaker 1: Let me just put this in the perspective. So, you're
Speaker 1: making real money living in a city, right, You're living
Speaker 1: in Cleveland.
Speaker 2: We're living Yeah.
Speaker 6: I was making a decent amount of money at the time. Yeah,
Speaker 6: and then I took a graduate assistant position. I think
Speaker 6: it was making I don't know, twenty five hundred dollars
Speaker 6: a year, so.
Speaker 2: Twenty five hundred a year. But think about this you had.
Speaker 1: It's very easy though, for you to say, you know what,
Speaker 1: I've got a job, I've got a nice apartment paying
Speaker 1: my rent.
Speaker 2: I mean, Cleveland's cool city with my best friend. But
Speaker 2: the football which was so great that you gave it
Speaker 2: all up and drove with no connection to Saginaw Valley
Speaker 2: State to work for next to nothing, just to get
Speaker 2: your foot in the door.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and I think a lot of us have been
Speaker 6: in the same situation. But I'd say going back to John,
Speaker 6: I'd say his family was a huge impact. They essentially,
Speaker 6: you know, helped me over a two year period. And
Speaker 6: John is from outside of Detroit, so he had family there.
Speaker 6: So that was the only people that I really knew.
Speaker 6: And you know, John was supported. Here's my best friend
Speaker 6: working together. He was supporting as anybody. So I went
Speaker 6: up to Saginaw Valley. We actually had a pretty good
Speaker 6: team my second year, so working on offense, kind of
Speaker 6: working with the running backs, handling some of the special teams,
Speaker 6: and then I was also going to class at night,
Speaker 6: and I loved it. I mean, I was in football,
Speaker 6: I was going to school. I think I'm a pretty
Speaker 6: curious individual in nature like learning. So two seasons at
Speaker 6: Saginaw Valley and then in January of twenty it would
Speaker 6: have been twenty excuse me, two thousand and one, there
Speaker 6: was a grad assistant position available at Central Michigan. And
Speaker 6: the reason I came across that was typically when you're
Speaker 6: a grad assistant and you're a college coach, you work
Speaker 6: summer camps that's your way to make a few. So
Speaker 6: worked a football camp at Central Michigan University when Mike
Speaker 6: the Board was a coach there, and then Butch Jones
Speaker 6: was a running backs coach at Central Michigan. So Butch
Speaker 6: and I had kind of maintained contact.
Speaker 5: So he was at Central Michigan.
Speaker 6: So through communication, through dialogue and discussion, he had mentioned
Speaker 6: that there was potentially a GA position that was available.
Speaker 6: So from January oh one till June so I was
Speaker 6: a great I had assistant at Central Michigan. I started
Speaker 6: working on a defensive side of the ball with the
Speaker 6: outside linebackers and John Mulligan was a defensive coordinator at
Speaker 6: the time. We actually had a really good stat John
Speaker 6: Mulligan was a defensive coordinator. Scott Leffler was the head
Speaker 6: coach a Bowling Green it was kind of quarterbacks coach coach.
Speaker 6: Butch Jones was he, you know, was the running backs coach,
Speaker 6: and Mike the Board who coach had you know, he's
Speaker 6: been an office coordinator and the SEC's been a head coach.
Speaker 5: So so started.
Speaker 6: So during the day I would I would go up
Speaker 6: there and do football, and then in the evening I
Speaker 6: would drive from Mount Pleasant to Saginaw and take my
Speaker 6: classes two or three times a week.
Speaker 1: So you stayed in Saginaw, but you were coaching at
Speaker 1: Central Michigan.
Speaker 7: How long?
Speaker 2: How far is that?
Speaker 6: It was about a forty five minute to sixty minute drive,
Speaker 6: so I didn't go back and forth.
Speaker 5: So it was in my apartment in Mount Pleasant.
Speaker 6: So I worked during the day and then if I
Speaker 6: had class, I think it was like two or three
Speaker 6: times a week, I'd go take class and then I
Speaker 6: come back. And that was kind of my routine for
Speaker 6: six months in the spring.
Speaker 5: It's because I wanted to finish Miami.
Speaker 1: He's going to say, why did you? Why did you
Speaker 1: through that NBA so aggressive? Was there always in the
Speaker 1: back of your head, like, well, if this doesn't work out,
Speaker 1: or is it just you always wanted it?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 6: I would say I was interested in finance as interested
Speaker 6: in business, and I kind of started down that path.
Speaker 6: And my you know, my mom and dad always taught me,
Speaker 6: once you start something, you need to finish.
Speaker 5: So I did you know, I can very easily could have.
Speaker 6: Walked away, but I invested eighteen months of my time,
Speaker 6: so you know, I was, you know, this semester out,
Speaker 6: so I said there's no way I'm not going to
Speaker 6: do this. So and coach the board was great. He
Speaker 6: understood kind of my predicament that I was in. So,
Speaker 6: you know, education, I would say, is a big part
Speaker 6: of my life, but a lot of time, you know,
Speaker 6: and be able to message that to my daughters certainly
Speaker 6: be important.
Speaker 5: So I was able to finish my MBA.
Speaker 6: Like I said, I'm interested in finance, I'm interested in investments.
Speaker 5: I was at the time. I still am to this day.
Speaker 6: So finished off that kind of January until June, and
Speaker 6: then in February of one. At the time, Josh had
Speaker 6: been hired by New England to be kind of QC
Speaker 6: quality control. So obviously our relationship goes back to our
Speaker 6: time together at you know, John Carroll, so that he
Speaker 6: had mentioned that, hey, there might be an opportunity in
Speaker 6: New England as a scouting assistant. Would you be interested
Speaker 6: in kind of play a personnel And at the time
Speaker 6: I had no idea what player personnel in the NFL
Speaker 6: was like zero, Like no idea.
Speaker 2: Did you even?
Speaker 1: I mean, so, so Josh McDaniels is working there already
Speaker 1: and you get this call and you're thinking, was it
Speaker 1: was the NFL even a thought.
Speaker 5: No, Peter, not at all.
Speaker 6: I mean I was certainly happy enjoying what I was
Speaker 6: doing in college. I thought, Okay, my next opportunity, maybe
Speaker 6: I can get a full time position in college football somewhere,
Speaker 6: maybe be a position coach or strict at earnings or
Speaker 6: whatever the natural progression was.
Speaker 5: So so I was.
Speaker 6: Working through Central Central and then you know, the middle
Speaker 6: of it was like June, June. We were just about
Speaker 6: to finish up, you know, and Josh said, hey, look,
Speaker 6: you know there's a position. Would you be interested? And
Speaker 6: I said, sure, I'll come up in interview, so I'll
Speaker 6: never forget. I got the call Nancy Meyer, who's one
Speaker 6: of to this day one of my best friends, who
Speaker 6: i'd say has the biggest influence in my life as anybody.
Speaker 6: So she connected me. Scott at the time was overseeing
Speaker 6: personnel and New Yeah. So Nancy said, hey, can you
Speaker 6: get on a flight in Detroit at whatever time it was?
Speaker 6: I said, yeah, no problem, this is probably midday, so
Speaker 6: and Detroit was probably two to two and a half hour.
Speaker 6: I mean, give her to I can't exactly, but it's
Speaker 6: a decent drive for Mount Pleasant to Detroit.
Speaker 5: And I said yeah, no problem, I'll I'll figure it out.
Speaker 5: So it was like a late evening flight, late afternoon flight.
Speaker 6: Grabbed my suit and went to the UH went to
Speaker 6: the airport, changed into my suit in a stall in
Speaker 6: the men's mentathroom, and then got on the plane. Got
Speaker 6: there that night, and then interviewed the next day. It
Speaker 6: was in scouting. It was a player of personnel assistant,
Speaker 6: so all the things that go along with that. I
Speaker 6: would say responsibility, scouting assistant, personnel assistant.
Speaker 5: Whenever you want to terament. So went up there and interviewed.
Speaker 2: You know, did you meet Belichick on that first interview?
Speaker 2: You don't even get to the Belichick level.
Speaker 6: It might have been a quick like hey, great to
Speaker 6: meet you, kind of a jove. And we were in
Speaker 6: the old Foxboro State at the time, so the offices
Speaker 6: were kind of up on a second floor. They were
Speaker 6: kind of hidden, so it was kind of a dilapidated
Speaker 6: rush for staying this but a little bit of a
Speaker 6: dilapidated setup. So anyways, so I went and interviewed, went
Speaker 6: back to UH Central and they called and they said,
Speaker 6: you know, would you be interested in this position?
Speaker 5: And I said, you know, absolutely, So went talked to
Speaker 5: coach to board.
Speaker 6: He was gracious enough to let me out and then
Speaker 6: so I was hired in the middle of June kind
Speaker 6: of two thousand and one in New England, went up
Speaker 6: there for a week or two, kind of got situated
Speaker 6: at organized, and then that fall of two thousand, training
Speaker 6: camp two thousand and one started. I'd say, really kind
Speaker 6: of got off to an inauspicious start if you were,
Speaker 6: you know, with coach Ravine passed away in literally a
Speaker 6: week of training camp, so there was sort of a
Speaker 6: recalibration and reallocation of responsibilities. So and at the time
Speaker 6: it was just whatever I'm asked to do, I'm going
Speaker 6: to do it. So they literally handed me a playbook
Speaker 6: and at the time we were literally hand right and
Speaker 6: breaking down the film. I think coach Dable Brian went
Speaker 6: through this, Josh went through it, where you literally you
Speaker 6: diagram each play all twenty two players, the play the alignments,
Speaker 6: the technique, the term. So one game took you literally
Speaker 6: six to eight hours to break down. This isn't you know,
Speaker 6: jump on a computer and input the information and evaluate
Speaker 6: the data. So and I didn't have any background in
Speaker 6: the system. I literally just got on campus. So they
Speaker 6: literally handed me a playbook and said, you're going to
Speaker 6: break the film down for the offensive staff. That's going
Speaker 6: to be your job during the year. So part of
Speaker 6: my job that was to stay a week ahead, so
Speaker 6: I would do three or four games and the opponent,
Speaker 6: and then by Friday before the Sunday game, I had
Speaker 6: to hand that to Charlie White, who was the offensive
Speaker 6: coording at the time, so that he could kind of
Speaker 6: start his preparation. So I was sort of the sort
Speaker 6: of the first introduction to the opponent. So did that
Speaker 6: responsibility all year in addition to my personnel kind of
Speaker 6: scouting assistant assignments. So that was my first year in
Speaker 6: the NFL, and you know, it just kind of kept
Speaker 6: I would say, snowballing from there. And then I would say,
Speaker 6: I don't want to say each year the job kind
Speaker 6: of changed or my role kind of changed, but I
Speaker 6: mean the thought process was trying to show up, try
Speaker 6: to put a good product out there, just work as
Speaker 6: hard as possible I can and make them, you know,
Speaker 6: want to keep me around, understanding nothing is guaranteed. I
Speaker 6: mean I think I was making you know, fourteen thousand
Speaker 6: dollars my first year in the NFL, and make work
Speaker 6: full time in the NFL. Living in Boston, I mean
Speaker 6: I get an apartment with Actually I live with Clay Barnetts.
Speaker 6: So Clay Gary Barnett's sun was a successful a coach
Speaker 6: at Colorado. So we literally we were in a vacated
Speaker 6: two story building that got turned into apartments, like an
Speaker 6: industrial building got turned into apartments where the windows there
Speaker 6: was no locks, so you could open up and down
Speaker 6: and you could climb like literally through the windows, like
Speaker 6: if you wanted to. So matter of fact, I was
Speaker 6: locked out of the apartment one day and the only
Speaker 6: way get in.
Speaker 5: Was climb through the windows. So we lived in Providence.
Speaker 6: My first year is a thirty minute commute from Providence
Speaker 6: to Foxboro Stadium.
Speaker 2: He probably lived at the facility though, right, I mean
Speaker 2: who we.
Speaker 5: Can't exactly exactly, so you're there.
Speaker 6: I mean I was twenty whatever I was at the time,
Speaker 6: so I had nothing else going on.
Speaker 5: So that was my first year.
Speaker 1: And can I throw out some names? So like your
Speaker 1: first year there, I think Brady's a backup. He's already
Speaker 1: been there a year. BLEDSOE goes down, where were you
Speaker 1: for that?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 6: No, we were playing the Jets, so you know, we
Speaker 6: had the whole nine to eleven situation that we were
Speaker 6: going through. Actually, so before we get to plane the Jets.
Speaker 6: So you know, part of my responsibility as a scouting
Speaker 6: assistant was when we brought players in for workouts on Tuesday,
Speaker 6: was to transport them back and forth from the stadium
Speaker 6: to the hospital. So the Mass General Hospital is right
Speaker 6: in Boston Foxboro Stadium, you know, call it thirty minutes
Speaker 6: outside of Boston or so, so we had a group
Speaker 6: of players in nine to eleven. So I was driving
Speaker 6: to the airport and quarter to nine nine o'clock, just
Speaker 6: as the plane hours, I was parking the car in
Speaker 6: the garage of Mass General Hospital and we started to
Speaker 6: get some information like what's going on. So we had
Speaker 6: a handful of players that were in so they got
Speaker 6: their physicals, then drove back to the stadium and then
Speaker 6: obviously everybody has their attention turned to what was going
Speaker 6: on in the television.
Speaker 5: So that was that day.
Speaker 6: So it was the week if we were supposed to
Speaker 6: play the Jets that week, and then that game got canceled,
Speaker 6: right so then we you know, shifted gears moved it
Speaker 6: to the following week. So during home games, I would
Speaker 6: go up in the press box and then I would
Speaker 6: actually kind of for self scouting purposes, chart our game
Speaker 6: so that could in put it into the system, you know,
Speaker 6: the following morning. So during the game, like that's what
Speaker 6: I was doing. So I was up there just charting
Speaker 6: a game, going through the.
Speaker 2: Game, Lewis Knox Blood so what's I mean?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, and then.
Speaker 6: Just kind of like all right, I'm just going to
Speaker 6: kind of keep doing my work and kind of preparing
Speaker 6: for tomorrow. And you know, Tom went in and you know,
Speaker 6: we actually almost won a game there at the end.
Speaker 6: And then you know, the following week we were owing two.
Speaker 6: Played the Colts, Okay, who were I mean, one of
Speaker 6: the best teams, one of the best offense in the
Speaker 6: league at the time with Peyton and Marvins.
Speaker 5: And the group that they had.
Speaker 6: So that was kind of my first introduction to the
Speaker 6: NFL the regular season, and then you know, fortunately I
Speaker 6: was able to stay in one place for twenty some
Speaker 6: odd years before I got here to Houston.
Speaker 2: You couldn't have been too much older than Brady, Like
Speaker 2: I would imagine you're a couple of years older than him,
Speaker 2: did you, guys?
Speaker 5: It's close?
Speaker 1: Would you guys bes like, was that like a division
Speaker 1: of labor.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I wasn't hanging out with the players, so to
Speaker 6: stay as far away from the players as possible to
Speaker 6: try to do my job. You know, I think there's
Speaker 6: a certain professionalism that you know, you respect the players
Speaker 6: and their privacy and what they're there to do. And
Speaker 6: my job was to work and focus on my job
Speaker 6: and not worry about things that you know, quite frankly
Speaker 6: don't matter. So because in the end, I think this
Speaker 6: league is about work. So if you keep the focus
Speaker 6: on work, keep the focus on the things that are important,
Speaker 6: Like that's the most important thing.
Speaker 2: All right, give me a Vrabel story.
Speaker 5: Actually I might.
Speaker 6: You know, so I the first year, my first year
Speaker 6: with the team was when you know, Scott and Bill
Speaker 6: has signed Mike in a free agency, so that I
Speaker 6: think we sent it up signing I don't know, twenty three,
Speaker 6: twenty four to twenty five players that year is free agents.
Speaker 6: So I mean Mike came in and then Mike would
Speaker 6: go through his kind of pregame warm up routine. So
Speaker 6: it kind of evolved into me throwing routes to Mike
Speaker 6: his I'd say warm up, you know, and he'd always
Speaker 6: make the comment about Hines Ward and his hands were
Speaker 6: as good as heines word hard to refute that when.
Speaker 5: You go back to his history. But Mike was Mike
Speaker 5: was as tough as a come. He was as smart
Speaker 5: as a come. He was as tough as a come.
Speaker 5: He was very instinctive.
Speaker 6: He cared a lot about football, but he and he
Speaker 6: had a great sense of humor, and he worked his
Speaker 6: ass off in practice. I would say that team there
Speaker 6: probably you know three, you know four with Rodney, Mike Willie, like,
Speaker 6: Mike would go back during practice, so when the offense
Speaker 6: was going against the defensive look team working on the
Speaker 6: cards for the next opponent, Mike would go back there
Speaker 6: at free safety just to give Brady a hard time,
Speaker 6: to try to make him work, to try to simulate.
Speaker 6: And he'd take a lot of pride and a lot
Speaker 6: of joy out of that. So and he'd talk a
Speaker 6: lot of trash during practice. But I mean, Mike cares
Speaker 6: about football a ton, and I think you see the
Speaker 6: way the Titans play, they kind of play to Mike's
Speaker 6: personality and you saw that. And Mike was a player
Speaker 6: like whatever he was asked to do, he did it.
Speaker 6: He played outside linebacker in three to four. Then we
Speaker 6: needed him an inside linebacker, and Bill told him, look,
Speaker 6: you're going to play inside linebacker and based defense. Mike
Speaker 6: had really never played inside linebacker before, but he went
Speaker 6: in there and he played well because that was the
Speaker 6: best thing for the team. And I think because of
Speaker 6: his intelligence, because of his instinctiveness, he was able to
Speaker 6: go in there and function. And then we you know,
Speaker 6: Charlie and Bill, you know, and go linees. John Rump
Speaker 6: in their situations put him in there a tight end.
Speaker 6: So you're trying to create as much value and versatility
Speaker 6: as a player, and I'd say Mike was certainly emblematic
Speaker 6: of that. And I think those are the always the
Speaker 6: situations that are hard. You know, Mike was there for
Speaker 6: or you know, on O nine and you know then
Speaker 6: the decision was made to to move on from him.
Speaker 6: You know, those are always, would say, the tough decisions
Speaker 6: that you have to make, and you know that the
Speaker 6: organization has to go through. Mike went on have a
Speaker 6: few more productive years and then he started his career
Speaker 6: in coaching, and you know, Mike's one of the best
Speaker 6: coaches we have in this league.
Speaker 2: Sure, you know, it's amazing.
Speaker 1: So you progressed in your career going on, and everyone
Speaker 1: knows Belichick as the greatest coach of all time, but
Speaker 1: he's got a KNIGHTE for personnel too. For the listeners,
Speaker 1: Bill Belichick as the evaluator, what did you learn from him?
Speaker 1: And you know how how important is he in playing
Speaker 1: a role in your career as you've been guided through
Speaker 1: that New England system that eventually in Houston.
Speaker 5: Now, yeah, massive.
Speaker 6: I think he's so invested in every aspect of the process.
Speaker 5: It's it's rare.
Speaker 6: I mean, it's uncommon, the level of detail, the overall understanding.
Speaker 6: So I think one of the things that I learned
Speaker 6: from him was, among many things, was just the big
Speaker 6: picture perspective of understanding all different pieces and phases fit together,
Speaker 6: from offense to understanding what's going on defense defense, understanding
Speaker 6: what offenses are trying to do, how they use personnel,
Speaker 6: what are some of the things that are important, how
Speaker 6: to evaluate players, how to focus on their strengths, what
Speaker 6: are some of the things that they do well? And
Speaker 6: I think just the breath and overall understanding of players
Speaker 6: in the league. You'd be hard pressed to find anybody
Speaker 6: who has that type of mental acuity as Bill has.
Speaker 5: So I mean it taught me a lot.
Speaker 6: And I think you know the fact that he had
Speaker 6: enough faith and confidence and trust and you know what
Speaker 6: I brought to the table. I mean certainly speaks to
Speaker 6: his humility and just allowing people to do their jobs.
Speaker 6: So I mean we could spend you know, one podcast
Speaker 6: talking about the things offense Bill, but I'd say his
Speaker 6: just level and depth understanding of every aspect of football,
Speaker 6: from you know, coaching what the punt team should look like,
Speaker 6: to the technique that you need to understanding you know,
Speaker 6: what should happen on this double team block or the
Speaker 6: three technique, the backup three technique, and what are his
Speaker 6: strengths and how the team is going to use him.
Speaker 6: So just his overall breath and understanding of multiple aspects.
Speaker 6: What that taught me was, Okay, you want to have
Speaker 6: is why the scope as possible? Just understanding because any
Speaker 6: end it's a players German league, it's very personnel driven league,
Speaker 6: and I think everybody has their own way that they
Speaker 6: evaluate players, or how they view the game or how
Speaker 6: they you know, how they go through preparing for an opponent.
Speaker 6: But I would say just team philosophy, understanding coordinators that
Speaker 6: typically spills over into how they call a game, it
Speaker 6: spills over into how they assemble the team. So those
Speaker 6: are all some things I think that you know, over
Speaker 6: the course of twenty some odd years, you saw that
Speaker 6: and they kind of was able to develop my own
Speaker 6: process and you know realize, okay, well this is didn't work.
Speaker 5: Here's a reason why. Just understanding the why behind it.
Speaker 6: So you know, I can't thank billing Off for the
Speaker 6: opportunity that he provided for not only myself but a
Speaker 6: number of people that have been in that building through
Speaker 6: the years.
Speaker 1: All Right, so you're in New England for nearly twenty years,
Speaker 1: you're a rising star, and I tak for the last
Speaker 1: ten of those twenty your names. Your name would come
Speaker 1: up every year for the GM candidacy at some team
Speaker 1: and it was always all right, there's this Candidcate and
Speaker 1: then Nick Casara, we he'll never leave New England or
Speaker 1: is this going to be the time he finally does
Speaker 1: leave New England. You took the Houston job, you went
Speaker 1: for it. What was so compelling and what was so
Speaker 1: appealing to that Houston job that you finally left the
Speaker 1: Foxborough I'd say friendly confines of where you were comfortable
Speaker 1: and where you'd raised a family and your daughter's got
Speaker 1: to go to school in the same school, and everything
Speaker 1: you want in a career you left.
Speaker 2: Finally you took the leap. Why Houston.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think you know, our family has been very blessed.
Speaker 6: I mean what this league is done for us. I mean,
Speaker 6: we certainly can't repay the people that will provide the opportunities.
Speaker 6: And I think we all you don't want to check
Speaker 6: challenge ourselves, and you know, sometimes you need to make
Speaker 6: decisions that you know, quite frankly, you know, puts you
Speaker 6: maybe out of your comfort zone. Because anytime you take
Speaker 6: on a new situation of going to something new, there's
Speaker 6: typically a reason that they're sort of starting over because
Speaker 6: things aren't going all that well. But you know, there
Speaker 6: had been some opportunities at different points. I mean, you know,
Speaker 6: you know, Houston was a team that you know, and
Speaker 6: mister McNair was here.
Speaker 5: You know, they had expressed some interests.
Speaker 6: Or some sentiments, and you know, when Billy was here
Speaker 6: for a period of time, I mean, you know, there
Speaker 6: was some things, some dalliances through the years, and I
Speaker 6: think as we kind of got to the end, it
Speaker 6: was an opportunity that.
Speaker 5: You know, we thought might be a chance.
Speaker 6: To build something here, you know, from the ground up
Speaker 6: after twenty some odd years. So I think more than anything,
Speaker 6: more but curiosity and the challenge in front of us.
Speaker 6: And you know, i'd say the reputation ownership that they
Speaker 6: had in terms of providing people with the opportunity, you know,
Speaker 6: they deserve so anyway, so you know, we out here
Speaker 6: in twenty twenty one, you know, candidly, I mean the
Speaker 6: first couple of years probably didn't go the way that
Speaker 6: any of us would have hoped. But I think the
Speaker 6: one thing that you you do, you hope you just
Speaker 6: learn along the way and you just got to make
Speaker 6: it work. You got to figure it out. So just
Speaker 6: take it one day at a time. Just be disciplined,
Speaker 6: just be consistent, you know, try to make good decisions.
Speaker 6: If it's not going the way that you either wanted
Speaker 6: to or hope to, you know, do something to get
Speaker 6: it fixed. So, you know, it's a team that had
Speaker 6: had some success at different points. You know, i'd say
Speaker 6: be remiss. I mean, look, th realit. We've faced a
Speaker 6: lot of challenges here, you know, the last couple of years.
Speaker 6: But I think we've worked.
Speaker 1: Do you feel like there's a light now, Like it's
Speaker 1: funny because I don't want to say it was so
Speaker 1: dark because in the moment you don't look at it
Speaker 1: that way. But through the Watson stuff, through the Watson trade,
Speaker 1: through those different coaching stats, and now it's like people
Speaker 1: are talking about the Texans in there, this fun, young,
Speaker 1: energetic team, and of course you would have loved that
Speaker 1: from go, but it's almost like you had to walk
Speaker 1: through the mud to get to this point.
Speaker 2: Does it feel that way?
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think the reality is, Peter, things are never
Speaker 6: as bad or good as you think they are or
Speaker 6: people make them out to be. So I'd say everybody
Speaker 6: has challenges that they face on a day to day basis.
Speaker 6: Every program is going to have to deal with something.
Speaker 6: I think what we have to do is just try
Speaker 6: to fix problems and find solutions, and sometimes it takes
Speaker 6: a few steps back in order to go forward. I
Speaker 6: think there's a lot of people that invested a lot
Speaker 6: of time into this building, through a lot of good people,
Speaker 6: you know, and I think the players have remained committed
Speaker 6: through sort of the ups and downs. You know, when
Speaker 6: you bring Demico into the building with the you know,
Speaker 6: his mindset, his attitudes infectious, and it's about the players.
Speaker 6: So continue, hopefully, we continue to add good players into
Speaker 6: the building with the right thought process, with the right mindset,
Speaker 6: that are committed to winning, that put the team, you know,
Speaker 6: above themselves, because in the end, that's what it takes,
Speaker 6: is reading a quote or you know, after you know,
Speaker 6: the Rangers won the World Series. You know, Boach made
Speaker 6: a comment, you know, just about like the selflessness of
Speaker 6: his team that they don't care about like who gets
Speaker 6: the credit. They care about each each other and it's
Speaker 6: not about you know, who did what. And you know,
Speaker 6: when you have multiple people and multiple players that have
Speaker 6: that mindset and you overlay allow over they overlay that
Speaker 6: with a competitive nature, you're going to give yourself a chance.
Speaker 6: I mean, your reality is this league is so damn competitive.
Speaker 5: I mean, the.
Speaker 6: Margins are very small, and it's designed for everybody to
Speaker 6: kind of be in the middle. It's kind of where
Speaker 6: we are now, and there's some outliers on both sides.
Speaker 6: So you just want to put yourself in a position
Speaker 6: where you give yourself a chance. I mean, what going
Speaker 6: into last week, was it seventy five percent or eighty
Speaker 6: percent of the games in week seven or eight.
Speaker 5: Or one score games in the fourth quarter.
Speaker 6: So I think that speaks to the competitive nature of
Speaker 6: our league for the amount of i'd say good good coaches,
Speaker 6: good players, and so you're either going to rise to
Speaker 6: the challenge and embrace that or you're going to cower
Speaker 6: and walk away. So again, regardless of how bad or
Speaker 6: good people think it's going or it looks on the surface,
Speaker 6: you got to find the silver lining somewhere and you
Speaker 6: just got to find solutions and just keep people moving
Speaker 6: in the right direction. Understanding that you know, you can't
Speaker 6: accomplish anything by yourself.
Speaker 5: It's going to take a team effort.
Speaker 6: So if you can just get as many people with
Speaker 6: that mindset, and quite frankly, I kind of view my
Speaker 6: role as just to kind of be a facilitator. Sure,
Speaker 6: sort of get out of the way, just sort of
Speaker 6: get everything on the right track, empower the people that
Speaker 6: are here that you believe in, that you trust, and
Speaker 6: give them the opportunity to do their job. So, you know,
Speaker 6: hopefully I've been a good steward in that respect. And
Speaker 6: certainly we don't have everything figured out, and we have
Speaker 6: a lot of work in front of us, but it's
Speaker 6: always exciting when you can see the fruits of your
Speaker 6: labor at least start to come to fruition.
Speaker 1: My last question, and we're going to let you go.
Speaker 1: You've already given us more than enough time. And I'm
Speaker 1: loving this. I could do this for three hours with you.
Speaker 1: You get to the combine and you get in an
Speaker 1: elevator and there's a kid there with a tie on
Speaker 1: and an ill fitting suit and he's got a resume
Speaker 1: and a Manilla folder and he says, Hey, I what
Speaker 1: would be your thirty seconds of advice for getting into
Speaker 1: the league and how to position yourself best for you
Speaker 1: needy to someday be a general manager and NFL team.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I would say, just be yourself, be true to
Speaker 6: who you are, be authentic, and just do the work
Speaker 6: because in the end, it's going to be about the work,
Speaker 6: and try to learn and maintain as much curiosity along
Speaker 6: the way. Understanding you're going to face some challenges is
Speaker 6: not going to be easy, and wherever you start doesn't
Speaker 6: really matter because really all of us were given an
Speaker 6: opportunity to start.
Speaker 5: Once you're given an.
Speaker 6: Opportunity, ultimately it's going to be about your performance, about
Speaker 6: your mindset, about your intent on a day to day
Speaker 6: basis so and in the end, it comes back to
Speaker 6: the work.
Speaker 5: So do the work.
Speaker 6: Remain curious and take whatever opportunity comes before you because
Speaker 6: you never know where that's going to lead. And no
Speaker 6: job is too small. Don't think your first step is
Speaker 6: the most important step. So just be willing to take
Speaker 6: it and dive right in and jump in and understanding
Speaker 6: that you know it.
Speaker 5: Could lead you astray, but just keep working and don't
Speaker 5: lose hope.
Speaker 6: And if you really believe in what you want to accomplish,
Speaker 6: you know there's a lot of people that are going
Speaker 6: to be there to help you along the way.
Speaker 2: So just like to you know, bring it back to
Speaker 2: my industry.
Speaker 1: In the sports media, it's everyone wants to be on TV,
Speaker 1: everyone wants to write for the New York Times, everyone
Speaker 1: wants to be calling games. But you just said something,
Speaker 1: No job is too small, Like the jobs that I
Speaker 1: had in my twenties. If I don't do those, I'm
Speaker 1: tucking blogging for websites that don't exist, and writing for
Speaker 1: free newspapers in New York City, then we don't get
Speaker 1: to the point we're at now where we're doing the podcast.
Speaker 2: We have a show.
Speaker 1: And I think Nick and our worlds are similar and
Speaker 1: parallel that like, yeah, everyone thinks they can do it,
Speaker 1: but you gotta wait your time, and you also have
Speaker 1: to put the work in.
Speaker 6: You need to have patience, you need to have the
Speaker 6: right attitude, you have to have the right mindset, and
Speaker 6: you know, quite frankly, like you have to put the
Speaker 6: ego aside. Just because you work in the NFL, just
Speaker 6: because you work in the TV industry, quite frankly, it
Speaker 6: doesn't really mean anything.
Speaker 5: And that's why I guarantees us is the next day.
Speaker 6: And again it's about opportunity and it goes back and look,
Speaker 6: you guys, you know, you guys have a great show
Speaker 6: because you put the work in and it takes a
Speaker 6: lot of work behind the scenes, and candidly, not everybody
Speaker 6: is cut out for that, but you've put the time in,
Speaker 6: You've put yourself in a position, and you know, it's
Speaker 6: a credit to your mindset because again, none of us
Speaker 6: were given anything in life, period.
Speaker 5: So it's about what we do with those opportunities.
Speaker 6: And reality is there's a lot of people that are
Speaker 6: helping us along the way, and those are the people
Speaker 6: that we need to lean on. The most and tell
Speaker 6: them how much we care about them and tell them
Speaker 6: how much we love them. So a lot of respect
Speaker 6: for you know what you've done and what you guys
Speaker 6: have accomplished. I mean, you know, all seriousness. You've got
Speaker 6: one of the great shows on television because of the
Speaker 6: people and because of the work. And it's no different
Speaker 6: than any end. It's about the people and it's about
Speaker 6: the work, and that's the reality of it.
Speaker 1: You know, my feelings about you as a man, and
Speaker 1: I respect you as what you're doing in Houston. It
Speaker 1: feels like the bedrock is there now and you guys
Speaker 1: are building something and I'm excited to watch it. Last
Speaker 1: night's game, yesday's game was exciting, and it's just a
Speaker 1: I think it's just a window and what could be
Speaker 1: the future for the Houston Texans, all those young players
Speaker 1: and just to throw some more on it, like Dalton
Speaker 1: Schultz making plays and Nico Collins making plays and Mark
Speaker 1: seeing guys like Shaquille.
Speaker 2: Griffin, like these are not just rookies.
Speaker 5: You have some.
Speaker 1: Veteran acquisitions that are making plays too. And I love
Speaker 1: the makeup with the team and Nick, I really appreciate
Speaker 1: you coming on during the season.
Speaker 2: We'll do this again in the offseason.
Speaker 1: I feel like we're going to go through your career
Speaker 1: more but an hour of your time after the biggest
Speaker 1: Texans win in probably two years.
Speaker 2: I so appreciate it.
Speaker 6: Man, Thank you, you best for Peter, Thank you, and
Speaker 6: keep j mack in line.
Speaker 2: Real quick, mccordy, real quick.
Speaker 1: What was your scouting report on mccorty, because you didn't
Speaker 1: draft him out of ten out of Rutgers, but he
Speaker 1: did eventually sign him as a free agent.
Speaker 6: Love j Mack, him and Devin. I mean, you're not
Speaker 6: gonna find too better. I'll give you a quick story
Speaker 6: on James. Actually, so he got released. I want to
Speaker 6: say Cleveland. It was Cleveland. I think he was in Cleveland.
Speaker 6: They released him. It was in May or whatever it was.
Speaker 6: And before he was released, I walked into Bill's office
Speaker 6: and said, hey, what do you think Mac? And you know,
Speaker 6: he said, hey, all right, let's look at it's take
Speaker 6: a look at it. So we ended up trading for
Speaker 6: him before he was released, just to get him in
Speaker 6: the building. And I would say everything that you all
Speaker 6: are seeing. I mean, you're to talk about salt of
Speaker 6: the earth and just a great human being. I mean
Speaker 6: him and them actor like it's just you don't find
Speaker 6: people like that. So we were excited and ecstatic to
Speaker 6: get Jason in the building because I mean, he'd been
Speaker 6: a good player at Tennessee. You know, in Cleveland, he
Speaker 6: had some injuries, didn't work out, but he helped our
Speaker 6: team immensely, and he you know, he you know, he
Speaker 6: went through some tough times. I mean, there's another talk
Speaker 6: about somebody that went through some tough time. Yeah, went
Speaker 6: through some tough times at Tennessee. And then we were
Speaker 6: fortunate to get him in New England and you know,
Speaker 6: end up going to the super Bowl, and you know,
Speaker 6: to have him and Devin celebrate together, you know, it
Speaker 6: was a pretty special moment.
Speaker 1: He might make the biggest play in this super bill.
Speaker 1: He knocks the pass from Brandon Cooks and he darts
Speaker 1: off his man to go make it. I've been honored
Speaker 1: and blessed to be his teammate now for two years,
Speaker 1: and I was so proud of him yesterday. Who's calling
Speaker 1: the game. And you know, I don't search social media
Speaker 1: for my own, but I just typed it his and
Speaker 1: it was universal praise.
Speaker 2: I was like, just like, that's my guy who he
Speaker 2: des it was great. All right, Nick Seria, this is awesome.
Speaker 7: Man.
Speaker 1: Go do your thing and you got a game against
Speaker 1: the Bengals. We're on to Cincinnati. Is such a familiar refrain.
Speaker 1: Good luck, my truth.
Speaker 7: Thanks guys.
Speaker 1: It's time for delivering results presented by Uber Eats. Each
Speaker 1: week we give out an award for who delivered results.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go one might not be an obvious one.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go with the Cleveland Browns defense. Another shutout,
Speaker 1: another win, twenty seven to nothing, complete destruction of the
Speaker 1: Arizona Cardinals, held the Cardinals under seventy yards of offense.
Speaker 2: Are you serious?
Speaker 1: Jim Schwartz is the man in front, But of course
Speaker 1: you've got guys like Miles, Garrett and Emerson and Ward.
Speaker 1: This team is legit. They If the playoffs were to
Speaker 1: start today, the Cleveland Browns would be in. And you
Speaker 1: know what their defense is leading the way. That was
Speaker 1: delivering results presented by Uber eats, where you get almost
Speaker 1: almost anything, the official on demand delivery partner of the NFL.
Speaker 1: Order Now, Fun Interview, Fun Podcast, Rare Monday one.
Speaker 2: Aaron, always a pleasure with you.
Speaker 1: Jason English, our friend from the iHeart Team is not here,
Speaker 1: so we will have to give him crap for that.
Speaker 1: Shout out to everybody out west and Arizona football continues
Speaker 1: to win. That is the official team of the season
Speaker 1: with Peter Scheger. We had Jedfish on August fourteenth. They
Speaker 1: have been one of the best surprises of college football.
Speaker 1: Matt Schneider, Jason Kleinman, our executives out on the LA
Speaker 1: side of things. They are Arizona football fans and Arizona alums.
Speaker 1: I know they listen to this podcast. Another win, another
Speaker 1: victory for Jedfish. Bear down, and then for all the
Speaker 1: folks who are listening, please subscribe.
Speaker 2: Tell your friends really help. I really appreciate it. See
Speaker 2: you next week.
Speaker 1: The Season with Peter Schrager is a production of the
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