Speaker 1: If you were a character in the office, who would
Speaker 1: you be? I'd probably be you. Secretly, everyone thinks, oh,
Speaker 1: he's not the sharpest tool in the shed. But you know,
Speaker 1: I know how you got that money to buy that bar.
Speaker 1: At the end, you're basically in the whole time, you're
Speaker 1: the smartest one there. All right, Well, listen, that's a theory. Hi.
Speaker 1: I'm Julian Edelman, twelve year NFL veteran for the New
Speaker 1: England Patriots, three times Super Bowl champion, Super Bowl m
Speaker 1: v P producer, content creator, analyst on Inside the End. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: we get it. You're a stud streaming on Paramount. Okay, okay,
Speaker 1: Julian and lastly transitioning into one of the hosts of
Speaker 1: the greatest forced podcast of all time, named Games with Names,
Speaker 1: on a mission to find the best game to dog
Speaker 1: of all time. Greatest of all games. Yeah, that's me.
Speaker 1: How you guys doing, Hello, my friends, and welcome to
Speaker 1: a very exciting episode of Off the Beat Sports. As always,
Speaker 1: it's me your host, Brian baum Gartner. Now you just
Speaker 1: got a little sneak peek from my interview today with
Speaker 1: the legendary I think we can call it that legendary
Speaker 1: New England Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman a man, well
Speaker 1: you could say, a man that really did his job
Speaker 1: over twelve seasons in the NFL, three Super Bowl wins
Speaker 1: and the distinct honor of being the m v P
Speaker 1: of Super Bowl three. But you know what, it seems
Speaker 1: like he could have just on a little bit more.
Speaker 1: Am I right? Well now he is. Julian had an
Speaker 1: incredible career on the field, and now he's expanding his
Speaker 1: reach into the wonderful world of entertainment. He's starring on
Speaker 1: Inside the NFL and now into my neck of the woods,
Speaker 1: a brand new podcast called Games with Names, which I'm
Speaker 1: excited for you to hear about. But I'm also excited
Speaker 1: to dive into our interview today. So strap it in, folks,
Speaker 1: slap on the old helmet, and uh let's get ready
Speaker 1: to hear from one of football's all time great wide receivers,
Speaker 1: Julian Edelman. Bubble and Squeak. I love it, Bubble and
Speaker 1: squeak on Bubble and Squeaker, cook it every month, left
Speaker 1: over from the nut before. What's up, Julian? How are
Speaker 1: you doing? I'm good? How are you? I'm good? I'm good.
Speaker 1: I'm just I'm out here in Los Angeles. Oh are
Speaker 1: you in Los Angeles? Now? I am, I'm in Los
Speaker 1: Angeles now. Well, you're a big entertainer now. I mean,
Speaker 1: not that you weren't before, but you know that's where
Speaker 1: the entertainers live. I hear my daughter lives out here.
Speaker 1: That's why I live out here. I'm a nor Cow kid.
Speaker 1: I'm a Northern California kid. So it's it's it's different.
Speaker 1: It's different where I'm from. By the way, just off off.
Speaker 1: Your voice sounds. Really it's a good, good voice for like.
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's the headphones that I'm wearing
Speaker 1: right now, but the voice sounds. It's a good voice.
Speaker 1: You like me, You like me in your head, that's
Speaker 1: what you're saying. You're in my head right now. Thank you.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's that's a great compliment. I mean, you
Speaker 1: have a you have a face for television. I've got
Speaker 1: a voice for being in your head. I guess do
Speaker 1: you think I could have gotten in your head? Do
Speaker 1: you do you think I could have gotten in your
Speaker 1: head on the football field? No? Come on, no one could,
Speaker 1: No one could get in my head. No one. The
Speaker 1: only person who could get into my head was my me,
Speaker 1: like I would give myself like that's the only thing.
Speaker 1: But usually other guys I was pretty good at that,
Speaker 1: you know, especially when I was in the prime of
Speaker 1: my career. Like early on in my career, I was
Speaker 1: still learning. But once I knew the material and I
Speaker 1: once I was comfortable and I had experience and remembered things,
Speaker 1: like I was so confident in my ability that I
Speaker 1: was getting in other people's head. Yeah, I know that
Speaker 1: about you, but I still I feel like I could
Speaker 1: have gotten in your head. I feel like I could
Speaker 1: have found some button to push that would have stopped
Speaker 1: the Patriots dynasty. No, no, because anytime a guy I
Speaker 1: would try to do that, like it's like that's the
Speaker 1: last thing you want to do, because especially if you're
Speaker 1: on like a if you're on a good team, like
Speaker 1: it's never gonna go down like that. When you're on
Speaker 1: like a mediocre team and you're playing like week eight,
Speaker 1: you're eight, no, and this other teams like two and six,
Speaker 1: and this guy's talking and you already it's like the
Speaker 1: middle of the year. So the first part of the year,
Speaker 1: you're excited the season started. Then you start getting beat
Speaker 1: up that there's a middle chunk of the season where
Speaker 1: you're like, man, it's a grind. You know, you're mentally,
Speaker 1: emotionally just exhausted. And so sometimes when that would happen,
Speaker 1: it gave you a little spark because you go to
Speaker 1: that one of those crappy teams or a mediocre team.
Speaker 1: It's hard to get up to play that when you're
Speaker 1: you know, when you're always doing well, and then you know,
Speaker 1: so you would use that kind of stuff and you
Speaker 1: would put it in your head and create a story
Speaker 1: and then I would attack that person and I would
Speaker 1: try to embarrass them. Yeah, that makes sense, That's probably
Speaker 1: what would have happened. Um, I want to go back.
Speaker 1: You talked about being a nor Cow kid. You grew
Speaker 1: up in Redwood City, California. How would you describe your childhood?
Speaker 1: Good childhood, great child sports, sports and more sports, A
Speaker 1: lot of sports. But I had a great childhood. You know,
Speaker 1: my my parents were you know, hard working, middle class people.
Speaker 1: My dad was a mechanic and very involved in my
Speaker 1: whole sport life and just in my life in general.
Speaker 1: My mother was, you know, the lady that kind of
Speaker 1: kept everything together, stayed at the house, raised us there
Speaker 1: was no crazy struggles, but it was definitely, you know,
Speaker 1: it was a tough taught childhood just because of how
Speaker 1: my father, how demanding he was of of me, specifically
Speaker 1: in my family, for achieving greatness out of practice or
Speaker 1: you know, doing you know a spelling you know, the
Speaker 1: spelling words for the week. He'd worked with me and
Speaker 1: homework and he was just he'd always pushed me, and
Speaker 1: you know, it was tough, but I wouldn't be where
Speaker 1: I'm at without that childhood, right. What was your what
Speaker 1: was your go to sport growing up? Was it football
Speaker 1: initially or no? Yeah, I mean I was. I was
Speaker 1: on the football field when I was in diapers because
Speaker 1: my brother was seven years older than me and my
Speaker 1: dad coached him, uh in Pop Warner. He started playing
Speaker 1: when he was eight. So I grew up on the
Speaker 1: field around the coaching staffs and you know, organized football,
Speaker 1: and it was like the you know, like the tough
Speaker 1: guy thing. And I was really good at baseball. I
Speaker 1: played a lot of baseball, but I had too much
Speaker 1: a d D like, especially as a young kid, and
Speaker 1: I played a lot of basketball as well, but I
Speaker 1: just couldn't. I had to have something like my mind
Speaker 1: would float off in like the middle of the third inning.
Speaker 1: You know you're picking daisy, and then you have to
Speaker 1: like focus up, and you didn't get that same feeling
Speaker 1: you felt when you scored a touchdown. Like scoring a
Speaker 1: touchdown when I was a kid, like that was the
Speaker 1: most electric, euphoric feeling. I used to dream about it
Speaker 1: at night, like on certain things I could. I still
Speaker 1: have the same dream a cutback, spin move turn when
Speaker 1: I started dreaming it when I was eleven years old,
Speaker 1: because this guy Tafo, he told me about it once
Speaker 1: and when I was like eleven, you gotta if you're
Speaker 1: in the sideline, you gotta stiff arm and then spin
Speaker 1: off and then keep it going. And I would dream
Speaker 1: that same dream over it because I love that, you know,
Speaker 1: that touchdown feeling. I don't know the other sports I
Speaker 1: loved him, but they never nothing compared to my love
Speaker 1: for the game of football. Mano Imano man Verse Man
Speaker 1: man Verse Man. So the the Oklahoma drill, you like
Speaker 1: the Oklahoma draw? I mean you don't like the oklow.
Speaker 1: It's Oklahoma drill is fun for a time and place
Speaker 1: when you're young. But I'm just saying, like, you know
Speaker 1: you're playing man coverage. It's it's literally the you know,
Speaker 1: this man is trying to cover you using technique, good tellnique,
Speaker 1: using your strengths, exploiting their weaknesses and finding that's like
Speaker 1: a that's like a puzzle every time, you know. And
Speaker 1: then when you get to beat that man, he knows
Speaker 1: you you can beat him every time, you know. I
Speaker 1: don't know. That's just that that that got me going
Speaker 1: when I was a kid and kept it going to laugh. Now,
Speaker 1: I'm told that in eighth grade that you would sometimes
Speaker 1: pretend to be Tom Brady. True, yeah, like eight Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean he was a berry a kid. He went
Speaker 1: to Sam and he was from San Mateo. I lived
Speaker 1: in Redwood City, which was a town over a couple
Speaker 1: of towns, San Carlos, Belmont, Sam, San Mateo. And he
Speaker 1: I just loved. He was a scrappy guy. He didn't
Speaker 1: get drafted in the first round. You know, his whole
Speaker 1: college story when he was at Michigan where he was
Speaker 1: battling Handy because he was the guy that was supposed
Speaker 1: to come in and make Michigan the best. And all
Speaker 1: Tom did was just grind and win, grind and win.
Speaker 1: And I just loved that about him. When I was
Speaker 1: a kid and he was from the Bear So there
Speaker 1: was that connection, Like you rooted for him, and he
Speaker 1: already had a Super Bowl in two thousand one. I
Speaker 1: was in eighth grade and so like this on the
Speaker 1: asphalts of Recess and be like, I'm Brady all time, QB.
Speaker 1: Let's go. And so it was his It was it
Speaker 1: was his ability to grind and the fact that he
Speaker 1: had adversity through college and and and and getting into
Speaker 1: the NFL. That's what you admired. And yeah, he was
Speaker 1: the underdog. Yeah, he was always the underdog, even when
Speaker 1: he wasn't the underdog, but he was always treated like
Speaker 1: the underdog. And he just keep kept proving people still
Speaker 1: to this day that he's not. He's the top dog.
Speaker 1: He's the alpha dog. And I love that. You could
Speaker 1: tell he had that killer instinct in him, and he would,
Speaker 1: especially when he was younger, You're getting all fired up,
Speaker 1: and you know the TV would catch that, or you know,
Speaker 1: it was just I liked him. He was a fiery guy.
Speaker 1: He didn't reminded me of Montana. I was a Montana guy, right. Well,
Speaker 1: I heard you had two two dogs growing up, Dwight.
Speaker 1: What was it Dwight in Montana, Is that right, Tim Dwight, Yeah,
Speaker 1: Dwighton Montana. We had him for about eight months until
Speaker 1: they only listened to me and they started biting people
Speaker 1: and they had to get rid of them. They were
Speaker 1: like these they were black labs over pictures. My parents though,
Speaker 1: they were like so much we found out like it
Speaker 1: was crazy, but I was like, yeah, we can't be
Speaker 1: having this. These guys are nipping. Okay, you are quarterback
Speaker 1: for your high school team, barely five ft tall, a
Speaker 1: hundred pounds. Yet your senior season you lead your team
Speaker 1: to a thirteen and oh record yards twenty nine touchdowns,
Speaker 1: another thirteen touchdowns rushing. You're good, I mean and no North,
Speaker 1: I mean California football. This is this is legit. And
Speaker 1: so you might wonder who was recruiting you for college.
Speaker 1: No one was, is this right? No one offers you
Speaker 1: a scholarship? Yeah, zero scholarship. You know, we had a
Speaker 1: really good football team that was in my senior two
Speaker 1: thousand four at Woodside. We had a we had an
Speaker 1: unbelievable running back by the name of Tyrese Jacks, and
Speaker 1: so we had, you know, really good receivers like we
Speaker 1: I went and poached a bunch of the basketball guys
Speaker 1: and recruited him to come play football down Dominic, Duncan Cruise,
Speaker 1: Kenneth Walker, we had Spencer Garrison, who was a track
Speaker 1: kid who I played football with a lot. So we
Speaker 1: had like it was like a perfect storm. So you know,
Speaker 1: it was really Tyrease was like the show. He was
Speaker 1: rushing for like two He was the guy that everyone
Speaker 1: was looking at. I mean he was a man child
Speaker 1: on the football field in high school, you know, and
Speaker 1: I was a late bloomer I was at by that
Speaker 1: time in my senior year, I was about five eight,
Speaker 1: you know, you know, probably buck sixty, buck fifty. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I didn't get recruited out of it, but you know
Speaker 1: that that all those stats and stuff. I mean, back
Speaker 1: in those days, you just throw it, throw it his
Speaker 1: higher high and far as you can to that guy
Speaker 1: who's six six Duncan Cruise, and you know you're gonna
Speaker 1: get touchdowns. So we had. That was a fun year
Speaker 1: and that was one of the you know, you know,
Speaker 1: you still think about your high school days to go
Speaker 1: out the way we did because I don't know, if
Speaker 1: you know, the year before our season got canceled, we
Speaker 1: had a full mutiny on head coach. There's a chant
Speaker 1: going on in the locker room. It was on like NBC.
Speaker 1: They covered it like nationwide. Our principal canceled our season
Speaker 1: with like three games to go because no one would
Speaker 1: rat on who started like this chant in the locker room.
Speaker 1: They brought it every single teammate, every single guy, and
Speaker 1: said and asked were you in the chant? And everyone
Speaker 1: said no, and and they said, uh, do you know
Speaker 1: he started the chance? And they said, I don't know
Speaker 1: the whole team, So they canceled our season. So that
Speaker 1: it was that was a perfect storm that that that
Speaker 1: senior year where we just went out and we were
Speaker 1: so mad. We went out and wirt know and it
Speaker 1: was it was a great, great way to go out. Man,
Speaker 1: it was so fun. Did you consider giving football up
Speaker 1: at that point? I did? Uh not? Not. At that point.
Speaker 1: I was in a you know, I was in an
Speaker 1: area and I had a lot of friends that they
Speaker 1: were all getting their acceptance letters to you see Berkeley,
Speaker 1: and some would go to the party kids to go
Speaker 1: to Chico State and you see Santa Barbara or Stanford
Speaker 1: and you know, and I was in limbo, like what
Speaker 1: am I gonna do do I try to go to
Speaker 1: junior college too. I mean, you know, you're you're I
Speaker 1: wasn't highly recruited, so you know, you still have that
Speaker 1: that that mindset of when you're going into something unknown,
Speaker 1: especially when you're that young, and you know that's a
Speaker 1: big transition to go from high school to college, whether
Speaker 1: it's community college or a regular four year college. You know,
Speaker 1: these next four years of your life are a huge
Speaker 1: part of building your foundation and what are going to become.
Speaker 1: I never thought I wasn't gonna play football, but there
Speaker 1: was an anxiety going into that decision of like, what
Speaker 1: do I do now? Right? Right? Well, yeah, you go
Speaker 1: to San Mateo where you do play football, you have
Speaker 1: a school record for rushing yards, you are still playing quarterback.
Speaker 1: Does that start to get the attention of schools. Yeah?
Speaker 1: So I ended up going to College of San Mateo.
Speaker 1: Our head coach Larry Owens, he was a Redwood City guy,
Speaker 1: and I I have to admit I originally wanted to
Speaker 1: go to College of San Francisco because College of San
Speaker 1: Francisco was like the big dog junior college in the country.
Speaker 1: They get a lot of bounce backs guys that went
Speaker 1: to like a four year full ride. Some would get happen,
Speaker 1: you know, kids would get in trouble, they'd have to
Speaker 1: go back. And this is before the portal days, so
Speaker 1: that they would go to Juco for a and then
Speaker 1: get rerecruited so you didn't have to lose a year.
Speaker 1: So you get a lot of those guys that would
Speaker 1: go to San Francisco and uh, I'm I'm honestly so
Speaker 1: glad I didn't. And because CSM was so me it
Speaker 1: was once again an underdog kind of school, a tough
Speaker 1: group of guys that worked their tails off, and that
Speaker 1: was instilled through the coaching staff Coach Owens, coach Taller,
Speaker 1: coach Pollock, and uh, you know, it was a It
Speaker 1: was a team that everyone around the Bay Area was from.
Speaker 1: You didn't get guys from other states and stuff. So
Speaker 1: there was a camaraderie between playing and that in that environment,
Speaker 1: which is the last time you get to play with
Speaker 1: people you grew around, you know, because then you go
Speaker 1: to college, you go to then you go to like
Speaker 1: I went to Ohio after that, and you're going to
Speaker 1: the Midwest and I'm a Bay Area kid. A melting pot.
Speaker 1: There's Polynesians and black kids, Mexicans, there's Asian kids, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. Like then you go to Ohio,
Speaker 1: white and black. You know, it's it's completely different. So
Speaker 1: like that is a special year in my life because
Speaker 1: that was the last time I got to play with
Speaker 1: like my people from where I'm from, you know. And
Speaker 1: and that's what CSM was really about. A tough group
Speaker 1: of guys, young men that are that are like treat
Speaker 1: it like it's a family. You know. Once a bulldog,
Speaker 1: always a bulldog. And that's when I started getting a
Speaker 1: little notoriety. We had a really successful year. We went
Speaker 1: to the Bulldog Bowl and played this guy, Brent Shafer,
Speaker 1: who was a really stud quarterback, one of those bounced
Speaker 1: back so he was a starting quarterback at Tennessee. Came back,
Speaker 1: played uh at College Sequoia is another junior college in
Speaker 1: northern California, and we were playing in a bulldog game
Speaker 1: and we ended up with a win, ended up like
Speaker 1: number eight in the nation. And then after that, that's
Speaker 1: when I started getting, you know a little more attention.
Speaker 1: I got a lot of attension. You know, I was
Speaker 1: starting to get letters from Pac ten schools, Big ten schools,
Speaker 1: eat SEC schools, Big twelve schools. You know, I was
Speaker 1: getting all these letters, which I was a static. You know,
Speaker 1: no one's ever wanted me, and it probably made nothing,
Speaker 1: but I was getting letters and I like that was
Speaker 1: the biggest high. I wanted to be wanted, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. But then these letters kept on saying
Speaker 1: the same thing. We want you to stay another year.
Speaker 1: We don't have enough scholarships. You talked to the coaching stuff.
Speaker 1: We don't have scholarships this year. We want you to
Speaker 1: stay another year and produce that same kind of statu
Speaker 1: and we'll take a shot on you. Or they wanted
Speaker 1: me to change positions. And you know, then I come back.
Speaker 1: It was in the winter and we were doing some
Speaker 1: running as a team and I'm walking up the hill
Speaker 1: and coach Tullock or Public. There are two different guys,
Speaker 1: but the same SEAE coaching Staff's real I run, It's weird. Uh.
Speaker 1: They came up to me and and he goes, yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a school ken't State that wants to talk to you.
Speaker 1: They flew in or something. They want to offer you
Speaker 1: a scholarship and bring you out. And I was like,
Speaker 1: where's Ken State is it? Because my goal was to
Speaker 1: play quarterback at a Division one level, and like it's
Speaker 1: a D one because there's a couple other like D
Speaker 1: twos and stuff that we're coming. And I was like,
Speaker 1: I'm cool with that. I won't play quarterback at D
Speaker 1: one and they're like, yeah, it's D one, it's in
Speaker 1: the MAC. I was like, what's the Who's in the MAC?
Speaker 1: And they're like, you know, like Bowling Green Miami, And
Speaker 1: I knew Bowling Green because that's when Brandon of this
Speaker 1: Jacob's quarterback back in the day, he was in the
Speaker 1: Heisman hunt, like in that little area of my high
Speaker 1: school and junior college life. He was lighted up. And
Speaker 1: Ben Roethlisberger went to Miami, Ohio, and you knew of
Speaker 1: Ben Roethlisberger. So then I, you know, I I went
Speaker 1: and took the visit, and you know, it was definitely
Speaker 1: a culture shock of everything aesthetically on like how Ohio
Speaker 1: is like built. It's like little hills and you know,
Speaker 1: pretty flat, and and just the people and very comforting
Speaker 1: and heart of the earth type people, and you know,
Speaker 1: it was like I went out there and watched the
Speaker 1: practice and I was like, hey, I can start right
Speaker 1: away here, and you know, I wanted to. That's why
Speaker 1: I ended up committing to their coach Martin And you
Speaker 1: wanted to be quarterback. That was it for you. I
Speaker 1: wanted to be that, yeah, and that gave you an opportunity.
Speaker 1: You became three year starter, Derek. Kent State. A good
Speaker 1: decision for you to go there, A great decision, unbelievable decision.
Speaker 1: Part of my story, part of my foundation. Love Kent
Speaker 1: State University, Love Northeast Ohio. I mean I learned a
Speaker 1: lot in those three years in college on the field,
Speaker 1: off the field, you know, perspective of of how that
Speaker 1: part of like the country and like I never left California,
Speaker 1: so that was like a huge thing. I remember my
Speaker 1: mom crying when I left. You know, it was like
Speaker 1: my third time on our second time on a plane,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Like, you know, I loved it,
Speaker 1: and then you think about it football wise, you know,
Speaker 1: see I did go to a big school. I changed
Speaker 1: positions right away. Then I'm dependent on, you know, a
Speaker 1: quarterback to throw me a ball. Maybe you get eight
Speaker 1: to fourteen targets a game. You go on that you
Speaker 1: have six seven to you know, nine catches a game
Speaker 1: or whatever like that. That's balling out in college, you
Speaker 1: have to do that. For three years as a receiver.
Speaker 1: I had the ball in my hand every single play
Speaker 1: at Kent State, So either I was distributing it, or
Speaker 1: I was showing my athleticism while running, or just showing
Speaker 1: that I was a football player. So, you know, and
Speaker 1: I learned how to play in the cold. You know,
Speaker 1: it just so happened. I went to a very cold
Speaker 1: place in New England, and I started playing in snow
Speaker 1: games in Ohio and then the weather out there is
Speaker 1: outrageous crazy. I mean, I played in a game against
Speaker 1: the Ohio University at Kent where we had a lightning delay, hail,
Speaker 1: and then by the end of the game it started snowing,
Speaker 1: and then at like at the beginning of the game,
Speaker 1: it was like hot. It was crazy. I never I
Speaker 1: never experienced this. I'm literally it's seventy five and sunny
Speaker 1: where I grew up my whole life. You know, maybe
Speaker 1: it gets the fifty we're throwing on a hoodie, but like,
Speaker 1: you know, it was crazy. So I learned a lot,
Speaker 1: I met a lot of great people, and I honestly
Speaker 1: loved Ohio, Northeast Ohio, and I'm I'm a static that
Speaker 1: It's part of my journey because once again it goes
Speaker 1: into that category of that underdog, you know, like can't state,
Speaker 1: can't read, can't rag, can't state, you know, And you
Speaker 1: go into the locker room in the league, and I
Speaker 1: loved it. I was from Kent State and I'm still
Speaker 1: in the same locker room with you who You're at Alabama,
Speaker 1: you went to USC you went to Oregon. You guys
Speaker 1: did all that with all that great facilities, all that money.
Speaker 1: Probably got a pay cut when you came into call
Speaker 1: the pros because you guys are getting paid out then.
Speaker 1: And I'm still in the same spot, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. You have an amazing career through high school
Speaker 1: and then in college, but you're working hard in not
Speaker 1: the biggest places. Are you thinking you're going to the NFL?
Speaker 1: Is that always a part of your consciousness? I mean
Speaker 1: I hear at some point you thought you were going
Speaker 1: to become a firefighter after college. I looked into it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: But are you always thinking about the NFL still and
Speaker 1: that you can play at that level at that time
Speaker 1: of my life? No, okay, you know subconsciously that's your dream,
Speaker 1: you know, when you're When I was an eight year
Speaker 1: old kid or a seven year old kid watching Dion Sanders,
Speaker 1: Jerry Rice, Brent Jones, Ken Norton coming off the field
Speaker 1: thrown gloves. I wanted to be that guy, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean, That's what I wanted. So obviously it
Speaker 1: was a dream. But when I was there were so
Speaker 1: many things that went on in my life where I like,
Speaker 1: I hurt my back my senior high school a little bit.
Speaker 1: So I go to you know that that was also
Speaker 1: a part of the story, and you know, baseball end up.
Speaker 1: Quentin went to Juco. Juco had to like battle to
Speaker 1: take out like the first they had a first string
Speaker 1: quarterback and that's like a senior quarterback who started the
Speaker 1: year before in junior college because it's only two years.
Speaker 1: So like that was a task and I wasn't like
Speaker 1: thinking about anything other than just trying to win the
Speaker 1: job and then trying to win games and keep this
Speaker 1: guy off my back. Then I go into CSM and
Speaker 1: I'm kind of the same predicament. There's a you know,
Speaker 1: a prototypical six ft six gun sling and bounced back
Speaker 1: guy who played in baseball. He's like twenty eight years old.
Speaker 1: I'm like nineteen battling against him. So like I had
Speaker 1: that story narrative that that was in my mind. Then
Speaker 1: after that, it's just about winning games because the pressures
Speaker 1: of you know, when you get to college, the game
Speaker 1: is it's it's still a game, but there's a lot
Speaker 1: more on the table, you know what I mean, There's
Speaker 1: people getting fired if you don't do well. You get
Speaker 1: focused on people that gave you an opportunity to go
Speaker 1: the place you're at, trying to work hard and and
Speaker 1: and repay them through the results you try to put
Speaker 1: on the field, you know. So then I was dealing
Speaker 1: with that, and after that, I'm trying to make the
Speaker 1: NFL am I gonna be this? Am I going to
Speaker 1: be that? So like I always in my life have
Speaker 1: always had to worry about what's on my plate right now,
Speaker 1: and it's always served me to the best. And you know,
Speaker 1: in grand in like the grand scheme of things, it's
Speaker 1: probably the best. So then it keeps me, you know,
Speaker 1: blindered up. Yeah, Uh, it seems like the right time
Speaker 1: to talk about you have a connection. I mean we
Speaker 1: talked about you have Dwight and Montana, your dogs that
Speaker 1: you unfortunately ended up having to give away. You also
Speaker 1: have a connection being from the Bay Area and you
Speaker 1: live around Jerry Rice. Now I understand you dated Jerry's
Speaker 1: daughter when you were in high In fact, you took
Speaker 1: her to prom. That to her, I went to her,
Speaker 1: I went to her. You went to her problem. Okay,
Speaker 1: so she invited you to her prom? Yeah, I guess. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then when you were in college. My understanding is
Speaker 1: is that you said the following that you needed to
Speaker 1: get addicted to the Jerry Rice mentality and that you
Speaker 1: needed to work hard. You needed to get up before
Speaker 1: everyone else and outwork them. And there was a hill
Speaker 1: that he made famous in in Redwood City that he
Speaker 1: would run up for training and you would start training
Speaker 1: on this hill. Is that right when you would come
Speaker 1: home from college? Yeah? Yeah, Yeah. Me and Jaqui we've
Speaker 1: you know, we were little kids from eighth grade to
Speaker 1: like high school and you know, dear friend and you know,
Speaker 1: a little puppy love. So that was always fun and
Speaker 1: that was a fun experience and an unbelievable thing. And
Speaker 1: she's an oblieble person and they're a great family that
Speaker 1: I you know, I was around a little bit, but
Speaker 1: as far as coming back from college, you know, and
Speaker 1: really taking on the mindset because then you at that
Speaker 1: time I was really researching, you know, great people and
Speaker 1: who who who more than than Jerry Rice, who I witnessed,
Speaker 1: you know, in his forties catching a thousand you know,
Speaker 1: catching a hunter ball or going for a thousand yards
Speaker 1: in his forties. I mean the um longevity, the discipline,
Speaker 1: the sacrifice, uh, and the hard work that he put in.
Speaker 1: And there was like a documentary that I watched. It
Speaker 1: was like an older one and I saw that hill
Speaker 1: and everyone knew Edgewood Park over there on the border
Speaker 1: of San Carlos and Rodwood City. There was like a
Speaker 1: three mile track that you could do. And there was
Speaker 1: also a hill at Kenyatta College is a junior college
Speaker 1: at the top of the hill in Redwood City. And
Speaker 1: it was like a I don't know if my masks on,
Speaker 1: but like it was probably like a sixty degree pitch
Speaker 1: and you would go from like it was sandy hard
Speaker 1: to like hard and then you have it was probably
Speaker 1: like a hundred a hundred and fifty yards up, so
Speaker 1: it's not like a thirty yard you know thing. And
Speaker 1: so yeah, I would go out there and I would
Speaker 1: try to outwork people and and and you know, run
Speaker 1: that hill, because that's what Jerry Rice did. And then
Speaker 1: when I became a receiver, you know, catching bricks, that's
Speaker 1: what Jerry Rice did. You know you hear that, and
Speaker 1: and and now you're seeing all these these to transition
Speaker 1: and a completely different tangent. And now that's why you're
Speaker 1: seeing the receiver position transition into the NFL faster than ever.
Speaker 1: It used to take some time. But I think with
Speaker 1: the information that these kids have on how to practice,
Speaker 1: what to practice, what to eat, how to recover, like
Speaker 1: all these things you could learn on social media, and
Speaker 1: with the information that you have in your poem. I
Speaker 1: remember like going like stealing a DVD of this Jerry
Speaker 1: Rice thing and throwing that in and like you saw
Speaker 1: him like running this hill with like I think Ricky
Speaker 1: Waters was in the background or something, and like you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. So like, yeah, yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 1: Despite you working hard, you don't get an invitation to
Speaker 1: the combine in two thousand nine, but your shuttle drill
Speaker 1: time was faster than anyone else who was there. Now
Speaker 1: you don't get invited to the combine. You've graduated with
Speaker 1: all these unbelievable numbers from Kent state, what what are
Speaker 1: you thinking in your head? Are you are you getting
Speaker 1: drafted or is your football career done? What? What are
Speaker 1: you thinking? Well, at that time, I was committed. You know.
Speaker 1: The time I was in limbo was like immediately after
Speaker 1: my last game of college, you know, there's like a
Speaker 1: you know what is that? That's you end? And we
Speaker 1: never went to a bowl. So we'd ended November early December,
Speaker 1: and then like you have a couple of months to
Speaker 1: see what you're going on and and that's what happens.
Speaker 1: So that was the time where like I went and
Speaker 1: visited a firehouse and Cincinnati, and you know you just
Speaker 1: kind of throwing shipped away and seeing what sticks sticks?
Speaker 1: Can you swear on here? I'm sorry? You want so? Uh?
Speaker 1: You know That's that's what I was doing with with
Speaker 1: that when I was doing like my train once I
Speaker 1: went to training, and once I i I started really
Speaker 1: taking it to a whole another level as far as
Speaker 1: like I was how much I slept, how much I
Speaker 1: ate training twice a day, trying like doing everything, going
Speaker 1: to class at night. Every time I compounded a week
Speaker 1: of that, my confidence went higher and higher. And then
Speaker 1: once I didn't get invited to the combine that pissed
Speaker 1: me off, you know, So that was that made me mad,
Speaker 1: and that made my pro day that much more important,
Speaker 1: so than it gave me more time to compound hard work.
Speaker 1: You know, all the consistent things that I was doing
Speaker 1: to go out and perform on that day that I
Speaker 1: had to for the scouts. That gave you extra motivation.
Speaker 1: I mean I already had the motivation, but it was like,
Speaker 1: all right, that's that's lame. We get it cool, you know,
Speaker 1: all right, what I went to a MAC I rest
Speaker 1: for like yards that year. I threw for like almost
Speaker 1: two two thousand of my senior year in college. And
Speaker 1: you're not gonna let me come to the combine. It's
Speaker 1: fucking bullshit, Yeah, because I'm at mad at the MAC
Speaker 1: right now? Are are you? Are you thinking at all
Speaker 1: at this point that you're still going to be a quarterback? No?
Speaker 1: By this point I hired my agent, Don Yee from
Speaker 1: me and Doubing Sports, and uh, he instilled a lot
Speaker 1: of confidence in me. And you know, with what Don
Speaker 1: said to me, and he's seen a lot of football
Speaker 1: players over his career of representing guys, and you know,
Speaker 1: you gotta be kind of a talent agent when you're
Speaker 1: an agent, and he kind of pumped me up. And
Speaker 1: once he started doing that, you know, then I was
Speaker 1: working out and I linked up with Charlie Fry. He
Speaker 1: was a starting quarterback for the Cleveland Browns at the
Speaker 1: time and he was just just transitioned into the Raiders.
Speaker 1: He was starting at the Raiders, and he trained at
Speaker 1: the same facility I did in Euclid, Ohio, which was
Speaker 1: like on this it was like a Rocky four training
Speaker 1: montage video when you rolled up to this place like
Speaker 1: potholes on the side of a fuicking like railroad track,
Speaker 1: and like, I don't know anything about Cleveland because that's
Speaker 1: the only place I went into Cleveland. I usually stayed
Speaker 1: in camp, but I was thinking it had to be
Speaker 1: the rough area of Cleveland, and like, I loved it.
Speaker 1: It was just like a grind and he went there
Speaker 1: and so we linked and so I started working with him,
Speaker 1: and he was giving me insight of like just as
Speaker 1: a quarterback, what quarterbacks like in and out of their receivers.
Speaker 1: Do they like flat to downhill on in cuts? Doing this?
Speaker 1: And he, you know, he worked with me, which you know,
Speaker 1: I'm in debt to him for a long time because
Speaker 1: he was a starting quarterback taking a shot on a
Speaker 1: guy that he said, oh, you know this guy works hard.
Speaker 1: Let me, let me rub off and throw with him.
Speaker 1: And you know, I would just be in his back
Speaker 1: pocket and ask him questions and let him talk. And
Speaker 1: you know, that helped me a huge And he'd come
Speaker 1: and throw my my workouts so that we had a
Speaker 1: built in timing and stuff, and he kind of taught
Speaker 1: me a little at the beginning stages of running routes
Speaker 1: and uh yeah, that's that's when I started playing quarterback
Speaker 1: or receiver. But I got worked out by some teams
Speaker 1: like the Pittsburgh Steelers work they wanted they worked me
Speaker 1: out as a safety. They wanted to be seeing me
Speaker 1: do some safety drills. The Patriots initially sent their running
Speaker 1: backs coach and put me through running back drills. So
Speaker 1: you know a lot of a lot of guys were curious,
Speaker 1: especially in that year two thousand nine. I don't know
Speaker 1: if you remember. In two thousand eight, that's when the
Speaker 1: whole Wildcat bad came. You know, the Patriots got blown
Speaker 1: out by Miami and the wild Cat so everyone, you know,
Speaker 1: you get these little trends in the NFL and and
Speaker 1: that was like, who who could be like throwing type
Speaker 1: running back for a potential package. And that's when my
Speaker 1: stock started raising. Interesting, do you have any idea before
Speaker 1: the draft who who's really interested? So I had in
Speaker 1: my mind who I thought was interested. And then you know,
Speaker 1: so draft day comes and first day and I going
Speaker 1: first day, first day, No, so I didn't even watch
Speaker 1: the first day. Back then there was only two days
Speaker 1: of draft. Now there's like three or four, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. He starts on Thursday Friday. But I
Speaker 1: was on day two, which is like the late rounds
Speaker 1: and about you know, I went on and you go.
Speaker 1: So the process goes. You do your combine pro day
Speaker 1: work out individually for teams. Teams fly you out for
Speaker 1: visits to meet with their doctors, to talk with their
Speaker 1: upper department, like their gms, and see the facilities and
Speaker 1: they just kind of want to pick your brain. And
Speaker 1: then the draft comes. Now I did like seven workouts.
Speaker 1: I did like five or four trips, and like so
Speaker 1: everyone gauges like how many trips you go on you'll
Speaker 1: potentially get drafted. You know, yeah, you probably can get
Speaker 1: drafted if you went on like four four more trips
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. Like, so as a late
Speaker 1: down guys, that's that's what you're thinking about. You're talking
Speaker 1: to guys. And I went on a visit to Miami,
Speaker 1: and I like, I was like, man, this is my
Speaker 1: first time in Miami, Florida. And you go out there
Speaker 1: and you see the facility. You see like the work life. Like, man,
Speaker 1: I see like Joey uh Joey Porter. Joey Porter is
Speaker 1: hitting like golf balls in the practice field. There's like
Speaker 1: pre made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and like a
Speaker 1: cool like cafe and I'm like, man, this is awesome.
Speaker 1: And they brought me in there, you know, they test
Speaker 1: me and they worked me out a bunch, and so
Speaker 1: I thought there was some interest with Miami, especially with
Speaker 1: the Wildcat. And then I went to Chicago and then
Speaker 1: I went to a couple other spots San Francisco, which
Speaker 1: it was like a regional thing. But I originally thought
Speaker 1: Miami potentially might give me. But in like the first
Speaker 1: day the second round, they got Pat White and I'm like,
Speaker 1: well that's gone because he was like a running quarterback.
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, well, they're not gonna draft two guys,
Speaker 1: are they like something like that's gone. And then the
Speaker 1: sixth round starts coming and there's a bunch of there's uh,
Speaker 1: you start getting calls from teams for like a priority
Speaker 1: free agent. We had like four or five teams call
Speaker 1: that like, hey, we're not going to draft you, but
Speaker 1: if you go on drafted, we'll give you twenty dollars
Speaker 1: to sign with us and we'll bring you to camp.
Speaker 1: And so the sixth round ends and I'm talking with
Speaker 1: my agent and you know, I'm kind of sad I
Speaker 1: wanted to get drafted, you know, because now I'm just
Speaker 1: starting to get all these deals. But then we turned
Speaker 1: on a different cap and I'm like, all right, now
Speaker 1: we gotta focus on what's our plan of action going forward.
Speaker 1: We put down the teams and we decided, you know,
Speaker 1: the Hackers were a team that wanted to, you know,
Speaker 1: offer me a contract. I was like, well, you know,
Speaker 1: me and my agent came up with a decision that
Speaker 1: that would probably be the best fit. So we're talking.
Speaker 1: He goes, all right, if we go undrafted, will sign
Speaker 1: with the Packers. We'll take their offer up, and we'll
Speaker 1: go there. They don't have a slot, they don't have this,
Speaker 1: they don't have a punt return at the time, and uh,
Speaker 1: that's our deal. And then it is right before I'm
Speaker 1: about to hang up Don, which is Brady's agent. So
Speaker 1: he's dealt with the Patriots, and he's got like a
Speaker 1: little you know, you know what I mean, he knows
Speaker 1: how the handling that he knows like certain tactics, and
Speaker 1: he's seen it for at that time twelve straight years,
Speaker 1: you know, with Brady. Right, and he goes, you know,
Speaker 1: the Patriots did. And the Patriots didn't bring me in
Speaker 1: for a visit. They worked me out twice and they
Speaker 1: drilled me on like chalkboard. The second time. I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: these guys hate I'm like, I call protections here and
Speaker 1: they're in college as a quarterback, but like I don't know,
Speaker 1: I'm over here making ship up. I'm like, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: over front. Uh, this guy comes, he swings out, you know,
Speaker 1: and Ivan fears he's testing me. He's like, what the
Speaker 1: funk you call it that? Or I'm like, yeah, it's inverted,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. I'm trying. So I'm over
Speaker 1: here like they fucking hate me. They think I'm dumb,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, right before I'm about to
Speaker 1: hang out my agent after making the decision on the Packers.
Speaker 1: He goes, you know, the Patriots did trade and get
Speaker 1: another seventh round pick. You know, wouldn't be surprised if they,
Speaker 1: you know, picked you up. I don't know, but I
Speaker 1: wouldn't be surprised, you know. And then later on in
Speaker 1: the later part of the seventh round, Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: I got the call and they picked me, and Don
Speaker 1: was right, and that was history. How how excited were
Speaker 1: you to be one to be drafted and two to
Speaker 1: be going to a team, a real contending team at
Speaker 1: that point in the middle of their dynasty. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm was. I was very excited, you know. I mean
Speaker 1: that was That's like a dream when you're That's the
Speaker 1: dream you had when you're a kid, is to get
Speaker 1: to experience that with your family, your friends, you know,
Speaker 1: getting to go out and get an opportunity to play
Speaker 1: in the National Football League, throwing the helmet, get free towels,
Speaker 1: free socks. I went to Kent State. We had to
Speaker 1: pay for like protein shakes in our locker room. We
Speaker 1: had a vending machine, okay, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: like all the little things like it just I thought
Speaker 1: it was so cool, like that was so pro. That
Speaker 1: was like a word we used to say, like if
Speaker 1: a guy looked good and he was all like, you know,
Speaker 1: Jerry Rice, he was like a professional, always had his
Speaker 1: little towel, and you know what I mean, like you're
Speaker 1: gonna get to become potentially a pro. But then, you
Speaker 1: know how my mind works, I instantly started thinking. I
Speaker 1: talked to my my agent, and he goes, well, you
Speaker 1: didn't make the team yet, you know, he just got drafted.
Speaker 1: And so then I started, you know, looking it up
Speaker 1: and like seventh rounders barely make teams. You know there's
Speaker 1: there's already a long shot. So then you instantly go
Speaker 1: into you know, the mindset will now everyone, all my friends,
Speaker 1: all my family, they're all happy. Now you gotta go
Speaker 1: out and you gotta go put the work in. You
Speaker 1: gotta go do it. Yeah. How different was the work
Speaker 1: when you started a training camp and started working with
Speaker 1: them from the work that you've been doing on your own.
Speaker 1: Completely different. I was training just to get like good times,
Speaker 1: and you know what I mean, Like when you're training
Speaker 1: for the combine or you're training for your pro day,
Speaker 1: you're training for the drills that you're getting tested on.
Speaker 1: That's completely different than having football legs, especially for a
Speaker 1: guy that's never been in a full practice as a
Speaker 1: receiver or a special teams guy. I was a fucking quarterback.
Speaker 1: I was like of the periods in college. I'm sitting
Speaker 1: there playing goalposts throws with sucking the quarterbacks while the
Speaker 1: special teams goes defense. You know what I mean, Like
Speaker 1: quarterback schedule is completely different, or doing drills. You're throwing
Speaker 1: a lot, you know what I mean, Your your legs
Speaker 1: don't get tired. As a core her back. I remember
Speaker 1: I would run and get so tired and like, man,
Speaker 1: I have to go do this again. I don't know
Speaker 1: if I could, I I might as well just throw
Speaker 1: this one in the least. Like when you become a receiver,
Speaker 1: you're running all practice long. I was never used to that,
Speaker 1: so I had to like learn that you have to
Speaker 1: get your football. I was dead. I was shot, like
Speaker 1: I was so my my rookie training camp, and that's
Speaker 1: when we had double days, so you had run run practice,
Speaker 1: run game in the morning, passing the afternoon. It was hot, muggy,
Speaker 1: and in Boston. I mean it was completely different. I mean,
Speaker 1: it just was. It was something that I've never been
Speaker 1: used to the amount of yarded. You were putting on
Speaker 1: your legs at a high you know, at a higher velocity.
Speaker 1: And I was on everything. I was on, you know,
Speaker 1: punt punt return, kickoff, kickoff return, back up holder, on
Speaker 1: field goal, field goal block. You know, when you're a
Speaker 1: rookie trying to make the team, you barely play offense.
Speaker 1: I would get like three reps and then you go
Speaker 1: play like after practice they would put like the guy
Speaker 1: newcumbers and you guys get to scrimmage each other, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean, Which is a pivotal point in
Speaker 1: your improvement process because you're getting those reps. But you
Speaker 1: know that's compounded on top of a full fucking practice
Speaker 1: where you're on scout team doing all the scout team
Speaker 1: reps you're doing. You know, you get three reps when
Speaker 1: the starting receivers tired, then you gotta go the whistle blue.
Speaker 1: I'm what am I own? Is it fucking punt pup? Like?
Speaker 1: It's just like a whole another It is crazy and
Speaker 1: you and you you're trying to make a team and
Speaker 1: you're in the New England Patriots. There's a fucking there's
Speaker 1: a standard, you know, it's It was one of the
Speaker 1: most stressful. And then you get home at night. You
Speaker 1: have to study in your room because you're you're you're
Speaker 1: learning a new language. You know, when you when you
Speaker 1: learn football, especially there's like three systems, four systems. I
Speaker 1: was in, you know, kind of a West Coast type
Speaker 1: offense in college. This was completely different. That takes a lot,
Speaker 1: you know, you really have to compute that, and guys
Speaker 1: that don't, they're not there. You know, it don't matter
Speaker 1: how how good you are out that if you can't
Speaker 1: get lined up right and know the fucking snap count,
Speaker 1: you're gone, you know what I mean. That's a lot
Speaker 1: when you have to compute that all right, what's the formation,
Speaker 1: what's personel, what's the play? Who am I on this play?
Speaker 1: What's coverage? What's because everything changes, you know, so the
Speaker 1: ability to process that's a lot of stress for a
Speaker 1: young football player in this league. That's why, you know,
Speaker 1: I feel for a lot of these younger guys. You see,
Speaker 1: I'm watching training camps right now. You watch these guys
Speaker 1: that are like, you know, they're all over the place
Speaker 1: because there's so much going in these guys mind. When
Speaker 1: you're a young guy, a late round to undrafted guy.
Speaker 1: You're not like the first rounder who's over here laughing,
Speaker 1: drinking water because you know he's getting paid, Like you're
Speaker 1: sitting here like a cornered animal back against the wall.
Speaker 1: I'm doing everything I can to make this team, you know,
Speaker 1: I mean competing, and it was like a whole new
Speaker 1: experience and you're trying to work harder than everybody else. Right,
Speaker 1: That's that's the philosophy. That's that's what the work that
Speaker 1: you put in, and that's what you're doing there, right.
Speaker 1: The rabbit gotta be the rabbit, and everyone's chasing when conditioning,
Speaker 1: you know, going to the drill to drill, when the
Speaker 1: whistle blows, you're running like you gotta expend a lot
Speaker 1: more energy if you're trying to be seen. At what
Speaker 1: point through O t S and training camp, at what
Speaker 1: point do you feel like you're going to have a job,
Speaker 1: You're gonna have a spot or was it not until
Speaker 1: the very end? I felt like I made some ground
Speaker 1: After the first preseason game. Tom Brady the year before
Speaker 1: missed the complete season towards a c L. Matt Castle
Speaker 1: at his year that year that he went on to
Speaker 1: Kansas City. So this was Tom's first game Lincoln Financial Field,
Speaker 1: Philadelphia in Sylvania, two thousand nine, August seventeen. I don't
Speaker 1: know if that date is right, but it sounds like
Speaker 1: in that it could be like a four game window
Speaker 1: where it's off on there. Well, it was against the
Speaker 1: Eagles and it was in two thousand nine. I have
Speaker 1: that done, but I don't have the day, but go ahead,
Speaker 1: and so you know, this is Tom's first game back,
Speaker 1: and so he's I mean, when you have a big
Speaker 1: time injury, like an a c O, which I've had
Speaker 1: through my experience those first couple of games, Man, you
Speaker 1: could do all the rehab, but there's no live bullets
Speaker 1: and you ain't getting hit, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So there's a psychological battle, there's a psychological hump that
Speaker 1: you have to overcome through the play of the game
Speaker 1: after a huge injury. And and the whole team, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean, it's Tom Brady. So the whole
Speaker 1: team's you know, a little edgy at our first preseason
Speaker 1: game because we were about to get some clock because
Speaker 1: we wanted to you know, we wanted to see where
Speaker 1: we're at. We get a game time decision Welkers not playing.
Speaker 1: That was his back up all camping well and in
Speaker 1: camp and also Scotty O'Brien special teams coordinator. He comes
Speaker 1: up to me pregame he says, we're gonna have you
Speaker 1: cover a kick. We're gonna have you cover kicks. You're
Speaker 1: gonna return punts. You're gonna we're gonna start you at
Speaker 1: punt returner. And like the whole time in camp, I
Speaker 1: really wasn't so like they wanted to see me. So
Speaker 1: I was starting that receiver. I was starting on kickoff,
Speaker 1: kickoff return, and punt. First game, so electric it was.
Speaker 1: I was so excited for this game, but so focused
Speaker 1: and like kind of very nervous. And first play of
Speaker 1: the game on kickoff, I make a tackle. Awesome, great,
Speaker 1: then we go three and out. Uh, then we we
Speaker 1: they score something and then first playoff offense, Tom gives
Speaker 1: me a swing signal and he hits me on his
Speaker 1: first throw coming back from the A C L and
Speaker 1: so like, And then I had like five catches in
Speaker 1: that game. I was getting open a little bit. You know,
Speaker 1: things were starting to pay off. And at that point,
Speaker 1: you know, you go against the same guys over and over,
Speaker 1: they learned your tendencies and I didn't know how to
Speaker 1: run routes yet, so I didn't know what my tendencies
Speaker 1: were even working at the time. So in camp I'm
Speaker 1: getting covered. But then you're learning this new stuff in
Speaker 1: the game against guys that don't know you, and you're
Speaker 1: making plays. And then finally, you know, they go back
Speaker 1: on defense and we go back on defense. They punt
Speaker 1: up a kick and I returned to punt for a
Speaker 1: touchdown like a seventy five yarder. And after, you know,
Speaker 1: like after that game, my confidence got higher, and it
Speaker 1: wasn't like I was gonna make the team, but I
Speaker 1: thought to myself. I looked into myself as like, I
Speaker 1: can play here, I can play in this league. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna be all I'm gonna be all right. I didn't
Speaker 1: know if I was making team because I end up
Speaker 1: getting hurt the next I sprained my ankle next week.
Speaker 1: So after that, like, was that enough to make the team?
Speaker 1: Oh my god, am I gonna make the team? I
Speaker 1: don't know that I've seen you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: You just never know. But the versatility that I showed
Speaker 1: throughout camp in preseason, you know, I had a lot
Speaker 1: of backups to guys, you know, so I could back
Speaker 1: guys up. So that made the versatilities with Ultimate really
Speaker 1: kept me on the team. Yeah. The Patriot way when
Speaker 1: when when are you introduced to the Patriot Way? Is
Speaker 1: it right away or is this a gradual way that
Speaker 1: you learn first day? First day? Read the sign when
Speaker 1: you walk in, there's a sign with there's a sign
Speaker 1: when you walk in, Be attentive, work hard, put the
Speaker 1: team first, do your job on the sign out. When
Speaker 1: you leave the facility, there's a sign out. Don't believe
Speaker 1: the hype, speak for yourself, ignore the noise, and always
Speaker 1: put the team first. Like you walk in the building,
Speaker 1: you see the sign, see all the trophies, You see
Speaker 1: the pictures, and you see Tom Brady's pictures, West Welk,
Speaker 1: Greeney Moss two years ago they were eighteen one. This
Speaker 1: is a big time team, you know. And then you
Speaker 1: go into the auditorium. You know, coach addresses the whole
Speaker 1: of the rookies because this is rookie camp. You going there,
Speaker 1: it's like Darth Vader walks in or like God or
Speaker 1: something when built, because like everyone's like different things. Those
Speaker 1: are two different things and Darth Vader but okay, but
Speaker 1: definitely Darth Vadery. He walks in and like there's a
Speaker 1: little chatter, guys, you know, everyone's kind of excited. There's
Speaker 1: like sixteen and the whole team is out there. This
Speaker 1: is just rookies. It's like sixteen guys, and there's all
Speaker 1: the coaches up in the back and there's like there's
Speaker 1: like they're not they're like coach assistance. They're guys that
Speaker 1: are trying to become coaches, but they're like little do boys,
Speaker 1: so they gotta do everything. They gotta turn on the
Speaker 1: lights and fucking get everything ready. And all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: like and all of a sudden, one of the coaches assistance,
Speaker 1: he comes comes over the middle of auditory and puts
Speaker 1: the podium, sits down. Everyone sits down, and and fucking
Speaker 1: Bill walks in the lights like shine up. Place gets
Speaker 1: completely silent. All of a sudden, he singles someone out.
Speaker 1: He's I think he's singled Uh, it was probably Chunk.
Speaker 1: He'd always single out, but you know, the first round
Speaker 1: guy because you know, hey, you're not you're not a
Speaker 1: first rounder anymore. You're all trying to make this team.
Speaker 1: And he goes, who's that on the wall because all
Speaker 1: the walls had all these like moments of last year
Speaker 1: of players making cool plays. He shows a picture of
Speaker 1: Logan Mankins. He goes, who's that or or Matt Light
Speaker 1: one of the two, and he goes, I don't know,
Speaker 1: and he goes, he don't fucking know. I don't know
Speaker 1: if it was Pat, I don't know who's singled that.
Speaker 1: But he goes, you need to tell me. You're a rookie,
Speaker 1: never even played in the game, and you're gonna have
Speaker 1: this guy is gonna be sitting here and three weeks
Speaker 1: and you're not gonna know his fucking name. After that,
Speaker 1: everyone went to like the guy who's in the operations
Speaker 1: guy gave me a print out of like of everyone's
Speaker 1: name everyone, like in the fucking cafeteria, people around the hallways,
Speaker 1: people are like study like you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: He wouldn't like pick on a guy, but he would
Speaker 1: What he would do was he would he would he
Speaker 1: would let everyone know that everyone is accountable for everything,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Which that's like you're on edge,
Speaker 1: your shoulders are back whenever he walks in the room,
Speaker 1: because you never know if he's gonna test you what
Speaker 1: you know, so like, especially your young guy first time,
Speaker 1: first team meeting, that that, and that's when you're like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, it's done differently here. And then a couple
Speaker 1: of weeks later you start seeing the veterans come in
Speaker 1: and you see how they work, you see the time
Speaker 1: they put in. You know, it's not like, you know,
Speaker 1: the superstars are over here dilly dacking around. They're they're
Speaker 1: working their asses off, They're doing things to get better,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? And that you know I
Speaker 1: there's no specific fucking playbook of the Patriot Way. You
Speaker 1: just see it through actions of people that have been there.
Speaker 1: You know, Teddy Bruski walks in and it's Teddy Bruski
Speaker 1: still working his ask Kevin Falk, Tom Brady, Randy Moss,
Speaker 1: West Welker, you know, like the studs. These guys went
Speaker 1: eighteen and one last year. I was still like a
Speaker 1: little kid. So like it is like, all right, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the Patriot Way. When you see the top of
Speaker 1: the top working their tail off, holding everyone, holding themselves accountable,
Speaker 1: being reliable, being dependable, Do you eventually develop a relationship
Speaker 1: with coach Belichick that you're able to relax? Is there
Speaker 1: is there a point in time once you learn how
Speaker 1: it's done and you become one of the older guys.
Speaker 1: Does that happen ever or is it always? Yeah, it
Speaker 1: happens a little bit here, it happens. But I mean
Speaker 1: he he'll still get on you if you don't. If
Speaker 1: you're not it doesn't matter who you were, if you
Speaker 1: weren't producing, and if you did something wrong and you
Speaker 1: need to be coached, you can coach it, you know,
Speaker 1: which I don't know how, you know, like, but it
Speaker 1: got to a point where I could walk by him
Speaker 1: and like in the hallway and like, hey, coach, Like
Speaker 1: I'd always give him like one of those hey coach,
Speaker 1: have you just like fuckingman, I go, but I don't.
Speaker 1: That was like year eight eight years. Oh that's crazy
Speaker 1: that long? Really Yeah, I mean, I mean you could
Speaker 1: tell when like he would dick with you. That means
Speaker 1: you're not you're in the game. But like like like
Speaker 1: little things, it's very hard to explain. It could be
Speaker 1: a look, it would it didn't even have to be
Speaker 1: the words. It could be a look or a smile,
Speaker 1: a grin. Yeah. That there's like a lot of nonverbal
Speaker 1: communication that goes on. Interesting that's going on all the time.
Speaker 1: Brady now has referred to as his security blanket, his
Speaker 1: little brother. This is the guy you looked up to
Speaker 1: and pretended to be when you're a kid. Who were
Speaker 1: you more nervous or intimidated to meet and work with
Speaker 1: Bill or Tom bhil I was more like scared and nervous.
Speaker 1: That's the coach, you know. Tom was like, I mean,
Speaker 1: you'd feel that same. You never want to let anyone
Speaker 1: when you let someone, like when you do like a
Speaker 1: mental era Emmy on a player, he didn't do something
Speaker 1: the way it was. I felt like I was getting
Speaker 1: cut at those early years. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1: You don't want to disappoint him because ultimately, you know,
Speaker 1: as a quarterback, if the guy can't do him practicing
Speaker 1: and can do in the game, so that you're limited
Speaker 1: the opportunity, especially as some brown guy. So you know
Speaker 1: you're definitely nervous. But to meet Tom and you know,
Speaker 1: be around him, that was just kind of like Dan boy,
Speaker 1: get a little fan, a little like, oh man, what's
Speaker 1: up Tom? Hey? How are you doing? Like I the
Speaker 1: first time I met him, I'm running too? Like a
Speaker 1: special teams like pre meeting, like a meeting pre pre meeting.
Speaker 1: A guy would have to go to like the special
Speaker 1: team's coach, like fifteen minutes before the meeting, or like
Speaker 1: sometimes even hours before the meeting, and like he would
Speaker 1: explain everything in the meeting to me, and then I
Speaker 1: had to, you know, like he just wanted that he
Speaker 1: was my guy, Scotty. He was looking out. That's the
Speaker 1: way of a guy looking out for you. He's preparing,
Speaker 1: you know, he was gonna give me the meeting for
Speaker 1: the meeting. So it was just reiteration, reiteration. Reators should
Speaker 1: give this kid a shot. If he knows his ship,
Speaker 1: he's gonna be able to play. So I love that
Speaker 1: that he did that, but I had to go to
Speaker 1: so many meetings. I'm running in with the fucking like
Speaker 1: three and a half inch binder with the playbook because
Speaker 1: we didn't have iPads back then at that time. I
Speaker 1: went to iPads like two or three years later. And uh,
Speaker 1: I'm running through like a chicken. My head cut off.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be like I'm going like five minutes early
Speaker 1: to the pre pre meeting because you know it, you're
Speaker 1: trying to make a team. I'm running over and through
Speaker 1: the gates to the locker room or the doors. Tom
Speaker 1: walks in and I'm like and like drop my binder.
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh ship Tom Brady. He's like he knew,
Speaker 1: he like knew my name. He goes Julian Tom. I'm like,
Speaker 1: nice to meet you, Tom. Trying to play it cool,
Speaker 1: but but you're like the nerdy kids in school who
Speaker 1: drops his binder on the ground, like like big gloved. Yeah,
Speaker 1: when he's following the chan a little girl or whatever.
Speaker 1: That's good. I got like, I got like like uh
Speaker 1: and then I had to go back and go to
Speaker 1: the meeting. It was like made my day met Tom Brady, right,
Speaker 1: you were. I mean, you did so much for the team.
Speaker 1: I mean not only all of this stuff. During your career,
Speaker 1: you end up playing some safety when when you guys
Speaker 1: need it was that fun for you, Oh corner, it
Speaker 1: was Nicols, So it's the third corner that comes in
Speaker 1: and plays the slot defender. That was all. I had
Speaker 1: a blast. That was fun. Um. You know, delivering a
Speaker 1: hit is sometimes better than receiving a hit, I'm sure.
Speaker 1: And it was just a fun experience. And I can
Speaker 1: play defense in Pop Warner literally and I was a
Speaker 1: quarterback and then Bill one meeting or one day Josh
Speaker 1: Bowyer who's the defensive coordinator for He's the defensive coordinator
Speaker 1: somewhere right somewhere right now. I should know that I'm
Speaker 1: an analyst. But he comes up to be pre game
Speaker 1: like we were going we were going through guys, like,
Speaker 1: guys are getting hurt. That's the thing about the league, man,
Speaker 1: It's it's fifty three guys, but there's a hundred percent
Speaker 1: injury rate. And you know you're going through guys, guys
Speaker 1: coming off the street. And goes, see, hey, come up
Speaker 1: to me before team meeting. He guys, you're gonna be
Speaker 1: with us today. I'm like, what, let me never be
Speaker 1: with you? And he goes, hey, you're gonna be with
Speaker 1: us Nicol. We're gonna throw in Nickel a couple of things.
Speaker 1: See what you could do? And I was like, oh, show.
Speaker 1: So it was fun. I loved it. It was it
Speaker 1: was it was a It was so fun. Honestly, defense
Speaker 1: is different. You could run around and hit people, and
Speaker 1: you know, like if you know conceptually what the offense like,
Speaker 1: I could cheat because I knew concepts down in distance.
Speaker 1: Not cheap, but I was just very informed on like
Speaker 1: situational type offensive play. So it helped me. And then
Speaker 1: you know, going back to offense, it helped me to
Speaker 1: sit in meetings and learn the techniques of the defensive
Speaker 1: backs and what they're trying to do with Lena scrimmage,
Speaker 1: and what they're trying to do once they're in phase,
Speaker 1: out of phase, you know, on certain coverage I was learning.
Speaker 1: So it was it was honestly, it was. It was
Speaker 1: a great thing for my progression to the player I became. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, that's actually really interesting. I've talked to some
Speaker 1: other guys in the league about that. That having the
Speaker 1: perspective of the other side. In other words, as an
Speaker 1: offensive player, you have a sense of what the defense
Speaker 1: is doing and how to beat them in some ways
Speaker 1: better than guys who are exclusively defensive players. Right, and
Speaker 1: what you're looking at from the other side gives you
Speaker 1: the ability in some way to know and read what's
Speaker 1: effective on the other side of the ball, right, Yes, sir,
Speaker 1: and that and that's what you know. You see a
Speaker 1: lot of that, like with coaches when you see, like
Speaker 1: I I referenced, the coach's assistant who's like the coffee guy.
Speaker 1: So a lot of the times when they're early on
Speaker 1: in their life, like Matt Patricity did this. Who's you know,
Speaker 1: technically an offensive line coach this year for the New
Speaker 1: England Patriots. But he started he wanted to be a
Speaker 1: defensive coach. I think Bill sent him to offense and
Speaker 1: he had to learn the offensive line person that he crossed,
Speaker 1: he crossed teaches them, you know. So he has to
Speaker 1: stick on offense for two or three years, learn offense,
Speaker 1: and then he throws him back on defense. He's done
Speaker 1: that with a few different coaches, you know, And I
Speaker 1: got to have that kind of like experience through a player,
Speaker 1: which was, you know, awesome. Yeah. I mean, look, we
Speaker 1: could talk all day about your career with the Patriots.
Speaker 1: You end up at the end of your career or
Speaker 1: being the number two player in the history of the
Speaker 1: NFL too, Jerry Rice, who helped teach your work ethic
Speaker 1: in both yards and receptions in the playoffs. You win
Speaker 1: three Super Bowls with the New England Patriots, Super Bowl
Speaker 1: for one and fifty three Super Bowl MVP with I
Speaker 1: don't know, I read that it was over half of
Speaker 1: the receiving yards. It felt like you were the entire
Speaker 1: offense in Super Bowl fifty three against the Rams, just
Speaker 1: an unbelievable career. But super Bowl fifty one, I want
Speaker 1: to talk about just really briefly, when you're down so
Speaker 1: big to the Falcons, by the way, my hometown team
Speaker 1: who have had to win a Super Bowl, Atlanta, also
Speaker 1: the Red and the Blue. My friend, Yes, when you
Speaker 1: said to um what you said to him at halftime,
Speaker 1: did you believe you could come back? Honestly, I did.
Speaker 1: I knew it was gonna be tough, and I knew
Speaker 1: the percentages were down. But like, first off, there's never
Speaker 1: really a There hasn't been a blow out on Super
Speaker 1: Bowl in a while. I mean there wasn't kind of
Speaker 1: thirteam with Denver and Color at Carolina. But I ain't
Speaker 1: gonna blow us out, Okay, and you're not gonna blow
Speaker 1: We're a hard like we're a mentally tough football team.
Speaker 1: There's gonna be some things to happen, which we we
Speaker 1: helped produce a lot of the production of the Atlanta
Speaker 1: Falcons through turnovers a pixel, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: Like we gave them a lot, but we also were
Speaker 1: moving the ball and we were doing things. There are
Speaker 1: a couple of things we were doing well. But if
Speaker 1: we were tightened up a little bit here and there.
Speaker 1: You know, we didn't get to really see much of
Speaker 1: our defense. We were setting him up for shitty uh
Speaker 1: fuel position a bunch and they were like, they didn't
Speaker 1: really get to open up their game plan. So once
Speaker 1: we got back on track after that resettlement of halftime,
Speaker 1: you know, being a raw rock guy, Yeah, we're gonna
Speaker 1: do it this that, And first third down, I dropped
Speaker 1: a third down like I would have been I probably
Speaker 1: would have broke a tackle, and it was a man
Speaker 1: covers a little under route and I was under gone.
Speaker 1: I had him, you know, And after that, I was like, fuck,
Speaker 1: you know, but that's gonna be tough. It's gonna be
Speaker 1: tough now. And then you know, things started and everyone
Speaker 1: kept on saying, you can't win the game with one play,
Speaker 1: You can't go out one place is not winning a game.
Speaker 1: So why don't we just try to do our job?
Speaker 1: Why doesn't everybody? If we all do our job collectively,
Speaker 1: the unit will win each every play and we'll see
Speaker 1: where we go from there. And that's what started happening.
Speaker 1: You know. You start, you started feeling momentum coming our way,
Speaker 1: and we we started everyone started honing in. Everyone did
Speaker 1: put a little extra into their mental capacity of like,
Speaker 1: all right, hey, I need to just do this. Let's
Speaker 1: go to our fundamentals of each and every play. If
Speaker 1: this happens, we know this, there's chance of this happened.
Speaker 1: There's sixty percent chance of this happening. Let's like let's hone,
Speaker 1: let's honeing it in and let's do it. And and
Speaker 1: you know, we went out and we did it. It
Speaker 1: was crazy, and watching that game, it's still crazy, but
Speaker 1: that was that team's mind. You know. I played on
Speaker 1: some really crazily strong, mentally strong football teams and and
Speaker 1: to to see that one, that team that two thousand
Speaker 1: and seventeen year, like to be down that far and
Speaker 1: and especially in the Super Bowl to go we we've
Speaker 1: been down a bunch, Like I kept on thinking of
Speaker 1: like back when we were playing thirteen. We were playing
Speaker 1: uh Cleveland, we needed like two scores and like a
Speaker 1: minute and thirty and we somehow won that game. You know.
Speaker 1: On then Denver was up twenty four, oh on us
Speaker 1: in in thirteen, and we came back and won that
Speaker 1: game at half. After the half, we had like these
Speaker 1: comeback wins. So I was like, like we could do this,
Speaker 1: Like you're you're playing all scenarios in your head. And
Speaker 1: I also had some thoughts like damn, we ain't gonna
Speaker 1: do this, you know what I mean? So like I
Speaker 1: bounced it back and forth and and the thing that
Speaker 1: ultimately keeps your mind in the right places when what
Speaker 1: you know, the coaches always preaches, think about what you
Speaker 1: got to do for your job. Yeah, is your catch
Speaker 1: with a couple of minutes to go that ends up
Speaker 1: tying the score shortly after? Is that the greatest catch
Speaker 1: in Super Bowl history? I don't know. There's some good catches.
Speaker 1: There's some you know, Julio had an unbelievable toe tap.
Speaker 1: Matt Ryan that that toe tap like outbreaking route, like
Speaker 1: a thirty yard ball down the field on the sideline,
Speaker 1: jumps over hand and face that was a great catch.
Speaker 1: The helmet catches a really good there's something really good catches,
Speaker 1: you know. To be even put in that category, or
Speaker 1: to even be asked that question, I'll take that you
Speaker 1: didn't answer, just pointing it out, just pointing it out.
Speaker 1: My cots deception didn't work. Oh yes, Oh gosh, it's no.
Speaker 1: You have to do the Patriots way anymore. They're not
Speaker 1: paying you. Bill is not gonna come walking in the
Speaker 1: room and give you ship. No, you can answer the question. Now,
Speaker 1: that's a really good call back. I honestly think that
Speaker 1: I don't know. It's hard to put one onto Okay, alright, fine,
Speaker 1: I have another Super Bowl question for you. In Super
Speaker 1: Bowl forty nine, the end of the game, did you
Speaker 1: think Marshawn was getting the ball? And were you? Were
Speaker 1: you surprised or glad that he didn't? Uh? D all
Speaker 1: of the above. It's Marshawn Lynche. You know a lot
Speaker 1: of people fail to to mention. And Dante high Tower
Speaker 1: on the play right before that play where he brought
Speaker 1: down Marshawn Lynch while taking on a blocker. The play
Speaker 1: right before the pick saved the game, you know. And
Speaker 1: and that was probably the reason why, because we we
Speaker 1: threw in our personnel group that was like straight run,
Speaker 1: like run gun, We're blitzing every you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: It was one of those all out blitzes and uh
Speaker 1: thank god they didn't. Yeah, thank god they didn't. You
Speaker 1: don't know the butterfly effect on that one. Yeah. Uh.
Speaker 1: As I mentioned, you win the m v P in
Speaker 1: Super Bowl fifty three of all of York of all
Speaker 1: the games with the Patriots, of all of the the moments,
Speaker 1: the plays, do you have one that stands out above
Speaker 1: all else? Ah, I mean the Super Bowl fifty three.
Speaker 1: The hill I had to climb that year. It was
Speaker 1: fucking early, you know, I tear my c H. I
Speaker 1: gets spended and like I said, after an a c
Speaker 1: L you know, those traumatic injury, especially a guy that
Speaker 1: has to run like you learn how like that was
Speaker 1: a huge thing. And I was like I was in
Speaker 1: my It's not like I was twenty two, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. You know, I had a lot of
Speaker 1: things going on on the field off the field. To
Speaker 1: end that that was the hardest year of my life.
Speaker 1: And to end it the way our team got to
Speaker 1: and and I got to it was you know that
Speaker 1: that was such a and also experience and something great
Speaker 1: for like me as a as a person to to know,
Speaker 1: you know, like you always I've been through some a
Speaker 1: lot of adverse situations. But you gotta continually do those
Speaker 1: kind of things. You gotta contin It's not. Oh, it's
Speaker 1: not easy. You know when people always some people will
Speaker 1: come to you and say, like, man, it's so crazy
Speaker 1: this your story is that Well, there's gonna be like
Speaker 1: ten other stories that you have to you know, continually
Speaker 1: do and anytime you get to chalk up a win,
Speaker 1: it's hard to win, you know, and anything, and and
Speaker 1: you know, to win that with my folks there, my family,
Speaker 1: my daughter, Like that was amazing. That was like one
Speaker 1: of the happiest days of my life, just just through
Speaker 1: the like the pressure, like it was just a long year.
Speaker 1: That was like a really tough year, Like mentally emotionally
Speaker 1: it was you know, you're not feeling physically right because
Speaker 1: you don't you don't become like that's a process when
Speaker 1: you tear your a c o. Like your you can
Speaker 1: go out and play in like eight months, nine months,
Speaker 1: Like you can run routes, I could look good, but
Speaker 1: can you continually compound and have this like endurance to
Speaker 1: go out and like each week, like you're you feel
Speaker 1: like crap, you can't walk till Thursday. Then you come
Speaker 1: back and you you get ready for the next week.
Speaker 1: And like then at the end of the year, you're
Speaker 1: starting to feel like your knees getting better a little bit,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, because you're you're putting that
Speaker 1: yardage on your leg. Your your body's adapting and like
Speaker 1: it was that was that was cool. And the way
Speaker 1: we did it too was we weren't supposed to win
Speaker 1: it and that was awesome. Wasn't my favorite, but that's
Speaker 1: one of my favorite moments, not necessarily the win, but
Speaker 1: like that feeling after with my folks, my family. Yeah,
Speaker 1: once again overcoming adversity. I've I've noticed on your social
Speaker 1: media you it's possible you're a little bit of a
Speaker 1: fan of a television show called The Office. We had
Speaker 1: in our seventh year, near the end, we had Steve
Speaker 1: Carrell Michael Scott leave the show. Talk to me a
Speaker 1: little bit about your feelings when Brady leaves for the Buccaneers.
Speaker 1: I mean it was at that time it was tough.
Speaker 1: You know, you become really like we spend more time
Speaker 1: with the guys in that locker room, especially in those
Speaker 1: those months in the season. I mean we're putting in
Speaker 1: thirteen fourteen hour days. You know, people, and it's not
Speaker 1: just like the on field stuff. It's stay off the
Speaker 1: field stuff. You like going to work with people you
Speaker 1: love and that that makes you better, you know, like
Speaker 1: that having that and you know it was a mixed
Speaker 1: emotions though you wanted him and his family to be
Speaker 1: happy and and satisfied with everything, and and so it's
Speaker 1: that's a part of this game. It sucks. But every year,
Speaker 1: regardless of the team, there's gonna be new coaches, there's
Speaker 1: gonna be new players. And I never thought like that
Speaker 1: would be hard because we were so accustomed to that.
Speaker 1: But that was that was hard. It's one of your
Speaker 1: best it's one of your best friends, a guy that
Speaker 1: has done so much for you and your in in
Speaker 1: my life, a lot of guys and for that organization,
Speaker 1: you know, that was a very that was that was tough.
Speaker 1: But then instantly you turn on, well like, now we
Speaker 1: gotta go out and we got a we gotta go
Speaker 1: find a way to win without them. And we didn't
Speaker 1: do much of that that year. Mhm. Right, if you
Speaker 1: were a character in the office, who would you be?
Speaker 1: I'd probably be you. Secretly, everyone thinks so he's not
Speaker 1: the sharpest tool in the shed. But you know, I
Speaker 1: know how you got that money to buy that bar.
Speaker 1: At the end, you're easily in the whole time, you're
Speaker 1: the smartest one there. All right, Well, listen, that's a theory.
Speaker 1: That's a that's a theory. Julia, I just came up
Speaker 1: with that. Whoo who would Tom be uh Dwight? Uh? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Good good? What about? What about? What about Bill Correl?
Speaker 1: What like? Yeah? Yeah, he probably would. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Buil builds his own guy. It's hard to put he's
Speaker 1: his own character. I couldn't put one on him. But
Speaker 1: he's the he's the world's best boss, right, self proclaimed?
Speaker 1: Who said that? So No, I'm just saying he's the
Speaker 1: world's best boss, right like that's Michael Scott. He's got
Speaker 1: the mug that says world that means it's self proclaimed
Speaker 1: from him. Yeah. I'm a little nervous talking about Bill lately, honestly,
Speaker 1: because I've been doing it too much. And I gotta
Speaker 1: go to a practice here soon. And I know because
Speaker 1: he's already gave me one of the talks like how
Speaker 1: can I turn on the fucking TV and I see
Speaker 1: you impersonate me all the time? Like he gave one
Speaker 1: of those, and I still love the guy. Yeah, no more,
Speaker 1: no more, no, no more. You're done with impersonating again.
Speaker 1: I hear you have a hell impersonation. I gotta I
Speaker 1: gotta put it on old. Yeah, yeah, it makes sense.
Speaker 1: I gotta feel that The next time I see him,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, already already gave a couple
Speaker 1: after the last time I saw him, and he already
Speaker 1: said that what I just said like poking a little
Speaker 1: fun at me. But I don't know if it's really fun.
Speaker 1: Is it fun? Is he joking? Is he not choking?
Speaker 1: Is he throwing like a mind trick on me? Is
Speaker 1: he do using the forest like this? Dude's fool. I
Speaker 1: got some cards behind there something, there's a card behind there.
Speaker 1: There's a card you don't know. I am fascinated to
Speaker 1: see what happens with the Patriots this year. Fascinated it's
Speaker 1: it's it'll be very, very interesting. The no offensive coordinator
Speaker 1: who's calling place? Thing? Is this a Jedi mind trick?
Speaker 1: Or does it fail? And I'm not even asking you,
Speaker 1: I'm just saying I personally me, I'm not putting this
Speaker 1: on you. I'm not asking you to say anything. I'm
Speaker 1: saying I'm fascinated to see how it how it plays out.
Speaker 1: I am too, I mean, this is this is a
Speaker 1: big challenge. This is you know, and but who would you?
Speaker 1: I mean, who knows? This guy's coach Melichick's probably like
Speaker 1: I need this challenge. I want to see I'm gonna
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, who knows, I don't. That's
Speaker 1: so that's so interesting. I was thinking exactly the same
Speaker 1: thing the other day. So I have I've been at
Speaker 1: at at two golf clubs, clubs where golf happens, and
Speaker 1: there are pros at golf clubs, and the pros at
Speaker 1: golf clubs sometimes get bored with golf because all they
Speaker 1: do is play golf and hit golf balls and show
Speaker 1: people how to hit golf balls. And twice two different
Speaker 1: guys that I know have decided that the game has
Speaker 1: become too easy, and so they are they learned how
Speaker 1: to play left handed. And I was literally just thinking
Speaker 1: the same thing about Bill. Has doing it the standard
Speaker 1: way become too easy. Now, let's do something just a
Speaker 1: little bit different and see if we can approach or
Speaker 1: learn or be balanced in a new way trying something new.
Speaker 1: I don't know, I think I believe, you know, there's
Speaker 1: some I don't know that I see who knows that?
Speaker 1: But you know, like there's so many other variables that
Speaker 1: people like when you're in the building, you know what
Speaker 1: goes down, Like there's something that like he probably could
Speaker 1: have had something lines something went through. This didn't happen,
Speaker 1: that happened. This happened, you know. But it's gonna be very,
Speaker 1: definitely interesting to see the developmental stage, the developments of
Speaker 1: Mac Jones, you know, going in without a guy like
Speaker 1: that's a big relationship, an offensive coordinator, the guy who
Speaker 1: calls the play with with you know, a young quarterback
Speaker 1: trying to thrive and trying to blossom in this system.
Speaker 1: You know, it's Josh McDaniels. He's a great offensive you know,
Speaker 1: he's he's a he's a really good he knows x's
Speaker 1: and knows he knows that there's an art to calling plays,
Speaker 1: you know, And I'm not I'm not. I'm confident that
Speaker 1: you know, Bill called plays for the Cleveland Browns on offense.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you remember that, but he did.
Speaker 1: You know that some happened, but he called plays. So
Speaker 1: he's called plays on offense. But the games evolved, and
Speaker 1: if there's anyone who can do it, though, if anyone
Speaker 1: in the league can do it, that's the man. But
Speaker 1: it's gonna be it's gonna be fucking crazy. That's gonna
Speaker 1: be a tough one. But if anyone can it's Bill.
Speaker 1: Uh you retire from the NFL one just last year
Speaker 1: in April. Within three hours you have a new job
Speaker 1: there at inside the NFL. Uh. Congratulations on that. Congratulations
Speaker 1: on what you're doing. I love listening to you and
Speaker 1: hearing your insights, both from your time there and what
Speaker 1: you see. I'm sure you still are the hardest working
Speaker 1: man and doing your research to keep all of us
Speaker 1: understanding what what's going on out there. I appreciate that
Speaker 1: so much. You've got a kid's book, this was a
Speaker 1: while ago. Trilogy, you have a trilogy trilogy. Well, this
Speaker 1: just made me laugh. The squirrel named Jewels, and a
Speaker 1: goat named Tom, and an old owl named you. Gotta
Speaker 1: see the pictures too. It's pretty it's pretty cool. Those
Speaker 1: are fun. Yeah. I mean you could have hidden it
Speaker 1: a little bit better than that. But Jules and Tom
Speaker 1: and the old and the Old, the old wise owl
Speaker 1: and now breaking news. Games with Names new podcast launching
Speaker 1: very soon. Just announced What can you tell me about
Speaker 1: your new podcast? Games with Names? Well, Games with Names
Speaker 1: and partnered with this comic Sam Morrel. Very funny, very funny,
Speaker 1: Upper East Side kid from New York. You know, been
Speaker 1: a fan of his for a long time. And what
Speaker 1: he's been doing, and uh, I wanted to start a podcast.
Speaker 1: And we've been sitting around thinking about ideas of what
Speaker 1: what can we do a podcast? All? You know, I like,
Speaker 1: I like to talk. I want to talk maybe a
Speaker 1: little bit here and there. I got some insight. And
Speaker 1: my buddy who just so happens his name is Kyler.
Speaker 1: He's just one of our he's part of Coast Productions,
Speaker 1: one of our directors, huge part of our business. He
Speaker 1: comes in one day after Thanksgiving. This was like a
Speaker 1: year and a half ago when we started developing this
Speaker 1: thing and he goes, yeah, ranted an old kid at
Speaker 1: a sports bar, and we didn't know each other, but
Speaker 1: we recognized playing football against each other. And it was
Speaker 1: crazy to hear his perspective of this crazy game we
Speaker 1: played in and my perspective. And you know, we wanted
Speaker 1: to hear the crazy perspective of important games and people's lives,
Speaker 1: you know, And so we wanted to find the best
Speaker 1: game with the greatest names. And then that's what this
Speaker 1: is the sports history podcast. Over fun games. You know,
Speaker 1: everyone talks about the Goat greatest of all time? What
Speaker 1: about the Dog the greatest of all games? We need
Speaker 1: to find the dog. What's the greatest game? Everyone's always
Speaker 1: arguing about it, Like now, is it the Statue Liberty
Speaker 1: game with Boise State, Oklahoma? Remember that crazy game? Is
Speaker 1: it the eighteen and one Giant loss against the Giants
Speaker 1: and the Patriots? You know? And then there's also cool
Speaker 1: games that like you get to you get to talk with,
Speaker 1: like we had Ricky Williams on and then to talk
Speaker 1: about when he was at University of Texas and he
Speaker 1: broke Tony Dorset's all perfectly broke every record and that
Speaker 1: was like his going to hear his perspective on that
Speaker 1: game and like how he prepared, what was going on
Speaker 1: in pop culture back in It's a fun podcast with
Speaker 1: some you know, guys just having conversations talking crap, you know,
Speaker 1: me and Sam and I'm super excited. I'm super excited
Speaker 1: for it. It's it's been really fun, you know, especially
Speaker 1: with the guys that we've had on. I don't know
Speaker 1: if I'm supposed to tell every guys, but you know,
Speaker 1: we had Michael Irving, We had Paul Pierce talk about
Speaker 1: the wheelchair game. Did he shoot his pants? Did he
Speaker 1: not shoot his pants? We get the direct answer from
Speaker 1: Paul Pierce himself. That's called a teasers. And then we
Speaker 1: also that's a teaser. We had eight We had Eli
Speaker 1: and Teddy Brusky come and talk about the eight teen
Speaker 1: and one. Teddy Bruski's first time ever talking about this game.
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's a fact, but he usually
Speaker 1: doesn't talk about losses. So we're gonna run with it.
Speaker 1: Elis on there. We had Peyton when he started the
Speaker 1: season off with the game he threw seven touchdowns when
Speaker 1: he just signed Welker from tom and he comes out
Speaker 1: and lights up a seven game, a seven touchdown opening
Speaker 1: game against defending Super Bowl champions in the Baltimore Cold
Speaker 1: or Baltimore Ravens. Like, we're gonna have some We're gonna
Speaker 1: get Joe Namath on this bad Boy. We're gonna get
Speaker 1: a bunch of people. It's gonna be it's it's it's
Speaker 1: been fun and we've already got a bunch in in
Speaker 1: in the books and I'm I'm excited. And you know,
Speaker 1: Sam has been awesome to work with. He's a he's
Speaker 1: I have to, like, you know, I have to learn
Speaker 1: how to come up with something when he says something
Speaker 1: so funny to like, like my comeback skills are are
Speaker 1: kind of weak right now because when you work with
Speaker 1: the comic they're just so witty. They're on top of you,
Speaker 1: like you could drill. You could throw like a you know,
Speaker 1: a dick joke out like in front of Kurt Warner
Speaker 1: and make it somehow like I don't know, it's weird,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? All congratulations on that. I
Speaker 1: cannot wait to listen. Just annount breaking news here on
Speaker 1: off the beat. What's the what's the game you think
Speaker 1: we should do? What's your favorite game? What? What? What
Speaker 1: is your greatest game of all time? What's your dog
Speaker 1: greatest of all games? But not necessarily football, right, No,
Speaker 1: it's all sports we're doing. We're gonna we're getting soccer
Speaker 1: on here. We're getting it all. Get a NASCAR will
Speaker 1: make some wrestling. I think both. You could make an
Speaker 1: argument for either Game six or Game seven of the
Speaker 1: one World Series between the Atlanta Braves and the Minnesota Twins.
Speaker 1: Kirby Puckett hits the home run and then the next
Speaker 1: game small pitches you need to get smalt. Maybe for
Speaker 1: Game seven of what many people consider the greatest World
Speaker 1: Series of all time between the Braves and the twins.
Speaker 1: I don't know that one just popped into my brain.
Speaker 1: Um small Smaalty. If Smalty would talk about it, he
Speaker 1: probably hasn't talked about it ever, So that would be
Speaker 1: That would be something football man doesn't have to be.
Speaker 1: We're gonna, We're gonna, We're gonna, you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: the the USC Texas college football game. That's gotta be
Speaker 1: up there. We're gonna cover that bad boy. That Rose
Speaker 1: Bowl was unreal. That was right when I was in
Speaker 1: college too. Yeah, I was an electric game. That That's
Speaker 1: when the Rose Bowl was cool. Yeah, you want to
Speaker 1: you want to know the greatest sporting game. I don't
Speaker 1: know if it's a game that I ever witnessed live.
Speaker 1: I was very I was young. I was young, but
Speaker 1: I was there at the Olympics when Kerry Strong broke
Speaker 1: her ankle and they won the gold medal. I was
Speaker 1: there in Atlanta. We might have to get that race
Speaker 1: with me. We gotta get you come on and talk
Speaker 1: about that. We'll get it. We'll get We'll get the winners.
Speaker 1: And what is it the four by one who broke
Speaker 1: their ankle, the carry struck the gymnast when the women
Speaker 1: won the gold medal. Can do it. You do it, Bella, Carol,
Speaker 1: you were there. I was there, I was there, that
Speaker 1: was in Atlanta. There. That's yeah, Wow, that's awesome. We'll
Speaker 1: have to get you a pretty good I appreciate having
Speaker 1: congratulations on that. Julian, congratulations. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: coming and talking to us. So freaking interesting to me.
Speaker 1: The your career, how hard you had to work, the
Speaker 1: ups and downs from high school all the way until
Speaker 1: well not anymore. Now you just you retire and you
Speaker 1: get a new job, and now you've got more. So
Speaker 1: I don't respect you so much anymore. But back then
Speaker 1: you worked hard. Yeah, it's it's it's it's not retired.
Speaker 1: I mean the no, i'man what they like to call
Speaker 1: the transition phase. You're transitioning. You never really retired. What
Speaker 1: am I gonna sit and do nothing? I can't retire
Speaker 1: a d D. Julian, thank you so much for being on,
Speaker 1: No problem, man, I appreciate a big fan. It's it's
Speaker 1: it's honestly an honor. Julian, my friend, what a pleasure
Speaker 1: to have you on today. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: coming by and talking to me. I can't wait to
Speaker 1: relive some of my all time favorite sports moments with
Speaker 1: you on Games with Names listeners, make sure to go
Speaker 1: check that out and thank you for tuning in today.
Speaker 1: I have been having so much fun expanding into the
Speaker 1: world of sports. I really hope that you're leaving these
Speaker 1: feeling inspired in a way. These athletes, the work that
Speaker 1: they put in, the dedication that they have it is well,
Speaker 1: it's it's mind blowing. So why don't you and you
Speaker 1: take that inspiration and I want you to do something
Speaker 1: great this week, all right, or just relax, that's cool
Speaker 1: to whatever makes you happy, as long as you were inspired,
Speaker 1: all right. I'll be back next Tuesday as usual with
Speaker 1: a brand new episode of Off the Beat, and I
Speaker 1: will see you then. Off the Beat is hosted an
Speaker 1: executive produced by me Brian Baumgartner, alongside our executive producer Langley.
Speaker 1: Our producers are Diego Tapia, Liz Hayes, Hannah Harris, and
Speaker 1: Emily Carr. Our talent producer is Ryan Papa Zachary, and
Speaker 1: our intern is Sammy Cats. Our theme song Bubble and
Speaker 1: Squeak performed by my great friend Creed Bratton, and the
Speaker 1: episode was mixed by Seth o'landski.