Speaker 1: Welcome to another edition of the OTP. I'm Amy Wells
Speaker 1: and we are joined by Tennessee Titans head coach Brian Callahan. Coach,
Speaker 1: We're so happy to have you here. It's a holiday weekend,
Speaker 1: so there's a lot of time for relaxing and slowing down,
Speaker 1: and we want to talk about all of that. But
Speaker 1: first we've got to do some football stuff. Early, early, early,
Speaker 1: early in the off season program, you established that competition
Speaker 1: was the name of the game throughout the whole process.
Speaker 1: What was it that you saw or noticed about the
Speaker 1: twenty twenty four season that you felt like a little
Speaker 1: more competition could solve that problem.
Speaker 2: I think there's probably more layers to it than that. Okay,
Speaker 2: certainly after the season, from feedback from coaches and players
Speaker 2: as we left, and obviously whatever whatever we did prior
Speaker 2: wasn't quite good enough. And so how do you know
Speaker 2: as a as a leader, you have to sit there
Speaker 2: and you got to take a lot of different viewpoints
Speaker 2: and criticisms, and you have to be open to that
Speaker 2: because at the end of the day, it's going to
Speaker 2: make make you better, it's going to make our team better,
Speaker 2: it's going to make our process better. So there's a
Speaker 2: lot of different things that that some coaches and players
Speaker 2: and people had sort of gave me feedback on that
Speaker 2: I reflected on for a long time, and it's how
Speaker 2: do you take all this information and how do you
Speaker 2: make it actionable? How do you how do you take
Speaker 2: a comment here and an idea here and another idea
Speaker 2: over here, and so how do you manage all those things?
Speaker 2: So I spent a lot of time going back through
Speaker 2: all the things that the conversations I had at the
Speaker 2: end of the year with a lot of people, and
Speaker 2: and I sort of came away with like three or
Speaker 2: four main points of emphasis. One is how do we
Speaker 2: win football games? That's that's the goal, right, how do
Speaker 2: we better put ourselves in position to win in doing that?
Speaker 2: When you're saying how do we win football games? Well,
Speaker 2: how do we keep ourselves first and foremost from losing
Speaker 2: football games? Because that's a huge part of NFL football
Speaker 2: is that you can lose a game a whole lot
Speaker 2: easier than you can win one. And so we went
Speaker 2: through and looked at and as part of yourself scout
Speaker 2: and all that, all the different things that we did
Speaker 2: and where we can actionably improve the things that we
Speaker 2: can control, right, what are what did we do in
Speaker 2: games that don't doesn't have anything to do with talent,
Speaker 2: doesn't anything do with scheme. What are the things that
Speaker 2: we can very actionably be better at that we can
Speaker 2: control on a regular basis, And then how do we
Speaker 2: measure it and verify it? That's kind of the theme
Speaker 2: of what you what I'm going to talk about ultimately,
Speaker 2: And that was the first thing. How do you do that?
Speaker 2: Then the second thing was, we need more connection on
Speaker 2: our football team from top to bottom coaches and players.
Speaker 2: Coaches and coaches, how do you how do you players
Speaker 2: to players? How do you foster connection? I thought we
Speaker 2: had okay connectivity on our team, but it just needed
Speaker 2: it needs to be more, It needs to be better.
Speaker 2: So how do we do that? And for pro athletes
Speaker 2: generally speaking, the thing that they connect over the quickest
Speaker 2: is competition. Yeah, and so how do you how do
Speaker 2: you make something that they're going to that doesn't feel
Speaker 2: like you know, Kitchie and in high schooling and stuff
Speaker 2: like that, but still but still gets to the core
Speaker 2: of what you're trying to accomplish, which is is to
Speaker 2: ramp up the level of competition, which should also then
Speaker 2: in turn ramp up the level of connection those are
Speaker 2: that that was kind of the core of what I
Speaker 2: was looking at over over the course of the leading
Speaker 2: up to the off season program is that how do
Speaker 2: we do those things? How do we win football games?
Speaker 2: How do we take take command of the things that
Speaker 2: we can control, and then how do we connect our
Speaker 2: football team better? And a lot of that is going
Speaker 2: to be through competitive drills, competitive practices, competitive games for
Speaker 2: lack of a better term. And it really sort of occurred.
Speaker 2: I had a Peyton McCollum, who's who's our assistant wide
Speaker 2: receivers coach. He had came to me and said, look,
Speaker 2: there's here's something you should here's the thought. And I
Speaker 2: take thoughts and ideas from everybody, and and he said,
Speaker 2: there's this. You know, there's a there's a coach that
Speaker 2: that I've kind of gotten familiar with over the years.
Speaker 2: Who's a guy named Anson Anson Durants who's the head
Speaker 2: women's soccer coach in North Carolina. He's written now multiple
Speaker 2: books and you know they've been North Carolina women's soccer
Speaker 2: has been one of the highest they're one of the
Speaker 2: best programs in sports. And he was like, you should
Speaker 2: just breath this. It's pretty interesting on how they structure
Speaker 2: practice and how they compete, and so I kind of
Speaker 2: dove down this rabbit hole of all the things they
Speaker 2: did there and it's super fascinating. They do an unbelievable job.
Speaker 2: And then I come to find a lot of it
Speaker 2: can from Dean Smith, who was obviously legendary coach for
Speaker 2: North Carolina men's basketball, and how they charted and uh
Speaker 2: tracked practice. Uh So there's there's a whole and act
Speaker 2: kind of like that's really fascinating. Well, how do I
Speaker 2: how do we do something? Here's all the things I
Speaker 2: want to do, here's some ideas, and how do you
Speaker 2: meld them together? That's sort of how the whole thing
Speaker 2: was born. And it was again a lot of thought
Speaker 2: and effort and time and energy put into it. But
Speaker 2: that's how we divided our That's the first step was
Speaker 2: dividing the locker room back into into not just by
Speaker 2: position groups, so we weren't siloed in the positions, because
Speaker 2: that's where we spend all our time is with our position.
Speaker 2: So I mixed the whole locker room up, and then
Speaker 2: I said, well, let's mix the whole team up and
Speaker 2: So the idea was this, we come up with these
Speaker 2: eight different teams they have captains, and now you have
Speaker 2: eight captains, and then you have a bunch of guys
Speaker 2: that are competing for something other than just an offensive
Speaker 2: defensive win. You know, in practice, so an offensive player
Speaker 2: might get a point for a touchdown, but he also
Speaker 2: might have a defensive player on his team that he's
Speaker 2: playing against that has a negative because he just had
Speaker 2: bad leverage and he gave up the touchdown. And so
Speaker 2: there's this sort of points back and forth that really
Speaker 2: the guys as it went on, they really bought into
Speaker 2: and the competition amongst the players that wasn't just offense
Speaker 2: and defense. That was truly about they wanted their team
Speaker 2: to win. And so we again points, we points are
Speaker 2: assigned for a million different things. But the idea was
Speaker 2: is how do we how do we connect more through that?
Speaker 2: And I think it was a really cool offseason program. Again,
Speaker 2: the players will probably tell you their perspective on it,
Speaker 2: but for me, it felt like the intent of what
Speaker 2: we wanted to do we got out of it. And
Speaker 2: that's that's encouraging and exciting for me as a head coach.
Speaker 2: I think for our football team is that we found
Speaker 2: a way to get all of those things kind of
Speaker 2: packed into a very short amount of time, and I
Speaker 2: think we got value from it and we're better for
Speaker 2: it because of the of how we went about our business.
Speaker 2: So I know that's a kind of a long roundabout
Speaker 2: way of talking about the whole process, but I think
Speaker 2: it's important to have the context in the background of
Speaker 2: where it came from and why we're doing it. And
Speaker 2: at the end, the one of the first videos I
Speaker 2: showed the team and the team meeting was a video
Speaker 2: from Steve Kerr from the Quarter Gold documentary, which is
Speaker 2: really fantastic about all these other, you know, the other
Speaker 2: basketball teams for the Olympics, and Steve cur said he'd
Speaker 2: been around a bunch of winning, He's won a lot,
Speaker 2: he's you know, first and foremost good players. That's part
Speaker 2: of it, he goes, but there's two things that matter most,
Speaker 2: and what wins its joy and its competition. And then
Speaker 2: the third part is it's the joy in the success
Speaker 2: of others. And that sort of was like, that makes
Speaker 2: sense to me, And I think that's what we got
Speaker 2: out of our off season program, is that was those
Speaker 2: quite a bit of joy and a whole lot of competition,
Speaker 2: and I think we're better for it.
Speaker 1: It's interesting because conventional wisdom would say there's a five
Speaker 1: in line when instilling competition in something where you want
Speaker 1: guys to compete, but not compete to the level where
Speaker 1: you then fracture a locker room like you go too far.
Speaker 1: But it seems like throughout this whole off season you've
Speaker 1: done a really good job of minding that line and
Speaker 1: getting peak performance and peak competition. So you're right at
Speaker 1: the top of that curve.
Speaker 2: Yeah, anytime now there's when you're competing for something there
Speaker 2: you're always risking that that you're tipping over the edge
Speaker 2: right where it goes a little bit too too far.
Speaker 2: We haven't had that issue, I think partly because it's
Speaker 2: not it's not just a offense defense competition that there's
Speaker 2: that there's more involved in it, and there's more things
Speaker 2: that they're competing for with their team of guys as
Speaker 2: opposed to our side of the ball. Because then you
Speaker 2: do sides of the ball sometimes and it just becomes
Speaker 2: it becomes almost irritating and personal. Is that they just
Speaker 2: they just want to beat the hell out of each other,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean? Right, This wasn't that This
Speaker 2: wasn't that style of competition necessarily. It was more about
Speaker 2: the connecting and the building up of the players and
Speaker 2: the building of the relationships with guys maybe they hadn't
Speaker 2: been around a lot previously, and I think that's what
Speaker 2: kept it from being more than what we were looking for.
Speaker 1: So in your first year, you build a foundation to
Speaker 1: your football team what it's going to be. In your
Speaker 1: second year, you're adding this layer of connecting, of competition
Speaker 1: and kind of establishing that this is going to be
Speaker 1: the expectation going forward, that we handle ourselves in this way.
Speaker 1: What are you hoping that that creates in your team
Speaker 1: as you go through training camp and beyond through the season.
Speaker 2: At the end of the day, you're trying to create
Speaker 2: You're trying to create your culture of what you want
Speaker 2: your team and you're building to look like and act
Speaker 2: like to the point where what you hope happens is
Speaker 2: you get to you get to a spot where you
Speaker 2: bring somebody in and they do something that isn't, you know,
Speaker 2: kind of in line with how we operate, and people go,
Speaker 2: you know, we don't do that here, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean, that's not how were that's not how we
Speaker 2: do business here. That's what you're trying to get to,
Speaker 2: is you're trying to get to something that's so ingrained
Speaker 2: in the locker room in the building that that's what's expected,
Speaker 2: that's your that that is what your standard is. Now,
Speaker 2: we got to go earn our standard. You know, you don't.
Speaker 2: You don't just get to say what your standard is.
Speaker 2: You have to earn it right, and and you earn
Speaker 2: that through At the end of the day, you your
Speaker 2: culture and your standards and your expectations are are ultimately
Speaker 2: built through winning, because that's what we're all trying to
Speaker 2: get done is win football games. But there's a whole
Speaker 2: other part of that that as you as you win
Speaker 2: and you build through the culture, through the things that
Speaker 2: you're emphasizing and expecting, you hope that that's ultimately what
Speaker 2: takes hold and then it becomes who you are, It
Speaker 2: becomes what your organization is, your football team is that
Speaker 2: when you walk in that locker room, there's no there's
Speaker 2: no confusion on what's expected and what works for us here.
Speaker 2: And if you're not a part of that, if you
Speaker 2: don't buy into that, then you won't be here.
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Speaker 1: of the Tennessee Titans. Now back to the OTP. This
Speaker 1: team looks very different in twenty twenty five than it
Speaker 1: did in twenty twenty four. A lot of new faces.
Speaker 1: This roster has just experienced a lot of change. So
Speaker 1: I'm going to make some sweeping generalizations about this team
Speaker 1: and you can let me know if I am heading
Speaker 1: down the right path here. The first one is that
Speaker 1: one of the main characteristics you guys were looking for
Speaker 1: in free agent acquisitions over the twenty twenty twenty five
Speaker 1: offseason was durability. Is that correct?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's hard to It's hard to go out
Speaker 2: and pay players that you don't know if they're going
Speaker 2: to play seventeen games for you, because you're at the
Speaker 2: end of the day. It's, you know, you to take
Speaker 2: a step back from the personal side that you look
Speaker 2: at the business part of it. It's you know, it's
Speaker 2: you're you're making an investment in in a player, and
Speaker 2: you're making investment in in performance. And it's hard to
Speaker 2: perform if you can't play. And when you're when you're
Speaker 2: investing money and you're spending the money of the organization
Speaker 2: to upgrade your football team, you look at how does
Speaker 2: this how does this player impact our team? And when
Speaker 2: they're healthy, they are impactful. But you know this player
Speaker 2: acts only played forty of his games and player be
Speaker 2: as played ninety and so you're you're essentially betting on
Speaker 2: the durability and that they're going to be there to
Speaker 2: help us longer more often than you know another play
Speaker 2: that maybe isn't that's not part of their strengths. And
Speaker 2: so we invested heavily in availability. You know, guys that
Speaker 2: have been available and performed at a high level over time,
Speaker 2: and you want as many of those guys as possible
Speaker 2: because there's also a mental toughness and a character, a
Speaker 2: defined character to guys that are available, if that makes sense,
Speaker 2: Because it's hard, it's very hard. It's hard to play
Speaker 2: that many snaps over your course of your career because
Speaker 2: it's a physical it hurts these guys. But there's part
Speaker 2: of there's part of what drives these guys to continue
Speaker 2: to suit up on Sundays. And you want as many
Speaker 2: guys like that as you can find.
Speaker 1: All Right, another broad generalization, but this rookie class is
Speaker 1: one of the most sure groups of rookie football players
Speaker 1: that has ever existed.
Speaker 2: It's a really impressive class when it comes to professionalism, maturity,
Speaker 2: those things. It's they've they check all of those boxes.
Speaker 2: That was intentional, I know. I know Mike was very
Speaker 2: adamant about it. The same with Chad and even for me,
Speaker 2: I like him back at some point in the draft
Speaker 2: process to really what turned you know, you just your
Speaker 2: your product of your experiences. And so a lot of
Speaker 2: my experiences with building of a team was through Cincinnati
Speaker 2: when I was there, and I thought about the draft
Speaker 2: class that sort of flipped our football team, and it
Speaker 2: was our twenty twenty draft class, and that was it
Speaker 2: was Joe Burrow and T Higgins and Logan Wilson and
Speaker 2: Keem Davis gaither those guys that were I think of
Speaker 2: that draft class. I think seven of the eight picks
Speaker 2: were captains. They were super high level character players. They
Speaker 2: became the foundation. That draft class and that free agency
Speaker 2: class that we signed that year became the foundation of
Speaker 2: of what was back to back AFC championship games and
Speaker 2: a lot of success over two seasons. Mike had similar
Speaker 2: experiences in Kansas City. And so when you when you
Speaker 2: go when you and you were very intentional about the
Speaker 2: character you're drafting, and you do all the work and
Speaker 2: making sure that these are the kind of guys that
Speaker 2: love playing football, that are intelligent football players, that have people.
Speaker 2: When you draft a player and everybody you talk to
Speaker 2: at the school says, this is this is the guy,
Speaker 2: this is this is and maybe it's not their best player,
Speaker 2: but it's like that's the guy. Like that's the guy
Speaker 2: that's going to succeed. And so you you bet on
Speaker 2: those characteristics that that's going to allow them to succeed. Uh.
Speaker 2: And what is ultimately very challenging and difficult profession to
Speaker 2: succeed in. And that the class in and of itself
Speaker 2: has been fantastic when it comes to those things, But
Speaker 2: it was all very intentional. We we sought out those
Speaker 2: characteristics and players, and we drafted guys that fit that
Speaker 2: profile for us, and uh, it has certainly paid off.
Speaker 1: We've made it this far without saying the name cam Ward,
Speaker 1: which feels pretty impressive.
Speaker 2: Just for us.
Speaker 1: So this feels like the appropriate time to ask what
Speaker 1: has surprised you the most about cam warden the time
Speaker 1: that you've been.
Speaker 2: Able to work with him? Nothing?
Speaker 1: Really, he is as advertised.
Speaker 2: Yeah, nothing is surprised me. Because the more when we
Speaker 2: went back to the beginning and we start watching this tape,
Speaker 2: I would say that we were probably we were probably
Speaker 2: pretty early on the process because we knew we were
Speaker 2: picking first, so we kind of jumped into that maybe
Speaker 2: a little more in depth than some teams would have
Speaker 2: at the moment. And the more you watched him, you're like, man,
Speaker 2: I think this guy's got real talent. And what matters
Speaker 2: most in playing quarterback in the NFL, though, is the
Speaker 2: rest of it?
Speaker 1: Exactly.
Speaker 2: There's plenty of guys that got talent, it's just the
Speaker 2: rest of it. How do they process, what's their ability
Speaker 2: to relate with their teammates, how do they lead? What's
Speaker 2: the toughness like all the other things? Is what really
Speaker 2: matters in quarterback play, and at every point that we
Speaker 2: met with Cam, we learned more and more about him
Speaker 2: as a person. And the more people you talk to
Speaker 2: you learn about him as a player. In the locker
Speaker 2: room and everything that we heard and all of our
Speaker 2: own experiences, and once we got him here, everything was
Speaker 2: exactly as advertised when it came to those things. And
Speaker 2: that's what I mean by like nothing has surprised me,
Speaker 2: because he's incredibly focused. He loves playing football. He only
Speaker 2: cares about playing football at a high level. He works,
Speaker 2: his work ethic is off the charts, and then his
Speaker 2: ability to connect and relate to his teammates. He's got
Speaker 2: an easy way about him, but he is He's also
Speaker 2: highly competitive, hates to lose in anything he does. So
Speaker 2: all these things are all things we knew about him
Speaker 2: in the process, and then once he got here, as
Speaker 2: you get to know him better, it's all real. That's
Speaker 2: who he is. And so that's why nothing about Cam
Speaker 2: has surprised me, because I feel like we had a
Speaker 2: pretty good idea of who he was, and then he's
Speaker 2: shown that to be accurate.
Speaker 1: Throughout the offseason. But specifically, I think it was the
Speaker 1: most pronounced during the mandatory mini camp. You could tell
Speaker 1: that cam Ward was going to do cam Ward things,
Speaker 1: and the defense as a whole collectively was determined to
Speaker 1: remind everybody that he is still a rookie. Yeah, do
Speaker 1: you like that? I know you're an offensive guy, and
Speaker 1: I know you're a quarterback guy, but is that what
Speaker 1: you want to see on your defense?
Speaker 2: That?
Speaker 1: All right? Cool, we appreciate your eighteen in a row completions.
Speaker 1: We're coming for you now.
Speaker 2: Yeah. That's what he needs, That's what our team needs.
Speaker 2: And I think the mark of a good football team
Speaker 2: is when you do have You do have back and forth.
Speaker 2: You have offense has good days, defense has good days.
Speaker 2: Defense makes plays. Offense makes plays because you're competitive. Uh,
Speaker 2: if the defense is consistently beating you drill the drill
Speaker 2: day to day, that probably means you're not very good
Speaker 2: on offense and vice versa. And so that competitiveness and
Speaker 2: back and forth, I think is is great. And at
Speaker 2: the end of the day, all the defensive players want
Speaker 2: to know is is this a guy that we can
Speaker 2: count on? And is this a guy that's gonna gonna
Speaker 2: do what we think he can do? And they're testing him.
Speaker 2: They want to find out because I think the ultimate
Speaker 2: mark for pro football players is it doesn't really matter
Speaker 2: where you come from, doesn't really matter what what anybody
Speaker 2: else thinks of you when you walk in the locker room.
Speaker 2: The players in the locker room want to know can
Speaker 2: you help us win? And that is ultimately what they're
Speaker 2: trying to find out. And that's why they they test
Speaker 2: and they poke, and they prod and they and and
Speaker 2: they don't care. They're not They're they're not trying, No,
Speaker 2: They're just they're just trying to find out if this
Speaker 2: guy's for real. And that goes the same way for
Speaker 2: for for Elk and Strepo and Chim and all these
Speaker 2: young players. They're just trying to find out are you
Speaker 2: Are you going to be able to help us? And
Speaker 2: they're going to find out are you made of the
Speaker 2: right stuff? Do we think as veteran players and older
Speaker 2: players or defensive players that all these young players are
Speaker 2: able to help? And they go through their own process
Speaker 2: of finding out. And that's really what you saw sort
Speaker 2: of in real time, is that they're trying to find
Speaker 2: out if these guys are up to the task.
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Speaker 1: to the OTP. Is that why it was so important
Speaker 1: to do as many joint practices with other teams as
Speaker 1: you could to get that experience, to get that adversity.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's exactly what you hope for. And it's good
Speaker 2: because you get tired of playing against the same scheme.
Speaker 2: You know, we've played all spring against an Arnge defense,
Speaker 2: and he's played all spring against us, and you get
Speaker 2: tired of just the day to day back and forth,
Speaker 2: and it's like, you just want to go play something different.
Speaker 2: You want to play different players with a different color
Speaker 2: jersey on and a different scheme and then see where
Speaker 2: you stack up. And I think I got a lot
Speaker 2: of respect for Todd Bowles and what he's done in
Speaker 2: Tampa and the defense style that they play there and
Speaker 2: how well they've been able to build that offense, and
Speaker 2: they've went through a couple of different iterations because obviously
Speaker 2: Tom was there Brady and they had some success and
Speaker 2: had some They've had success with Baker. I just think
Speaker 2: they do such a great job and so to go
Speaker 2: compete against a team like that is something I'm very
Speaker 2: much looking forward to. And then you know, Atlanta's got
Speaker 2: a ton of young talent, they got a young team
Speaker 2: or Hem Morse is I think a really fantastic football
Speaker 2: coach and so it's a and does things the right way,
Speaker 2: and so you want to go practice against people like that,
Speaker 2: and I'm excited for it. I think it's going to
Speaker 2: be great for our football team as as a as
Speaker 2: a barometer for us to see where we're where we're at.
Speaker 2: It's going to help us get ready for September. And
Speaker 2: it's also going to be hard. It's going to be hot, uh,
Speaker 2: and we're on the road and we're not coming home,
Speaker 2: and that's going to be a whole part of the process.
Speaker 2: It's all very intentional, but that's why we do it.
Speaker 1: How do you turn this you, I guess You've been
Speaker 1: working so hard to infuse as much competition in every
Speaker 1: situation that you can for months. Now, how do you
Speaker 1: turn that off for these next four weeks.
Speaker 2: I hope we don't. I hope. I mean, I'll everyone
Speaker 2: want to take a step back because it's been it's
Speaker 2: been a really good, hard offseason. It's been great. Guys
Speaker 2: have bought in. I'm appreciative of their effort. I'm appreciative
Speaker 2: their attendance, their their intensity, all those things. And so
Speaker 2: it's an eight week program, and and now we got,
Speaker 2: you know, roughly five ish weeks before we go back
Speaker 2: for the real thing here the end of July. The
Speaker 2: the idea is that this really isn't a vacation, it's
Speaker 2: a break, and they should take a little bit of
Speaker 2: time because they've they've earned that. But you know, fourth
Speaker 2: of July weekend, a little bit after that, we should
Speaker 2: we should be ramping back up, and guys should be
Speaker 2: ready to come report in shape, you know, not losing
Speaker 2: any of the things that we accomplished over this offseason
Speaker 2: program and being able to hit the ground running right
Speaker 2: back at it when we come back, when we come
Speaker 2: back at the end of the month. So that's The
Speaker 2: idea is that this this really isn't it's a break,
Speaker 2: but it's not a vacation. You know, this isn't like
Speaker 2: end of the season where you just like go away
Speaker 2: and unplugs. I will unplug, I'll rest and I'll but
Speaker 2: my mind is always on what's coming. When you get
Speaker 2: to this point and you rest.
Speaker 1: If you don't unplug, though, how how do you slow
Speaker 1: it down?
Speaker 2: You have to miss You have to try hard.
Speaker 1: If you're trying to rest, are you resting?
Speaker 2: No? No, not really No. I try to take a
Speaker 2: little bit of time and just kind of step back.
Speaker 2: But you know, I get to I get to get
Speaker 2: to the fourth of July, and it's kind of like
Speaker 2: you can just feel it coming and and and and
Speaker 2: my mind gets is sort of always on it from
Speaker 2: that point on. So I try to take a little
Speaker 2: bit of time, but it's it's to me, it's already
Speaker 2: it's here, so it's in it now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, do you physically have to go to a different
Speaker 1: place or can you just go home or be in
Speaker 1: Nashville and still like feel like you're stepping away.
Speaker 2: I try to go I try to get away a
Speaker 2: little bit, but really where being my kids are in
Speaker 2: some camps this summer that that they that they wanted
Speaker 2: to be in and so we're just kind of hanging
Speaker 2: around here, which actually for me is one of the
Speaker 2: usually I like take off for the summer and we
Speaker 2: go family and all that stuff. It helps it. You know,
Speaker 2: my mom and dad are here, which is nice. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but we don't we aren't going to do a lot
Speaker 2: this summer, and I'm kind of hopeful that that that
Speaker 2: does help a little bit where it's just you're not
Speaker 2: kind of on the go for a couple of weeks.
Speaker 2: I'm just here. I'm at my house, I with my
Speaker 2: kids and and just hanging out and join Nashville a
Speaker 2: little bit. And that's we'll see if that helps. But
Speaker 2: then I'll take a little bit of time and I'll
Speaker 2: go see my in laws and my wife's family. They
Speaker 2: have a place up in Lake Georgia, New York. So
Speaker 2: little lake life. Yeah, go jump on a boat and
Speaker 2: puts around, and that's sort of that's sort of like
Speaker 2: my one escape that I usually take.
Speaker 1: So your parents are here, your dad's on your staff.
Speaker 1: Do you guys, are you able to have conversations and
Speaker 1: not talk about work? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Not for ver long.
Speaker 1: Okay, there it is. Yeah, not for.
Speaker 2: Very long, but yeah we can. Yeah, and a lot
Speaker 2: of it's usually centered around the kids and I'm brothers
Speaker 2: and sisters and all that stuff, but yeah we can.
Speaker 2: We can do it for a little bit, but inevitably
Speaker 2: it always kind of like leans right.
Speaker 1: Back into the years into it. Well, I mean because
Speaker 1: even when you're like close friends with co workers, when
Speaker 1: you get together socially, you usually end up talking about
Speaker 1: work anyway, always, and so I would imagine that it's
Speaker 1: the same thing. You're at a family barbecue. You you're
Speaker 1: all grilling, but you're also kind of talking about work.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's pretty much how it good. Yeah, it's not.
Speaker 2: It's no. And when you're in this profession too, like
Speaker 2: it's it's just sort of all you ever think about.
Speaker 2: You know, there's not a whole lot of like I'm
Speaker 2: just going to leave this away for a while, Like
Speaker 2: it just doesn't work that way.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, there's not a lot of not a lot
Speaker 1: of separation, but still some time to relax, some time
Speaker 1: to rest. And then everybody comes back for training camp
Speaker 1: and we get this thing going. What is your number
Speaker 1: one goal or priority for the first week or two
Speaker 1: of training camp.
Speaker 2: The first week or two. The first week or two
Speaker 2: has changed so much because you've got to go through
Speaker 2: this acclamation period and so there's there's limits on we
Speaker 2: won't even put pads on until we've been practicing for
Speaker 2: almost seven days eight days. So you just sort of
Speaker 2: you're more focused on ramping back into football. And and
Speaker 2: what I mean by that is even OTAs isn't it's football,
Speaker 2: but it's not. You're ramping into like padded practice and
Speaker 2: real physical, hard football. And that's the ideas. You're trying
Speaker 2: to get to that point. And then once you hit
Speaker 2: that point, the process, the intent is to be hard.
Speaker 2: You want you have to do hard things. I mean,
Speaker 2: that's part of it. Like you're trying to manage your
Speaker 2: team and your roster so you're healthy for seventeen games
Speaker 2: and you're and you got to load manage some guys
Speaker 2: through training camp. But the idea is that the way
Speaker 2: that our practices are scheduled is we come off our
Speaker 2: off days. We have a jog through day, which is
Speaker 2: sort of like a primer to get back into it
Speaker 2: after an off day. It's not as intense, it's a
Speaker 2: little more mental. We're just moving around a little bit,
Speaker 2: and then we have two back to back days and
Speaker 2: pads and that's sort of our four day block works.
Speaker 2: It's off day jog through two days and pads with
Speaker 2: the intent of when we hit those two days and pads,
Speaker 2: those are long, hard physical practices and the expectation is
Speaker 2: that we are at full hill for two straight days
Speaker 2: and then we break and then we start to cycle
Speaker 2: over again. Yeah, and it gets you hardened and ready
Speaker 2: for the football season, but it also manages the load
Speaker 2: to the point where you're you're not losing guys hopefully
Speaker 2: too often to injury, and you're managing that process the
Speaker 2: smart and scientific way, which is what we do. But like,
Speaker 2: you need football pads on your body and you need
Speaker 2: to play football, and that's that's training camp, and it
Speaker 2: should be hard, and it should you should be sore
Speaker 2: and you should feel tired because you're trying to harden
Speaker 2: your team and you're trying to toughen your team for
Speaker 2: what's to come, which the regular season is is a
Speaker 2: grind and it's it's hard, and so you're trying to
Speaker 2: get yourself ready for that.
Speaker 1: But it seems like that cadence very similarly mirrors the
Speaker 1: cadence of the regular season where you have some down days,
Speaker 1: but you have some really really hard days, including Sunday.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's that's the idea, is that it should
Speaker 2: we the rhythm should mirror it to some degree because
Speaker 2: really you look at a jog through day sort of
Speaker 2: like our Wednesday practice and then our Thursday practices and pads.
Speaker 2: This is during the season, Thursday practice and pads. It
Speaker 2: should be long, it should be hard, and then Friday
Speaker 2: sort of back it back down again. So it's kind
Speaker 2: of like this, there's these undulations in effort and intensity,
Speaker 2: and that's scientifically the way that you should be doing.
Speaker 2: It shouldn't be this like max velocity for days at
Speaker 2: a time. There should be it should be ebbs and flows.
Speaker 2: And so that's the intent of it is that there's
Speaker 2: this idea of bursts of effort and back downs and
Speaker 2: bursts of effort and back downs, and that's how training
Speaker 2: camp schedule that it mirrors how we schedule our regular
Speaker 2: season weeks. And then again you max out on Sunday, Coach.
Speaker 1: That's for sure the first time the word undulation has
Speaker 1: ever been said on this podcast, and we've had we've
Speaker 1: had this podcast for seven years, so that's pretty impressive.
Speaker 2: Well, I'll take the win.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we've gotten a lot of words on this podcast.
Speaker 1: That's the first one for Undulation. Good coach Callahan. We
Speaker 1: so appreciate the time. We hope you get some time
Speaker 1: to relax and sort of unplug. Yeah, and then we'll
Speaker 1: see you again and train here. I can't wait for
Speaker 1: Brian Callahan. I'm Amy Wells and this has been the
Speaker 1: ot P H m hm