Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - LOCKED ON COLTS -1/24- Colts GM Candidates Begin To Emerge For Interviews

Episode Date: January 24, 2017

Matt brings on friend of the show, George Bremer (@gmbremer), to discuss the current candidates for the #Colts GM position; A new candidate arises while recording; Colts will no longer be in Anderson for training camp & why the job in Indianapolis is so attractive for potential suitors. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Welcome back to Locked On Colts, ladies and gentlemen. I'm your host, Matt Dainley. And thank you for joining me here on a Tuesday, January 24th. And we are back again here with our good friend, George Bremmer. George, how are you doing tonight, man? Great. A little worn out, but it's worth it. It's a fun time of year sometimes. I'll bet you are. I appreciate you coming back on. Always good to talk with you here. And first, one of the things that we just spoke about briefly, what's going on with the training camp?

The Colts were talking about possibly moving out of Anderson. What's with that? Yeah, they're definitely not going to be in Anderson next year. I can't tell you where they will be, but I know it won't be here. We have very reliable sources that said the team has let the school know that they'll go elsewhere. I've heard that DePauw is on the list and Greencastle. I've also heard it's possible that they could stay home and train at their own facility. So I think there's a lot of options out there still, but AU is no longer among them. Wow. Any clue as to what the reasoning was from that?

No, the only thing I've heard is that it wasn't anything personal. It wasn't anything about the city. It wasn't anything about the school. So I'm not really sure. I think maybe it's just time for a change kind of a thing. You know, see if new surroundings can maybe cause maybe some new results. Right. Well, that makes sense, I guess. If you're superstitious at all, that's a good thing. Well, obviously the big news was Gregson being relieved of his duties the other day. But I wanted to kind of go through with you some of these GM candidates

that we've at least gotten wind of so far. And why don't we start with Jimmy Ray III? He's currently the interim GM, but his typical title is vice president of football operations. Tell us, you know, people who don't get any sort of, you know, he's not a guy that you're going to see or hear a lot about, you know, of course. So if you could tell the listeners a little bit about him, a little bit about what you know of him.

Yeah, one thing is I think Jimmy Ray is one of the more interesting guys in the organization as far as his background goes. His dad was in coaching for a long time, actually was a mentor of Tony Dungy, and Dungy mentioned Jimmy Ray II during his speech at the Hall of Fame back in August when he was being inducted. So, you know, I know that there's a good relationship there. Jimmy himself started out as a coach.

He ended up getting into scouting with the Chargers, spent several years there. He's been given credit for coming up with the idea to trade the number one pick when Mike Vick was out there. They ended up getting LaDainian Tomlinson, obviously, that year that supposedly was his suggestion, and also he was involved in the drafting of Drew Brees at the start of the second round there. A pretty good move for San Diego out there. His biggest impact, I think, here so far, and he does a lot of things. He has a lot of administrative duties and things like that, but I think his biggest impact

in Indianapolis, as far as things fans would notice, has come with the undrafted free agents. That's been his kind of baby the last three years, I believe. He came in 2013, so I guess four years, that he's kind of been in charge of that after the draft. And they've obviously found some pretty good prospects through that means. So I think Jimmy Ray is a very viable candidate. I think he's somebody that Jim Irsay has a lot of faith in. And from what I've heard, the coaching staff is really tight with Jimmy Ray

and it is a good working relationship there. Yeah, he has done a good job. I know that a lot of people, you know, once that initial roster comes out or, you know, the Colts start heading to camp, everybody wants to dissect these undrafted guys. And that's fun. I enjoy doing it too. But, you know, a couple guys, of course, you know, one at least who didn't work out was Varga, but Majit looks like he's a possibility. I mean, he's had some issues in his past personal, but he's got the right build for it.

You never know what another year will do for him. But there's been a lot of guys over the past few years who have both made the team and had some contributions to it. So he's definitely done his job there. Now, I know that I do hear a lot of people or see a lot of people talking about that don't know Jimmy Ray because if he's Grigson's right-hand man, they're tying the two together quite a bit, but I don't necessarily think that's fair. I mean, regardless of what anybody thinks about Grigson, a lot of people around the league seem to be very high on Jimmy Ray.

Yeah, absolutely. San Francisco went out and included him in the process when they were looking for a general manager earlier this month. They still are, but they didn't bring him back for a second interview. It brought him out there for the first interview. He's a guy that's really well-respected in a lot of league circles. I think it's similar to maybe a situation Tom Telesco was in when he left to go to the Chargers.

Telesco, from everything I had heard, was a finalist when Grayson got the job, decided to stay on another year and help out with the transition. And then Jimmy Ray, of course, replaces Telesco in 2013 after Telesco got bumped up to get the main job out in San Diego. So, yeah, I don't know how much their styles are alike or how much you can compare them personally or, you know, professionally, but I think the kind of standard where he's at right now, the way he's thought of in the league is similar to where it was when Telesco was able to leave and get that full-time job. He's a guy people see as being ready to run a team somewhere.

Right. I definitely heard that. I think a lot of people have. So everything I've read about the guy, I'm very impressed with him just in general. You know, everybody seems to hold the guy to a very high standard. And, you know, like you said, the coaching staff is as well. That can work both ways. But when you have that many people on board for one guy, you tend to believe that either A, the guy is on top of his game, or B, they're all just great buddies. In this kind of a relationship between coach and executive, you typically don't become best buddies, so to speak, I wouldn't think. A couple other guys, it's kind of strange too because two of them, both from

Seattle, both are co-directors of pro personnel,rent kirshner and scott fitter uh have you heard anything about these guys and and what do you think was the draw on them well the colts have requested permission to interview both of them so they are i guess known targets if you want to use that phrase uh yeah they're both guys that have been uh around the league a bit before they they landed in seattle so they got some experience uh not obviously in the general manager's job but that's obviously up in seattle a situation where the roster has done a lot with mid-round to lower round draft picks they've also done done a great job identifying undrafted guys. You know, really, T.Y. McGill got his start with the Seahawks.

He was brought in after a rookie camp up there in Seattle, and then numbers game, because they had so much depth on the defensive line, I think they were trying to sneak him onto the practice squad, but the Colts were able to sign him out of training camp. So they've done a really good job of, as an organization, of identifying guys like Richard Sherman, who maybe didn't have a big following or a big really well-known name coming into the draft,

and then obviously has turned out to be a star in this league. Yeah, he fell a little bit. Yeah, absolutely. He was a receiver at Stanford for most of his career, so he's a guy that got switched. They've been able to see diamonds in the rough, if you will, and try to find some traits that have translated to a roster in Seattle that I think everybody looks at and really feels like is strong.

I know they've got some issues on the offensive line as well, but I think when people talk about the really deep talent laden rosters in in this league seattle's not very long before you get to that name no absolutely not i just thought it was uh not only interesting but uh you know kind of smart i guess you bring them both in see which one woos you the most and then kind kind of maybe put the other one sort of on the back burner, I guess, and use the other one as you get into your final tally or whatever. One thing that's interesting to me about those two is that they were both involved in the San Francisco search as well,

and they both pulled their names out and said, you know, we're going to be committed to Seattle now. So for them to kind of jump back in and come and do this interview with Indianapolis, to me it at least hints that, you know, I know there's been some talk or speculation, whatever you want to call it out there, that maybe Jim Irsay isn't fully committed to this process, that he's already got an end result in mind and to me the development the participation of these two guys at least in my mind makes you think that they're not feeling that way uh because you know obviously if you've already gone down that road and then come back and

said okay we did that we're going to stay with seattle now to come back out and join the colts process i think says that they believe that there's a real job opportunity here. Yeah, I think so too. Not only that, but I mean, it certainly doesn't take a genius to understand that this could be a, or not could be, this is a premier job that's out there for sure, despite how late it came open. I mean, with Andrew Luck and some of the pieces that this team has, you know, we constantly talk about how talent-laden the roster is or talent-deficient. And the reality is that's not nearly as bad as it is when you look at some of the pieces there and you see the holes on defense, the holes maybe on the offensive line a little bit,

you know, depending on how things shake out and some guys progress. But it really, I mean, you're looking at maybe one really good draft, two pretty decent drafts, or a combination of the two and a fantastic free agency period, and this team could look completely different by next year or the year after. Absolutely. I think that's one of the draws to this position. You've got $60 million or so, and you can kind of play with that number. There's some other things they can do to make it grow to use in free agency this year under the salary cap space. And then you've also got either the 14th or 15th overall pick in the draft. So there's definitely

an opportunity for somebody who's going to come in to immediately put their fingerprint on this roster. One of the other guys is George Patton from the Vikings. He's the assistant general manager currently. But he has been kind of pegged as the 49ers guy, at least seems to be the guy who is likely to get the role if he takes it. Do you think there's any getting him out of that role? I would still assume, aside from the draw to the West Coast,

that Indianapolis is a far better job and people have to be cognizant of that. Yeah, it'll be interesting to see. That's another situation where here's a guy who's reportedly a finalist in San Francisco and is jumping in and joining this, this search. And he's a guy who over the years has been, I don't want to say particular, but he's been careful. He's turned down a lot of opportunities. He hasn't interviewed every time he's been asked. Uh, so, you know, I think he's a discerning guy and for him to be a part of this search as well, I think shows you that the Jim Irsay is going out trying to find the hot names.

And these are all guys who obviously were on San Francisco's radar. They're all guys who seem to come up whenever that list of potential GMs gets shared by whomever, you know, online. They're all guys whose names seem to come up. I think what's interesting in these three cases is that you obviously don't have anybody who has the experience of having been in the role, but all three of these guys have been in the league for quite a while, have been in front offices with very successful teams for a while. Minnesota's another roster that when you look at what they've been able to do particularly building that defense which i would think of would be a particular interest here uh in the last few years you know obviously he's played a role in that and i wonder too you know i always one of the things i always

admired about al davis the old stories that you would hear when he had an opening he would bring in 20 25 30 people because he was picking their brains. He was trying to find out, hey, if you were running this team, what would you do with some of the smarter guys out there? And I wonder if there isn't a bit of that here with Jim Ursa. When you look at some of the guys he's brought in, even if they don't get the job, to hear what they might do and to hear how they view the roster and how they view their jobs could be beneficial to whoever does end up in that role.

Oh, absolutely. I think hearing the vision of others and realizing the vision of what your organization, of what you want your organization to be, could do nothing but help. I know that we haven't really caught wind of it quite yet or anything like that should it happen, but just your opinion here, do you think Elliott Wolfe or Chris Ballard or maybe even Cesaro from New England get in the mix in this? It's funny that you mention Elliott Wolfe because just literally before you called, I think the last thing that I saw was that he's in the mix now as well.

He's expected to get an interview. I thought it was interesting. I don't know that it means anything. It could be my overactive imagination. But I thought it was interesting that Jim Irsay brought up his dad, Ron Wolf, during the news conference on Saturday. Yeah, I caught that too. I thought for sure that was a lead-in to something.

Because you could tell, and you can always tell with Jim, he wants to say more than he's actually saying. And you can tell that he's almost biting his tongue, uh, as he's talking. Cause he just wants to, he just wants, you know, when he's up there and he wants to talk, he's just, he just wants to finish what he wants to say. He finishes a thought. Sometimes I feel the same way I do that. It gets me in trouble. So, uh, I give Jim kudos there for, for holding his tongue a little bit. When we look at the, all these GM interviews, uh, that are sure to come to come, and there's going to be a real class of knowledge coming through there for these interviews. Just like I said, based on opinion, I know that Ursae pretty much gave the

Chuck's our coach in 2017. And this is something people are going to talk about until basically we're told from the new GM that Chuck's the coach for 2017. But do you think, I mean, is that any sort of a deal breaker you think for any of these guys? Look, you're going to have to deal with Chuck for at least a year, then you can reevaluate. Yeah, I think, I think Louis Reddick mentioned it today on ESPN at some point that, you know, it's going to be an impediment to some extent. I think it's, it's something it's going to be an impediment to some extent. I think it's something that's going to be a challenge when you come in because there's already a coach in place who's been here, who has a way of doing things, who has a style, has his own ideas,

and you've got to come in and mesh with that for at least a year. But I also think that they're in a situation where if you listen to Ursae's words on Saturday, he said, whoever comes in, I'm going to let them evaluate every aspect of this operation. I want them to look at everything, and that includes the head coach. I thought he made it very clear that ultimately the GM would make the decision, although I think the timing right now is such that you probably would keep

Pagano on for 2017 when you get in as a GM anyway, even if the owner wasn't saying that, for the simple fact that it's going to be really tough for somebody to come in and get rolling at the timing that you would finally be able to start that search. Yeah, and the Colts certainly don't have a guy on staff that could step in as interim coach, just my opinion, that would do any better than Pagano. Yeah, but there are some guys who have been head coaches before, so you do have that fallback if something should happen in the middle of the season, if it got to that point, which obviously nobody wants to see, I think.

I know there's fans that maybe are rooting for that, but I think nobody involved in the process wants to see that. No new general manager is going to come in and hope the team fails. You would love to see things go. And there's precedent for this in the past. I know around 2000, 2001, somewhere in that area, Jerry Angelo got hired by the bears and was basically told by ownership there in Chicago, Dick Geron is our guy.

You got to hold on to him for at least a year. We want you to, to evaluate. And I think if I, if I'm remembering, this is right off the top of my head, but if I'm remembering correctly, I think that's the year Chicago went 13 and 3 and won the division with with dicker on and so angelo obviously held on to him and then a few years later the program slipped a little bit he ended up going out hiring his guy who was lovey smith and you know the entire program may not have been exactly what they wanted but that group angelo and smith eventually reached the super bowl everybody i think in indianapolis is very well aware of that super bowl uh you know it was ultimately a pretty successful tandem even if it was unconventional the way it came about

absolutely absolutely this this whole process uh is just very strange, I guess. You know, it started off strange with, you know, all the silence for Merce. Then he comes out and it's like, you know, you just, I don't know, I guess we talked about this a few weeks ago, or at least a couple weeks ago, where it just makes more, well, and you know, like you said, there's a precedent, but there's very much a precedent for firing the coach and letting the GM redo the coaching staff versus firing the GM and bringing a GM to take over a coach. That's just not as typical. We don't see that nearly as often, but it's one of those things, I think, George, that, you know, I don't think that keeping Pagano on for one more year is going to kill anything. The idea for the new GM is to get a guy who, A, evaluates talent better, B, can fill out the rest of the roster, and C, has a better work environment with not only the players but the coaching staff because you've got psychologists coming in to work with these two guys

to get them on the same page, at least mentally and personally, I would assume. But that just sounds terrible. I mean, it sounds terrible. You would have to assume that whoever comes in, it would be a less explosive situation than whatever it currently was. Yeah, and I think there's no doubt when you look at the landscape as a whole, Jimmy Ray has to be a favorite, if not the favorite, for a lot of what you were just talking about. He's been here. He has experience with that coaching staff. He knows the lay of the the land so to speak but i think the hope would be that if he is not the

choice for some reason that he will choose the to stay around as telesco did and then so his knowledge either way could be helpful to whoever comes along and and maybe does get that job i do think it's open yeah i really feel like i don't think that jim ursa would have made this decision at this point if he wasn't serious about keeping the job out there and making it a real opportunity for one thing as we talked about before and national media said it time and again this is a highly coveted position and i don't think that that's something that ursa was unaware of at the time that he made the decision.

So I think when you wait that long, you were obviously weighing your options. I think there was definitively some indecision on his part about which way to go and what to do. And there's certainly enough rumors out there about other things that may have been explored that didn't come to fruition. But, you know, when you reach January 20th or so, and you're making that call, I think you have to be open to real change. Otherwise, why not just keep Grixen on board and, and, you know, plan to do this next year.

Right. That makes sense too. And maybe you can help me out with this, but why are the Saints turning into the Colts' annoying ex-girlfriend every day? No. I mean, this is, hey, you guys want him? I mean, you know, what's that all about? And then, you know, I don't want Sean Payton in Indianapolis. I don't know how the majority of Colts fans feel, but the guy is a brilliant offensive mind. There's no two ways about it.

But what's he done for the side of the ball that we desperately need help on since he's been in New Orleans, you know? It's been interesting. I know there's a lot of things down there, as you're well aware, with salary cap and things that have led to the situation in New Orleans as it is now, some things that were out of Peyton's control, some things that weren't, some things that he made the call on. I do think at some point there's probably an idea

of trying to maximize the offensive potential of this team. I think everybody can look at the offense in Indianapolis and see the spark, see that there is something there. There's clay to be molded. And I think there's an attraction, whether it's a Sean Payton or a John Gruden or anybody else who's been rumored or anybody who may get rumored in the future, to the idea that you bring in a real offensive genius and you could maybe take this team to another level.

I think, you know, and we've talked about this a little bit, I think, off the air before. You look at what Atlanta's done, especially this season, and you look at their personnel, and there are parallels there. And so you can find somebody who can kind of get that spark in Indianapolis. I think that's what they'd like to do. Now, that could be people who are here. I don't know. It could be a matter of, as you said, getting the right draft together.

Maybe Chuck Pagano and Rob Chudzinski are the guys in a different circumstance who can get that offense going, and I think that's one of the things that we'll be watching and trying to find out this year. I'm kind of trying to pick this apart right now. I told you a little while ago that I was doing and analyzing all of Andrew Luck's throws throughout this past season. And I've just gotten through midway point in the year. And it's crazy to see how the tendencies and, you know, even just something as simple as shotgun versus under center or where their design is to throw

the ball and everything is wildly different every week, even when something's successful, they tend to go away from it. And I thought that was something strange. But I do think that there are those plays. Now, when we get on Chudzinski, I'm just going to start rambling. I'll try not to. But he just – he does have some phenomenal play calls. I mean, he really does. And then you get, you know, maybe two or three stinkers

out of the next seven or eight play calls. And it's just – it's something that, and I don't think this goes on without saying, anything in the Colts organization, whether it's player, coach, process in any regard whatsoever, everything needs to be more consistent going forward. This has been a poor couple, two seasons, and this is something that they just

simply can't repeat in any facet of the organization. Absolutely. And I think that that goes back to when they were successful. I think that's been the maddening thing about this team for the last three or four years, really, is you see the moments, you see the high points, and you think, hey, if they can get those more often, if they can level out the low points, this could be a pretty good group. But they've been on that roller coaster. And it's really come from all areas. You mentioned sometimes it's the play calls, sometimes it's the line, sometimes it's the quarterback.

There's a lot of things that come into it, but they need to find a way. When they are good, they are very very good but they're not consistently at that level absolutely uh george got any other nuggets for us at all no not right now not that i can think of a the elliot wolf thing was kind of my ace up the sleeve here today so i think i'm all out for the time being well good i'm glad i pulled that out of you because that's uh that's interesting to me and i think that a lot of people he pulled that out of you because that's interesting to me. And I think that a lot of people, he's another guy that you kind of alluded to guys that have declined interviews in the past. He's another guy like that. And almost regardless of what

happens with the GM, let's assume that Jimmy Ray doesn't get the job. I would assume that Ursae could possibly covet him similarly to the way that some of these other guys have been paid that aren't actually GMs that get paid like that. Yeah, oh absolutely. I think his institutional knowledge, especially with the way this offseason has unfolded and kind of the time constraints that they're on now, the compressed schedule is invaluable. You know, they have somebody who's been there and understands the roster and understands where the needs are. Not that somebody

can't come in and get up to speed very quickly there, but it's always nice to have somebody who's a little more familiar and can take some of the guesswork out of it. Absolutely. Absolutely. George, thank you for joining us today. I absolutely appreciate any time that you come on. That's fantastic. I know the listeners are loving it. And just

everybody, make sure you guys are following George on Twitter. He's absolutely one of the best in the business and is a great guy all around. George, thank you for your time. No problem. Anytime. Thanks a lot. Absolutely. And if you guys haven't yet subscribed to the podcast, make sure you guys are leaving me a rating or a review on iTunes. Those have been fantastic lately, guys, by the way. I appreciate that very much. The podcast is getting way more attention than I ever expected because of you guys out there sharing the show, giving the ratings and reviews. You guys are doing amazing. And as a result, the podcast is growing pretty quickly,

especially for being technically the off-season for the Colts. So thank you guys for that. And I will check you guys all out tomorrow right here on Locked on Colts. You are Locked on Colts, your daily podcast on the Indianapolis Colts, part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day.