Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - LOCKED ON COLTS 6/2/20: What if the Colts hired Tom Telesco instead of Ryan Grigson?

Episode Date: June 2, 2020

On today's episode, Stampede Blue's Stephen Reed joins for our final What If talking through the Ryan Grigson era.What happens if the Colts hired former Assistant GM Tom Telesco (now Chargers GM) instead of hiring Grigson. How different would it be if Telesco was in Grigson's place?Would Andrew Luck still be playing if Telesco was GM? Where would the Colts be if Grigson was never brought aboard?All of this, plus so much more, in our final What If! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Before we get started here on today's episode of Locked On Colts with Stephen Reed, talking through our last what-if scenario, if Ryan Grixen wasn't hired and instead the Colts promoted Tom Telesco, the former assistant GM and now the current Los Angeles Chargers GM, I want to remind you guys about what's going on out in the world and to stay safe, to stay healthy, and to stay aware of what's going on. Here at the Locked On Network, we are with you guys all throughout the situation. We're going to be with you guys every day of the week throughout this time period. So again, stay safe, stay healthy out there.

And also want to remind you guys to also stay locked in with us on this network. We're going to be with you all throughout this time leading up to the NFL season. And also a quick note, there was some audio on Steven's end as far as a dog bark in the background, a little bit of reverberation. That really isn't an issue. I just want to remind you guys, if you are looking forward to the audio and maybe you hear a couple things in the background, that's all it is. So quick reminder on that. But we're going to go right into our show here.

Our final what-if scenario with Stephen Reed of Stampede Blue talking through what if the Colts did not hire Ryan Grixen and instead promoted former Colts assistant GM Tom Telesco. Hello, everybody. Welcome back into your latest episode of Locked on Colts, probably a Locked on Podcast Network. Today's guest is Evan Sedra and joined by our best guest of today's show, Stampede Blues, Stephen Reed. We're here to talk through our final what-if scenario, which is I think the most consequential one.

I know we've hit on Peyton Manning. We've hit on Peyton Manning and Ryan Leaf, Andrew Luck's career, Kevin Bowen this past week. But this one I think really shook the Cold Stone issue at its core because if this move didn't happen, I think there's a very fair chance Andrew Luck's still playing football here, and that is hiring Ryan Grigson instead of promoting Tom Teleska, who learned in a bill pulling for a couple years, and now he's the GM of the Los Angeles Chargers.

Stephen, how are you doing today? I'm doing well, Evan. How are you today? Doing well, and I appreciate you coming on. I know our listeners always know these what-if scenarios. Let's talk through, first off, Ryan Grixen and the era that was because we've seen over the last couple of years really how impactful that was negatively to these organizations. Yeah, Ryan Grixen, I think all Colts fans kind of understand that he was arguably one of the worst GMs in NFL history and certainly the worst GM in Colts history.

You look at the decisions that he made and it really, really set the Colts back. Retiring a generational talent, retires after his seventh season, two of which those years he dealt with major injuries because Ryan Gregson refused to address the positions that needed to be addressed to keep him healthy and keep him safe. Yeah, and that's the big thing here as far as that goes because we saw the offensive line being neglected for so long. The Mike McGuins, the Samson Soteli, the Winston Justice, the Goddard Sharelesses you spend big money on. It just went wrong in every single sense of the way there.

And nowadays, maybe, Stephen, we've seen more than ever as far as the ability to go ahead. And you see Kyler Murray in Arizona. There's more of an emphasis on the offensive line there. All these quarterbacks are really looking forward and ahead as far as that goes to talking through the offensive line there. All these quarterbacks are really looking forward and ahead as far as that goes to talking through the offensive line. Because I think Andrew Luck and what Ryan Griggs did to that player really changed everything for this franchise.

Yeah, and that's an important thing to know is that as Ryan Griggs is kind of the example for new age GMs when they bring in a quarterback is you've got to protect that quarterback. Very few times do you see GMs bring in a quarterback and then just totally ignore the offensive line. And Ryan Grigson really is the poster child for that. Yeah, and that is the crazy part of this because you go and look ahead to that and you see the impact that Grigson had on this organization it really is shaking it to its core all over the place and you ask overall like Steven what do you think would have happened if they would have had Tom Telesco in here we can go back and talk about Tom Telesco for a second because I think he was learning our point like

I mentioned at the top of the show there he had a chance to learn the ropes in the Colts organization you have to wonder why the Colts didn't at least look internally at Tom Telesco more because you see what he's doing in Los Angeles of course Phillip Rivers left they didn't have much playoff success there but he actually has a a lot of talent in that Los Angeles roster there and learning from Bill Point he's been drafting pretty well yeah it's really interesting to see that when Jim Marcy went with Brian Gregson over Tom Kolesko, they said that Gregson just kind of nailed his interview. But looking at how different the franchise would be if it were Tom Kolesko,

I can tell you a couple of things that I'm certain of. I'm certain that Tom Kolesko would not have traded a first-round pick for Trent Richardson. I don't think Tom Telesco has ever traded a player for a draft pick to get a player and send out a draft pick in his career as a Chargers GM to this point. And certainly not a high draft pick. Tom Telesco also was the same Bill Pullian philosophy of building through the draft, and so he really did value those draft picks. You also probably wouldn't have seen Vontae Davis, which, give Ryan Grigson credit, that was a good trade.

It might have been the only thing that he did. Now, people like to point out that Ryan Gregson drafted Andrew Luck in that 2012 draft. Well, Tom Telesco was still there with the Colts organization, and Ryan Gregson had actually promoted Tom Telesco in that situation, or the year prior to that draft. And so Tom Telesco was really good at finding wide receivers through his time. He had an instrumental part of the Colts draft, Anthony Gonzalez, Pierre Gonçon, Austin Colley, and T.Y. Hilton. And then he went to the Chargers and he drafted Keenan Allen and Mike Williams. So he does a really good job of finding wide receivers. And so there's a part of me that thinks that the Colts would have been in a

really similar draft class coming out of that first draft that Ryan Griggs met. Because again, he came in from Philadelphia. He didn't know a lot about the scouting staff, anything like that. He didn't bring in a lot of new people. So that first year, you don't really, like Griggs gets credit because he made the picks. He had final say in it. But a lot of that was done by the previous scouting staff. Yeah, and it really was, like we mentioned, you look at Telesco and compared to Grigson, I think it was fair to say that you go and you pick Telesco over Grigson, you see, like we talked

about, the offensive line concerns, the lack of a roster, then really making some really dumbfound decisions, like you mentioned, Steven, trading away a first-round pick for Trent Richardson. You sign all these players, like Ron Landry and Braden Seah. Just what was Ryan Grigson, like looking at the way he tried to build this roster, kind of made me feel like he was trying to feel like Andrew Luck was Superman, and he could really cover all the holes for him at once. And it just seemed like from the very beginning, Grrixen was kind of over his skis, so to say, that he really didn't know how to build a roster. He was relying on looking at the number one pick and having him try to save him.

Yeah, and I think you're spot on with that. He just totally ignored that position for the longest time and didn't really pay attention to what was the best thing for Andrew attention to what was the best thing for Andrew Luck what was the best thing for the team he went and took a bunch of chances he kind of like he was playing with house money in a way because he really just spent a ton of money in free agency he took a lot of risks when it came to the draft he traded for players when maybe he shouldn't have in in Trenton Richardson's case obviously he shouldn't have he took a lot of risks when it came to the draft. He traded for players when maybe he shouldn't have in, in Trenton Richardson's case, obviously he shouldn't have.

He took a lot of reaches like with the Bjorn Warner decision in 2013. Yeah. It's one of those things where it was just a cacophony of, of issues with him where it just all kind of spiraled together and add in the fact that Ryan Gregson didn't't build the culture of the building. He tore it down, and he was a king. He was the czar. And he just wanted everybody to fall in line after he got a couple years in. So that was one of the biggest things, I think,

is he changed the culture, the Colts organization, to the detriment of the players and of the team. Yeah, it really was so consequential what Brixen did in the end. We saw three healthy years of Andrew Luck, then year four, the body starts to break down with a shoulder, other injuries happen, like I covered Kevin Bowen last week on the show. It was a spiral down from there and not protecting your franchise investment. What really was consequential in the end there as the Colts didn't see the entire prime of Andrew Luck's career in Indianapolis for you eventually retired age 29 but how different it could be Steven like I mentioned at the top of the show too like you have Telesco in place or even anyone else didn't have to be

Tom Telesco you just I think I remember right they interviewed about six different GMs I think George Patton of Minnesota was on that list. You have Tom Telesco internally. I don't know what's the deal about Ryan Grixen. He was able to sell himself in the room to Jim Irsay there. But was that the most consequential decision, hiring Ryan Grixen in the office Colt Aris, Stephen, that maybe changed the most for everything? I think so. It was a pivotal moment for the franchise.

You know, he made – if you look back at the number of draft picks he had, over the course of his time as GM, and I'm going to take out the time that he had when Tom Telesco wasn't there. The four years that he had in 2013, 14, 15, and 16, those four drafts, Ryan Gregson had 28 picks during that time. Only two of them are currently still on the Colts roster. That's Ryan Kelly and also the Raven Clark.

Those are the only two from 28 picks that are still on the Colts roster. Now, take that same number of years from – and throughout that time, there's only been one player from those 28 picks that Gregson made that has made a Pro Bowl, one single Pro Bowl. That was Ryan Kelly this past year. Take that in comparison to Tom Telesco in this case. He's had 25 picks over that same period of time. They both had 11 guys that are still in the NFL,

but Tom Telesco has seven guys that are still on the San Diego Chargers roster. And in those seven guys that are still on the roster, well, out of those 25 picks that he made, he had one first team, AP, all pro. He had eight Pro Bowl selections. That's your,'s your base difference. The biggest part about being a general manager is building your own from the draft and building guys up and drafting those players and then really kind of bringing that through your system so then you can give them second contracts.

That's what Tom Telesco has done with San Diego in that same time period from 2013 to 2016. And so you had seven guys that were on the Chargers roster from those four years. That's telling versus the Colts who had two. And Raven Clark is kind of barely counted on that because he doesn't play. I don't think he registered a snap at all last season. Colts fans, a quick reminder before we go on to the next segment of our show.

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Use promo code LOCKEDON, L-O-C-K-E-D-O-N, for $10 off at BiltBar.com. That is B-U-I-L-T-B-A-R.com, BiltBar.com. Colts fans take advantage of this great offer right away. Yeah, and he did not. He had zero snaps. He wasn't active for most of the season last year. And he wasn't active for every single regular season game. Re-signed, of course, to a one-year minimum deal.

Who knows if he makes it even through the entire training camp because I think he is on very much the bubble of this and one of the few Grixen players left on this roster. How lucky – I mean, you look at this career that Grixen had from 2012 to 2016, like you mentioned, just a historical miss rate on draft picks. You have Philip Dorsett, Bjorn Werner, trading in 2014, Trent Richardson. 2015, it just seems like over and over again, these decisions were so costly.

And you see the polar opposite of Chris Bauer now, Stephen. He's heading mostly on his draft picks. And I think now Colts fans realize, I think we saw Bill Pulling, but I think we saw what Brickson the most. And maybe looking back on it through a microscope, how important the draft is. Because if you don't build your roster right through the draft,

you're going to be really suffering through mediocrity throughout your entire resume. Yeah. And one of the important things is hitting on those, those first two day picks. So hitting in rounds one through three is the most important thing. If you look at the San Diego chargers of their, that period of time,

those rounds one through three picks, in Tom Telesco's era at San Diego and now Los Angeles, his first year, all three of those first three picks are still in the NFL. His second year, two of the three are still in the NFL. His third year, two out of three are still in the NFL. For Ryan Gregson, he literally, his first year, two of the four, and that's including T.Y. Hilton and Dwayne Allen, none from 2013, none from 2014, none from 2015, and only two, the Brian Kelly and the Raven Clark from 2016 so he never he didn't hit early and he didn't hit late and if you don't hit at all that's that's a huge problem as a general manager Ryan Grigson just kind of ran everything to the ground. And it was a matter of, he had an opinion about everything that he knew, knew everything.

He had that, that mindset that, that he knew everything. He was the general manager. So it didn't really matter what anybody else said, what he said mattered most. And he was thought of himself as the smartest guy in the room. And you would go in and try to pitch your case. And if he didn't agree with you, you were just

wrong in his eyes. There was no nuance to it. There was no discussion. It was I am right, you were wrong. That's it. And the problem with that is when you're wrong, like all the time, that really takes down the team for the long term. Yeah, it does. And you see really the impact that Grigson and how horrible that era was as far as him making this bad decision left and right, really costing Andrew Luck his career, making terrible draft picks, how it really just stymied and stagnated the organization

until Chris Bauer arrived. I think another consequential decision was for Jim Ursae in 2015 when he had that weird press conference. I don't know if you remember, Stephen, where he had Chuck Pagano and Ryan Grixen up there together. It was calls for both of them to go. But then he decided to bring them back and extend them another year. And how odd that press conference was.

I think keeping Grixen around for another year, I know he hit Ryan Kelly, of course, in the next draft. But I think if Ursae would have fired Grixen and Pagano a year earlier instead of extending them a year later, I think you would have seen a different organization where the Colts maybe don't get Chris Bauer, but you're in a lot more stable place than you are now because another year of Grixen really did kind of flush them more down the toilet.

Yeah, and that's the tough part is you look at – we look back in hindsight and say man what were they thinking um that press conference was cringeworthy in and of itself um you know i think jim mercy was trying to do the best that he could and trying to tie these these guys together to make them work together to realize that they weren't two you know two ships floating out at sea, that they were tied together. And I think that that was maybe – you look back, and obviously it wasn't the best decision. But at the same time, it might have been the only situation he had.

I'm not sure if they get Chris Ballard in that situation. You know, it's – a lot of different things would have to fall their way in that situation um you know it's a lot of different things would have to fall their way in that scenario but i think the most you know the most damning thing that happened with ryan crickson is that he just failed to address the offensive line he just made just missed so hard on those early early valuable picks and like if compare, if you go through the list of you look at Tom Telesco's draft history in, in round rounds, one through three, he took five offensive linemen in those in his first five years as being a general manager, Ryan Gregson, maybe took what?

I think he took five, maybe three or three total in, in the whole draft. Maybe like the Raven Clark. And it just, he just didn't know how to evaluate talent. And that's what really crushed me about Ryan Gregson. And if you compare it to Tom Telesco's record and where Tom Telesco really was able to excel at, like you're looking at in 2013, I doubt the Colts take Bjorn Werner because they're not going to take a guy that doesn't fit the system. You're looking at maybe a DeAndre Hopkins, a Xavier Rhodes, a Travis Frederick in round one in 2013.

2014, you keep that Trent Richardson pick. So you're keeping pick 26 in 2014. You're looking at, you know, a Dion Buchanan, a Bradley Roby, maybe a Dexter Lawrence. In 2014 and 2015, there's no way Tom Peleska is drafting Philip Dorsett. So you're looking at Landon Collins, Preston Smith. You know, he did draft a running back early, so maybe a TJ Yeldon in that case and that might have been a miss but it kind of flowed into Tom Telesco's theory and in 2016 he's not taking each a TJ

Green in that second round Tom Telesco was known kind of for trading up and so he would have traded up for like maybe a linebacker like Jalen Smith. He would trade it up for Hunter Henry, which he ended up taking in San Diego, or he would have traded up for Michael Thomas if he didn't take DeAndre Hopkins back in 2013. With the ever increasing number of automobile sales out there, whether it's a Fiat, any sort of brand, a Pacifica, XT5, Kias.

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They know we sent you. Again, that is Locked On, L-O-C-K-E-D-d-o-n and they're how to hear about us box colts fans another great offers take advantage of right away like tantalesco as a talent evaluator is from that bill poley entry of taking the best player available versus position of need and too often like that's been one of his biggest issues in San Diego or in Los Angeles is that he took best player available when there were bigger needs. And so I think that he would have been able to work with, with Jim Irsay and talk about everything.

And Jim Irsay for everybody's griping about him being eccentric. He's a really smart football guy and he knows his stuff. And so I would think that they would talk it out and they would figure out kind of like, you know, Chris Ballard will sometimes talk with Hersey about things and how Jim Hersey pushed them this year to just to go ahead and go up and get Jonathan Taylor because they really liked them. I think that you're going to look at back and had Ryan Gregson not been the

general manager, the Colts, arguably are Superbowl champions at least once through this time period, because you've got Andrew Luck on a rookie deal. You're not spending huge money, like you said, on Gossard Cheerless or LaRon Landry or guys that just don't fit Andre Johnson, that those guys, it's just so many dominoes would have fallen in a better position for the Colts had they not hired Ryan Gregson.

But I think that with the new regime with Chris Ballard is really rectifying those errors. And it's one of those things where you have a good general manager that focuses on the draft and can nail those first picks. It makes a huge difference in your team, and it makes a huge difference in the culture. where you have a good general manager that focuses on the draft and can nail those first picks it makes a huge difference in your team and it makes a huge difference in the culture and i think that that's one of the biggest one of the biggest shortcomings of ryan grigson was just totally annihilating the culture of the indianapolis locker room the colts locker room the facility

everything and then obviously missing on those picks and people will bring up oh well he never had a losing season yeah but he lost the locker room he lost the players he lost the building that's arguably a bigger deal than anything else I think it's fair to say Steven how far I think it's fair to say honestly that Grixen set back this organization at least five plus years but how far do you think that the Grixen era set back this closely because now we're entering year four chris ballard there's no andrew luck we had four years of five years of ryan grixen we're almost entering 10 plus years now if you're including the grixen and ballard era is that it's fair to say grixen set back this organization almost a decade i think that's fair um you know because chris ballard took over and there's nothing like i think there's like

three four maybe five players from ryan grigson's era that's still on the roster four years later that's that's ridiculous out of 52 players you're sitting there like at four out of 52 maybe that are still on the roster it's mind-blowing how how much he was able to crater this team and it's also really awesome for Colts fans to see how quickly Chris Ballard is able to bring it back because you know yeah they had a tough year this past year because Andrew Luck retired two weeks before the season started but But the year before that, they made the playoffs and won a playoff game. Year two. That's crazy.

This year, I think that Chris Ballard's made a full rebuild, and it should be here going forward just up and up for Colts fans. Yeah, it should be. I'm glad we went back and looked through this, Stephen, because whether it was Tom Telesco who talked through a polling disciple who has done well for himself in LA, and he would have at least won a title in this Andrew Luck era, whoever the GM was, I think it's fair to say, anyone would have been upgraded Ryan Grixen and what happened in that time

from 2012 to 2016, how far it's like this organization, we're in a generational town and Andrew Luck, but you guys can go follow Stephen on Twitter at nice read Steve to read his work over at Stampede Blue and his own podcast around Stampede Blue. Stephen, appreciate the time as always.