The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Drafting QBs & the role GMs & position coaches play in the draft process with Rick Spielman & Dante Scarnecchia

Episode Date: April 22, 2022

How do GMs know when it's time to pull the trigger and draft their next QB? What impact do position coaches play in drafting players for their position groups? Former Vikings GM Rick Spielman shares details of his draft process in Minnesota and the thought process that went into trading up for QB Teddy Bridgewater, then former Patriots o-line coach Dante Scarnecchia brings insight on what it's like to draft alongside Bill Belichick and how position coaches get their voices heard in the draft room. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Football Show. Welcome to the Athletic Football Show. Today's Friday, April 22nd. I'm Robert Mays. Boy, do we have a show for you guys today. Dante Scarnacia, the Patriots' longtime offensive line coach, an absolute legend in the coaching profession, is going to be joining us a little bit later to chat about

the role position coaches play in the draft process. From evaluating players to the input they give, the rest of the coaching staff, the scouting department, lessons from 30 years of evaluating offensive linemen from Dante on this show. I really think that you guys are going to enjoy that conversation. I know that I did, kind of one of those pinch me moments. In a similar vein, we also chatted with long time Vikings general manager, Rick Spielman, about a whole bunch of topics as they relate to the draft.

What goes into drafting a quarterback, how you build analytics into your models and your approach as a general manager. What goes into psychological testing for certain positions? The process and the theories behind trading down, which Rick did more than any general manager in the league over the past decade. Today is one of those days where you sit back and think, this is really what I do for work is getting to have these conversations. An amazing opportunity to just ask some questions of people who have done this at a really

high level for a very long time. I know I learned a lot. I hope you guys will too. Let's get to it. All right, I am thrilled now to welcome former Minnesota Vikings GM, a job he held for a very long time. He's seen a lot as far as the NFL draft goes. Rick Spilman, Rick, thank you very much for taking the time to do this. I sincerely appreciate it. Yeah, no, thanks for having me on today.

It's always a fun time of year, especially when you get to talk about the draft. So I wanted to talk about the process of drafting a quarterback, more than the guys that are available in this draft, or even how. you land on the right quarterback. I wanted to peel back the curtain a little bit to just shine some light on what the process is actually like when you're going to pick one. What has to happen, all the boxes that need to get checked. And you're in a unique position to do this because you had to do it a couple different times as a general manager.

You went through the entire process. So I'm sure it's always situation dependent. But how far in advance typically do you know that you're going to have to spend a little bit more time on the quarterbacks? Yeah, it starts out with once we understand. who the top prospects are coming out in the upcoming draft. And we usually determine that where we're going to go and where our scouts are going to go during training camp when we set our schedule. But the number one thing is getting the tape work done first.

So you can make the evaluation there. From the tape work, what I always try to do and told all of our scouts to do as well is you have to get out and see these guys live. because you can only see so much on the tape, but get out there and see them live. And what I really enjoyed the most was I've tried to get to as many games as I could because you can see things, how they're interacting on the sidelines,

how they warm up, all the stuff that you can't see on tape, the ancillary things, and that adds into the process as well. So once you get through that, and then, you know, you start the interview process. Most of the time that's going to start, probably one of these all-star games, senior bowl, East West, Gridiron, NFLPA, wherever that is.

And that's the initial conversation you usually have with these kids to get there to know their personality. Then at the Combine, that's when we start to really have our coaches start to interview these guys. But also that's when we start doing all of our testing, our psychological testing, our intelligence testing, and trying to get a lot of that knocked out. One of the things that I learned was that quarterbacks have to be smart. And I always took it, you have to be smart. But sometimes earlier, when I missed on a quarterback, it wasn't the intelligent side of it. It was the mental quickness scores that we tried to identify.

So, you know, we would have quarterbacks in meetings and our quarter, in our offensive coordinator and quarterback coach would be in there. And they would install plays up on the white. whiteboard concepts, you know, this linebacker comes down or you think you're reading this blitz off the edge. Where's your adjustments? How do you go through your progressions, X, Y, and Z? And some of the quarterbacks we talked about, they would take notes for 20, 25 minutes as we wanted to get a feel for how copious of note takers they were during that meeting process and when the coaches were installing. But the part I originally missed and we were able to figure it out was that they can go up there on that board and sound like an offensive coordinator.

And some of them even sounded better than the offensive coordinator. But then you have to take the next step. And the next step, which I learned was that you could do that on the board in 20 minutes, but can you do that same process in two and a half seconds before someone's trying to take your head off? So we develop some kind of testing to test their mental quickness in order to try to identify. that the best we could. And then you could potentially have them on the top 30 visit and then draft and then go from there. How do you develop that kind of testing? Is that something where you soliciting opinions? I mean, I'm sure there's some proprietary information here, but I'm just curious

how that actually happens. Yeah, well, we relied a lot on the testing group that we use and that, you know, I always made sure I had a lot smarter people around me than I was, especially in specific areas of expertise. So we talked to the testing groups that we used and we talked to them that, hey, we know the intelligence side is good. But how do we test that mental quickness side? So they came up with different ways to do that. So they developed a mental quickness score. So you're hoping the intelligence score and the mental quickness score were relatively close with each other. But we've seen and I've learned is that you can be highly intense. and scored very high on the intelligence test, but they were very low on the mental

quickness test. And that was something that a quarterback had to have because, like I said earlier, you know, they have to take the snap. They have to read the defense. They have to pre-snap read the defense. And then they have to do everything we just talked about in two and a half seconds or less. And we had to try to identify if they could do that or not. Did you use that for other positions too. Yes. Yeah, it ended up becoming a standard for not only our intelligence test for all positions, but also for everything across the board. But we also found out is that some positions, it didn't matter. There were some pro bowlers at certain positions where the mental quickness or the intelligence actually was a bad thing. So, and just,

give an example, like a corner, he has to, especially if he's playing on the outside, he's basically covering his guy. So the guys that had the most success maybe weren't the most intelligent on these type of test, but they were really football smart. And they were able to, to process it and play at a very high level. What other positions were important? Yeah, the farther away from the ball, the less important that came. So if you're a center quarterback, running back because of all the past protections, the middle lineback and the safety, coming down the middle of the offensive defense, those were the positions that had to be had the highest intelligence and the highest mental quickness scores.

That's really interesting because we've had a long conversation earlier this week on the show about just how you identify linebacker talent and some of the misses that have happened with first round picks recently because there's such an emphasis on physical traits when you're drafting a guy in that range, when in reality, some of the best lineback. Eric Kendrick's being a great example, right? Somebody that just has incredible between the ears acumen, and that really drives success at the position. So the fact that it's important for linebacker

makes a ton of sense when you think about it. It's not surprising at all. Yeah, and just to give me an example, my brother couldn't run a 40 under 5 flat, but he claims he can run 4-7, but we've had a lot of arguments about that. But how he processed things so quickly, there was very rarely anyone that never beat into the sidelines

because he was so instinctual and he was able to read and react quickly to what he was seeing in front of him. So when you're going through the evaluation process for a quarterback compared to another position, are you soliciting more opinions on quarterbacks than you might say for a wide receiver as it relates to your offensive coaching staff or other people in the building? No, we've tried to, in fact, we had a staff that contributed to the draft of 95 people. and that's including our medical, our doctors, our psychologists, our player programs, directors, our coaches, our scouts, all the directors. So we had a lot of different people feeding in our analytics, which became huge over the last five or six years,

all kind of gave their opinions on every position. And then I would have to cipher through all that, the cipher through all of that, and then come up with a final grade on what we felt was best for our football team. But it was amazing when you were talking about the quarterbacks and where our analytics department really developed. And they had a four or five page report just on quarterbacks on the things that they were able to put through their algorithms to come up with some kind of measurement to tell us what they thought of this quarterback

was going to be successful or not. I mean, you said the last five years or so. I mean, you've done this for a very long time before. where the voice of an analytics department was as loud as it possibly is now. How did you go about, and there's a larger conversation, obviously, but how did you go about starting to build out an analytics department when your background isn't necessarily in that area? It goes back to making sure you're surrounding people that are experts in their areas,

but we were very fortunate because you can bring in the numbers guys or the analytics guys, but if they can't speak the football language, then it's harder to decipher for what they're saying. We were very fortunate. We had a pro scout. His name was Scott Coon, who worked for me actually in Miami, who came up in the scouting rates,

but I didn't know until he showed me what he was doing. He was a wizard with mathematics, just off the charts in the way he thought, and the way he processed. So we started from ground zero, and, you know, the first year you want to build your foundation, and then each year we kind of layered on top of that. So each year the predictive modeling became more and more accurate

and not to go down in the analytics rabbit hole, but it was just as important for us at the end of the draft and even what we call it our backboard. And having 700 names back there, they were able to run them through their algorithms and maybe pick out the 10 or the 20 of the 700 that actually had a legitimate chance to make an NFL roster. So we would bring those up in the April meetings,

and then we would go back and reevaluate them. And that's where we were pretty successful in trying to identify the Adam Thelons of the world, the C.J. Hamms of the world, a lot of the guys that end up making our roster and were pretty good players. How do you develop confidence in that sort of modeling when you don't have a strong background in it, or it's not?

When I see it work. Okay. Yeah. I was like, okay, that's why we're going to layer this in. Let me see where it goes. And let me see how, because I always believed that after the draft, you always go back and analyze. And a lot of times you couldn't get a snapshot.

And what the normal rule is, is after three years, you're going to know whether this player is an NFL quality player or not. So they did so much back testing and went back to when I first started with a Vikings in 2006, and we put in our grading system. So they went back tested as much information as they could because the more information you have, the more accurate a lot of that predictive modeling is going to be. So that's why you have to kind of slowly take your time, layer it in each year. They would add something new to it that would help make it even more accurate in their predictions. Nothing's ever going to be 100%. But it was a great tool for us. It wasn't.

It wasn't a decision maker, but it was an excellent tool to create conversation. Maybe we didn't think of how even have it. Yeah, that makes total sense. Again, a tool is a great way to put it. And I think that when people use the analytics term as some sort of boogeyman that's creeping in on the way that decisions are made in the NFL, I think that's the misunderstood part of it. It's a tool. So I wanted to get back in the quarterback a little bit.

So when you're talking about the pro days and just the visits in general, how many more boxes do you need? to check with a quarterback than for another position when it comes to spending time with that guy, personality. Even like you guys drafted Teddy, you had a defensive head coach. Did you want him to visit with a quarterback? Oh, yeah. You wouldn't with a guard. So how many more boxes need to be checked on that side of things?

Well, you're going down the whole organization, including your ownership as well. I was going to ask you when they become involved. Yeah, especially at that position because if you're drafting the quarterback, that is going to be the face of your franchise. So that's the one that's going to touch the ball, every snap on offense. That's the one that's going to have the spotlight on them. I mean, you're delving into a lot of other, as you say, boxes checked. How does he handle the pressure of that position? How does he handle when he's getting ripped in social media? I always try to look at if he had a poor performance and everybody attacked him, the public, let's say, or the media, attacked him on a social media. I'm not a

media, how did he react and respond to next week and the way he played? So you're trying to really dig down because you have to have some very thick skin to play that position. And the expectations on these guys coming in right now are so much greater. It's not like, if you take like a Patrick Mahomes, for example, he was able to sit and learn for a year behind Alex Smith. Even Aaron Rogers, who said, I believe, two or three years before he took the range. when Brett Farve was done. But nowadays, these guys and the way the media is and the way the fans are, as soon as you take that guy, okay, everybody wants it to be successful right off the bat.

And that position has to learn, it has to grow, it has to go through experiences, it has to go through failures so they can learn from those experiences and hopefully grow from them. This is probably an impossible question to answer. But when do you feel okay knowing that if this guy is available when we're picking, we're ready to pull the trigger. What rocks do you need to turn over before you reach that point? Just any player? The quarterback.

I think once everybody in the organization is totally signed off on him, and you've done as much in all the due diligence you possibly can't, and then you come up strategically. Is this a guy you trade up for? Is this a guy you wait for? Is this a guy you think you potentially move back, and he will still be there? So once you get the entire organization to sign off on it, hey, this is the quarterback and this is what we're going to go with.

And we've done all this research. We've done all this film study. We've done X, Y, and Z is everybody on board with this? And when we get the everybody's on board with it, then you go. So speaking of that, trading up in those considerations, in 2014, you guys faced a situation that some teams may be looking at in this draft, where it's the end of the first round and the quarterback that you're looking at is still on the board. you're picking at eight in that 2014 draft when you guys picked Teddy. Any considerations for saying we need to get him now or we risk losing him?

I think the biggest thing when we trade it up, I believe it was with Baltimore, and it was right at the end of the first round. Two things is that we did think Teddy would last to where we were going to pick in the second round. And the other consideration is, especially on a quarterback, when you go to the first round, you can have that fifth year option. It does take a lot of pressure off you, knowing that you have that extra year. It was Seattle, I think, was 32 that year because they just won the Super Bowl. But I was going to ask you if it was, you were worried that he wouldn't last until 40

or the 50-year option was most important. And I guess a little bit of both when you're making that move. All right. So that trade up for Teddy was pretty out of character for you during your time in Minnesota. I don't know if this is exactly right. But as I'm looking at the numbers right now, from 2011 to 2021, I'm fairly certain you traded up nine times and you traded down 29 times, which is the most of any GM over that stretch. So I'm wondering, where does that philosophy and approach come from? How do you build that?

Yeah, it comes, you know, and this is another thing where analytics came into play. So when we looked at, you know, everybody talks about the trade charts and the value of this and the value of that, as we broke down rounds on where, you know, where. where you select the player and what is the talent difference or success rate of hitting on that player? To give you an example, so the 17th pick in the first round down to the 34th pick in the first round, just for an example. All that range, all those players had the same success rate in the NFL, whether they were marginal starters or starters at what percentage, 56% or whatever it was. but there was not that big a talent difference as you analyze over the past 15 years that we did on guys making it or not making it or guys having success.

So what we looked at was if we were at 17, and it all depends on what's on the board too. And where the depth is in the draft, if you lose this guy or is he too good, you just want to stay there. Or if it's like, for example, a Downman Cook, you wanted to go up and get him in the second round. So it varies year to year. It's not just one set philosophy. But if we felt we had a lot of options on the guys that we like

and we were able to trade back maybe five or six slots and still potentially get that same guy and pick up some six, seventh round picks in the back end, that we were willing because I always thought the more you had on the back end, two reasons, the better chance that you can hit on two or three of them, you got a lot better chance if you have six or seven. that you're going to pick from them than just one. And the other thing, too, is if we really liked some guys and we didn't want, we knew that it was going to be very competitive in a free agent market, college free agent

market after the draft, we would use some of those because those were some of the top guys who wanted to sign. So I'm wondering, how do you kind of get comfortable with that uncertainty to know, all right, if we move back, we don't know who's going to be on the board because there's very human element of that that I'm sure it's difficult to get over. Yeah, no, there's a lot of, you have to understand that if you move back and how far you move back, what teams are going to be in front of them that potentially would take the player that you're really want. So last year's draft, for example, was Christian Darcyl.

So we moved back, I think, from 12 down to wherever we, I can't remember, is it 23 or 22 somewhere now? Yeah, I think it was they, you guys were at 13 and you turned. down to, I think, 21, I think is okay. So the two threats that we thought that potentially could take Christian Dara saw, we felt very good down to where Oklahoma or the Vegas, Las Vegas was picking, and then right before us Indy was picking. So we actually tried to trade back up to go get him. We weren't able to do that. So we sat there and then Vegas took leatherwood. So I felt very comfortable that between Vegas and Indianapolis that no one was going to take him there because they already had those needs filled. So they were going to go a different position.

And then when Indy came up, it was either going to be a tackle or it was going to be a pass rusher. And they went with pay, quitty pay. Because they had Eric Fisher, I think they had just signed. So you're trying to really understand knowing what you're. trying to do, but you're trying to understand what other teams' needs are. How did they fill those needs? How are they filling them through the draft? And we've had a big charts up on our video board. Okay, whoever X team filled three, four, and five needs. They still have, they still need a running back. They still need an offensive tackle. So you know when you're moving on

the board, you're trying to predict and look at if other teams, potentially, you're going to be able to would take that guy you want. It's kind of complicated to explain here. It's fascinating. It's it's it's it's you're constantly moving and you're constantly thinking and strategically thinking on how you manipulate through the draft. When you're defining those needs and you're identifying those other teams is that through research that you're doing through conversation or are you just looking at roster makeup when you're trying to figure out what those might be? You're looking at you know what they did in free agency where their cap situation is. Uh, any trace. rates that they made, any potential cuts that they may make after the draft because there's

a salary too high on a player and they wanted to use the post-June 1 rule. So you're factoring in all of that, but we had a great pro department who, that's their whole job, to study the NFL, study all 31 other teams, study their needs. So we would actually, as we did, if you want to call them mock drafts or our scenarios, that went through and we usually went through four or five days of different scenarios to really have them well they already filled that need so we don't think they're going to take player X. So you just keep rehearsing it just as much as you have to know the players that you're going to draft like the back of your hand, you know, this player is positive, it's negatives and it fits

or doesn't fit. But you also try to estimate and understand as best as you can where other teams are going to try to fill their needs in a position. So, in fact, for the draft weekend, I already have a book this big, studying other teams and studying needs and potentially where some of these guys are going to go. That's so great. So last year, Rayshan Slater went 12 right before you guys picked. Did that, was that ultimately what triggered you wanted to trade down? Was he a consideration for you when drafting 13th?

No, he was a very good football player. But you also got to understand, okay, how many other. options you have. So option, you know, whatever options, are there still enough depth that you would feel very comfortable with whatever player you took? That's why, again, you're, it's a little bit of a gamble. I remember sitting there in my first draft was Adrian Peterson and sitting there, hold my breath that the Arizona Cardinals didn't take him. I think they still regret that, by the way. Yeah. And then, uh, which, uh, you know, then we were picking right of in, front of Washington. Worceton ended up taking the safety from LLSAU.

Lelon Ranchery, yeah. Yeah, and we were very fortunate that Adrian fell to us that day. But those are the moments you were sitting there for that 10 minutes, seem like 10 hours, just waiting for someone to hopefully not take your player. What are you doing in that moment? You're trying to distract yourself, you're talking to people. What is that five to 10 minutes like? Squeeze balls.

You guys can't see this right now, but he's actually just pulled out a squeeze ball. I'm glad you have one in your desk. ready to go at all moments. So I'm curious, what would you say is the biggest misconception about moving up and down the board, whether it's availability of trade partners, how quickly it happens? What from the outside do people not understand as much about that process? There is a lot of, like if we even are talking about potential trades and, you know, we always had, I had two, it was George Peyton and Rob Brzezinski when I was in Minnesota that work the phones.

So 10 picks before us, if we were considering trading up, they'd start making calls or talking to those teams, hey, do you want to trade, you know, do you want to trade back? And then also we would work maybe the 10, 15, 10 teams behind us on seeing if they wanted to move up.

And if we wanted to. So a lot of times it's a lot of, I'd call them like sales calls, cold sales calls, see if anyone. And then all, of a sudden it's amazing and that's probably the most exciting part of the draft besides selecting the player that you want is that you could have two or three people

on the phone at the same time and you're on the clock so you're trying to decipher whether you're going to take that player or you're trying to decipher whether I'm going to trade with this team this team or this team of which the best deal for us so and you're processing all this I mean I've been on the clock where because once you decide to trade okay you You have to call the league off, you know, they're at the draft, but you have to call them say, this is what the trade is. The other team has to call them at the same time, say this is what the trade is. So we both match up.

And then the trade happens. But I've done that with just a minute left on the clock. And it's just crunch, crunch, crunch time. And that's the exciting part of it with all the juices flowing and everything. And so many things happening at the same time. I wanted to ask you that. I forgot to ask you this earlier. So when you guys traded back up for Teddy,

kind of similar to this conversation, at what point in the first round, do you know that is possible and do you start really chasing that ability to trade up? Does it have to get past a certain pick? Like how did, what trade is? We know, you have to know what value you're willing to give up to go do that. So we actually started around maybe I can't remember who was picking,

maybe in the 22 range, 23 range, and started calling those teams. to see if anyone was willing to trade back in the second round of us trading up and what that cost would be. And, you know, sometimes you call and they say, yeah, but it's going to

cost you X, Y, and Z. Well, doesn't even make any sense to do. No one's worth that. I think you only traded a fourth round pick to move up those eight spots. I'm pretty sure that's what it was, which is pretty good value, considering Chicago gave up a future first to move up nine spots

in the first round last year. Well, it's the value of trading, it seems to just like everything else, inflation has definitely gone up. You mentioned kind of how it changes in real time. And I'm wondering how that draft board changes in real time. For example, in 2022, you guys are, excuse me, in 2020, you guys are picking 22nd, which is the pick you got from Buffalo in the Diggs trade. From 15 to 21, three receivers go off the board. What is that five picks stretch like in the room? When you know you're thinking about a receiver. You have them stacked certain ways. I'm curious, just walk me through how the board changes

over the course of those five picks. Well, that's when you're just kind of, there's nothing, you're just kind of holding your breath. But it was, that was the draft that we were doing from our homes. That's right. That's right. So you're kind of watching TV. You're hearing a pick. And then it's like every time you hear a name come off, then it's like, you know, you just exhale because of, I don't want to say the anxiety, but the excitement of that. And then it's, but you better have a plan B. So if you're a plan A, it goes right before you pick, you don't have time to have another draft meeting. That's already been predetermined and discussed on if this doesn't happen, then this is what we're going to do.

So we're doing that, maybe six or seven picks ahead. This is the guy we want, but if we can't trade up and get him and he goes, what are we going to do that? So I would have everybody in the room. This is what I'm thinking. We'd put the three or four names over there. This is the order we talked about when we had our draft meetings. Is everybody still good with this order?

But there's not a lot of conversation going on. Basically, if you're running the room, you're saying, okay, here's the four guys. We'd be happy with any one of those four if our guy has gone in this order. is they wouldn't have any disagreement. And usually, you know, we've been through it so many times. So it's done. I'm curious if you can just lay out in a fairly simple way for people, the difference between stacking players horizontally and stacking players vertically

within the draft because I don't think a lot of people, including me, have a very good sense of how that works. I guess the best way to put it is when you have categories and you're stacking your board horizontally. So the first category is future Hall of Famers. or first year starters, they're going to be impact players. And then the second category may be starters, but they might not start the first game,

but they should start midway through the season, all the way down to this guy's only going to be a backup to this guy's a camp buddy. So you've got them going horizontally. Then what you do is as you weave the board, when you're going through your draft meetings, you're doing it vertically, like you're just talking about all the quarterbacks vertically and putting a grain on.

Then the next position, let's say halfbacks, you're doing all the half backs, you're doing it vertically, and you're putting a grade on them. So while we're doing it by position with the coaches and the scouts, I'm starting to weave it. So where does this quarterback stack with this running back? And what categories are they going to go in? So what that does is if you have five or six names and that these guys should be

starters midway through their rookie season and be very good players for you, you can have one offensive tackle, you can have one defensive end, one safety, and let's say one running back. That way you can go, well, what's our top need out of these four positions because they're in that category? Then let's take that. If you look at it vertically, you have number 10 to number 14. They may all have the same ability, just like I described. But when you and your owners are sitting there, well, why aren't you taking a 10th player, you're taking a 14th player, the street players better than him. Just optically, that's how you're looking at that.

And that's not what the case is. Seems like a lot. A lot happening here. Not an easy gig. So the last thing I wanted to ask you about that I felt like you would have a particular insight on, in this draft process, DeNeil Hunter's name has come up a decent amount because we have another potentially highly drafted past rush who didn't have a lot of college production.

And I'm wondering, what is the conversation about someone like DeNeal look like in your building, a guy that tests off the charts, but his production isn't necessarily where you wanted to be. What was that dialogue like between you and the staff? Oh, yeah. No, we had that. We had that with the coaches. I personally went down there to work him out with our defensive coordinator and our defensive line coach. And it's a little different because you're talking about we were very fortunate to get a DeNeal Hunter in the third round. So you're talking about potential, I'm assuming Trayvon Walker. That's who I'm talking about. Yes. That's the first overall pick in the draft.

So it'll be interesting to see how Jacksonville handles that. You know where Adrian Hutchinson is because he is a very good football player. He is ready to come in and start day one. The evaluators in what you read out there, how high is his ceiling? And then you got a Trayvon Walker who's not probably as developed from a pass rush standpoint and some of the other things as Hutchinson is, but he may have truly a higher ceiling because all of that unique athletic ability.

So those are the discussions you go back and forth and eventually do we want the guy that's the most ready that maybe not as high as ceiling or this guy. It's a little easier when you're in a third, second, third, fourth round than it is with the first overall pick in the draft. So that would be interesting. I'm excited to see what Jacksonville does. And this is, maybe there isn't a solid answer for this.

But at what point in the draft do you think the traits start to outweigh the production, you get comfortable with that? I think that is, that's a hard question to answer because I don't know, you know, how, you know, what all the analytics tests say, what the psychological test say, the medical. You know, a lot of people don't know the medical. So a lot of times we would pass up a guy because our doctor saying he made me healthy to the public, but. This guy has a herniated disc that's going to need back surgery, and it's going to affect him in a long term. And he may have a three or four year career. So those are the things on the outside that you don't know about. But on the inside, those are the things that will help you try to make and determine the best decision possible.

Awesome. That's all I got for you. I sincerely appreciate the time. And I sincerely appreciate the insight. Thank you very, very much for doing this. How was it good? Great. I could ask you about a million more things.

I'm not going to. All right. It's time now to welcome. I mean, one of the best position coaches in the history of the NFL. I think it's safe to say somebody who was the Patriots Offensive line coach for multiple decades and helped develop that position for an unparalleled run of success. Dante Scarnackia, Dante, thank you very much for taking the time to do this.

I sincerely appreciate it. You're welcome, Margaret. It's good to be on with you this morning. So what I wanted to do is really kind of give people. a window into what it's like to be a position coach in the draft process, what your guy's role is, and just what that couple months actually looks like within a building. So just to kind of go back to the beginning of the process, in a typical offseason, when was the first time that you would start watching prospects in a given draft? For me personally, it wasn't until after, you know, the season,

obviously the season was over. And really, whatever end of season evaluation, we made on our own players at that time. So then immediately we would start with the evaluation of the possible guys that we were interested in looking at for the draft. And that could vary, Robert, in any numbers between maybe 30 to 50 guys where you would have to, everybody has the greatest access to video that you could ever want in the NFL. Every college game you got against multiple opponents, going back two and three years to the guy's whole career. And whatever you wanted to find out, you could find out on tape.

And so that process started, like I said, after we got done evaluating our own roster. What did that list look like? Was that everyone that your scouting department had draftable grades on? How did they curate that list of 30 to 50 guys typically? It was usually, as you just mentioned, guys that you felt. would be either draftable or a high priority free agent guys, you know, that had been evaluated by the scouting staff. I mean, those guys, they're out there all year long in spring and the summer, you know, during the football season. They're out to the colleges and evaluating guys and putting numbers on them.

And so then what we're asked to do is to give our opinions on, you know, a smaller version of what they have done. they've done hundreds of guys. We end up doing, you know, 10, 20, 50 guys. How do you start that process? If it's a chunk of 50 players, how do you even begin knowing how to sort through the film for each guy, where you want to start watching? How do you break it up into chunks? Well, the easiest way to do it, first off is to look at the All-Star games at the end

of the year. And the number one game is the single ball. So usually you could look at the Senior Bowl tape. and of that list of 50 guys may be as little as three as many as seven guys were in that game. So you could look at them against really pretty good competition. And usually what you were looking for there, in my opinion, were the one-on-one pass protection tapes, the one-on-one run-blocking tapes, and obviously the game tapes.

I didn't really look a lot at the practice tapes. You know, they're just practice. So I would look at that. And then from there, I would kind of have a pretty, pretty good idea what those players look like. And then I would, what we do, and I'm sure a lot of people do this also, is that we have what we call point of attack tapes. And so that tape is put together by the scouting staff. It involves a large volume of run plays, a large volume of past players. It also includes the number of penalties they had in all their games. So, you know,

you had ways to evaluate it that way. And so you would then go to that. And then, what I I always like to do was, like, let's say, if you're looking at a guy in the Southeast Conference, okay, then you're going to, you're going to look at them against Alabama, Florida, you're going to look at them against Georgia. You're going to look at them in all these good schools against players that are going to be playing on Sunday in this late. There's no doubt about it. Okay. So you had access to looking at those guys against those teams and against really good players. And that could also happen, you know, like I remember Louisiana Lafayette. You know, they had a really good team with some pretty good offensive linemen in it. And, you know, you could see them against Alabama.

Well, that's a classic game you have to go see. And you have to watch on tape because you're seeing them against guys that are going to line up in the NFL. So, you know, I thought that was a great way to evaluate guys. And that really pretty much transcends all of college football. If you're looking at a guy from a smaller school, you try to get them against the best competition that you possibly can and try to make the most efficient evaluation you possibly can also. When there isn't a lot of tape with high-level competition, if you're looking at somebody in this draft, for example, let's say Trevor Penning from Northern Iowa, where most of his tape is not going to be against players from schools of that ilk. How do you try to make that evaluation and bridge that gap? I'm sure it's difficult to understand the context of what you're watching.

I believe this. Let's just talk about from a physical standpoint. If he only plays against teams that are of like standing as his, and I'm not downgrading Northern Iowa, Northern Iowa is everybody has a great game. What we're talking about is maybe Iowa's not on the schedule, okay, in this year. The thing that I have to see is that guy has to dominate the competition. There can be no ties.

I mean, he's got to just dominate everybody he plays because he's really playing a lesser quality of player than what we have already talked about. So that's number one. Does he dominate the competition? If he does, then he's all right, we're on the right track. And then you hope you're able to see him maybe as a junior against a higher level of competition.

Or maybe this is a guy like the player you just mentioned that's at the senior bowl or a high-level all-star game. Then you look in and see if he's able to make that transitional leap to a better quality of opponent and a one-on-one session. So I think that you just have to keep digging and keep searching. Did you guys ever drive? I'm looking at the list of players you've drafted over the years here. Not a ton of small school offensive linemen over the last decade or so.

Can you think of someone that you really had to look into in that way and try to figure out, all right, what am I really watching here that you guys ultimately did end up drafting? You know, if we didn't draft anyone from a smaller school, it wasn't because we didn't like them, okay, or we just said, hey, no way. We did exactly the same process that I just described. We looked at them and really tried to get the best evaluation for that player as we possibly could. But to your question, I mean, we didn't draft Steve Neal who played for us for nine years. He was a college wrestler. But we brought him in.

And for us, the evaluation process, Robert really was a case where, you know, we brought him in, tried him on defense. He was horrible. And but, you know, his workout pre-drub, when we got him in as a, before we signed him, was off the charts great. I mean, this guy was a phenomenal athlete, the size and speed and everything else. So I'm sitting there. I'm looking at this guy. I'm thinking we'll never get a chance of a player that has this guy's skill set. So I asked Bill if I said, just give him to me for a week or two, and let's see what he looks like at training camp.

And the one thing that he did, and really the thing that for me and for us as a staff, to be honest with you, that really seal the deal for Steve was in one-on-one pass protection, he was outstanding because that was his world. when those defensive line would go to grab him, throw him, that was Steve's world. He was a two-time NCAA wrestling champion. Yeah. Heavyweight wrestling champion. And he was phenomenal. But when they would go to push him, he could settle down.

When they would try to pull him, he could get his weight back. They couldn't do anything with him. And so when you looked at that, you just said, look at, all right, he's raw. He's got a lot to learn. But we're not letting this guy out of here. And we're going to put him on the purse. practice squad. And so that was his evaluation process.

And I think it's true for a lot of teams. You know, there's a lot of stories like that. Did you prioritize guys with wrestling backgrounds or was that just a happenstance incidence? You know, we really didn't. But I think to your question, if a guy, you know, has a high school background as a really good high school wrestler, not many guys were able to do both in college. Yeah. You know, then you just, you can't, you can't discount that. So, all right, this guy's a pretty good wrestler, you know, a state champion wrestler.

And so that's, all that stuff is in his favor. I, you know, I really believe in the saying that everything counts for something. So, I mean, if this guy has that in his background, that counts for something. So let's take a look at it. It ain't easy being a college wrestler or a high school wrestler. It's a hard sport. So all that counts for something. I certainly never did it.

When football season was over, I was not going to the wrestling gym. I can tell you that right now. I'm wondering, how would you watch, was it only alone? Did you do this as kind of a solitary process? Or did you guys ever watch as an offensive staff as a larger group when you were discussing these players? No, we did it largely, very largely on an independent basis. And so what I would do is I would look at these guys and I would write up reports on them. And I would submit those reports to, you know,

you know, the head of scouting, and I'd give them to the head coach. And if Josh wanted him for, you know, for offense, I would give him to him too. So he would have an idea of what we were talking about. So, you know, that's how all that information got shared. I was going to ask you that, whether they were written reports or whether you gave a presentation of any kind. So it was all written for the most part. All written, handwritten for me because I don't, I'm not good on computers and I don't mind writing everything up. But I had a form that I always worked off of that did me a lot of good.

And I felt like I could give an accurate evaluation. Was that one that you just developed over the years? It is. Yeah. Yeah. Can you describe it at all? Was it like a rubric? Was it kind of long form?

What were the most important things that you wanted to get across when you were filling that out? I really delved into five areas. Okay. I wanted to know everything I could have about him as a run blocker. Okay. Could he move the line of scrimmage? could he make the tough blocks in the run game, which for me, and I would assume it would be for a lot of people, can he make the backside cut off? Can he make the front side reach block? Can he unlock his hips, which is seeing, I don't want to get technical here, but in blocking, you know, you move them with your lower body and you control them with your upper body. And all those things, as I said, count for something. So you have to look for those traits in that guy within that particular. skill, which you're describing as run block, can he unlock his hips? Because again, you know,

you're generating force with your lower body. Can you redirect a guy? So if you're into a guy and the ball carrier goes one side, he tries to play off that way, can you redirect the force of your block on that guy? And pass protection, can you, the centers and guards control the depth in the pocket. If those guys are getting knocked back, you're not going to have a puck. And especially for us, because, you know, with Tom and their quarterback, you know, he's there. He ain't going anywhere else. So the idea was those guys couldn't sink and anchor the middle of the pocket and not get pushed back. And we felt like they were a real liability.

And the same thing's true for the tackles. The tackles keep the width in the pocket. So if they're getting collapsed down in from the outside end, then that does you know good. So you have to be able to have the depth in the pocket with the. the center and guards, the width in the pocket, the tackles. And the tackles, they got a double-edged sword. They got to handle speed to power rushes, and they got to handle speed off the outside edge or quickness up and unders and things like that.

So you have to be able to evaluate those traits and how well those guys can do those traits. As far as guards go, you know, you guys drafted Joe Tuny and Shaq Mason, I think, in back-to-back years. I know you weren't coaching full-time at that point, but you were part of those evaluations. Both of those guys have certain traits and strengths that you see from their college tape. Even Joe as a tester was impressive, but wasn't necessarily very long. Was that ever a priority for you when it came to guards? Were you willing to overlook arm length and some more traditional benchmarks at times

if you thought the guy was a really good player? Yeah. Shaq, I evaluated when I was retired. And then when I came out of retirement, that's when I evaluated Joe in that draft. but to your question is that I believe in length. You know, I think length is important. Okay. Look at Matt Light played on our team for 11 years, all right,

and he had his arms for 33 inches long at left half. Okay. Now, do you want them much shorter than that? I'd say no. Okay. Do you want them longer than that? Yeah, you know, it doesn't hurt. It's certainly good, but it's not the end all.

we absolutely cannot take this guy if he has 33-inch arms. So, you know, I just, I think it's, you know, I'm sure Shaq's arms aren't very long. I know they're not, you know, and David. I think it's 32 and a quarter for him or 32 and 8th for him and 32 and a quarter for Joe. Yeah. I mean, to me, that's long enough. Look, if you're blocking a guy, every time you hit the guy, your arms are 20 inches out in front of your body, that's okay. But if, in fact, it's very doable.

But if your arms are sitting in here, you know, like a Tyrannosaurus Rex arms and you got them right in here, you don't have 33 inch arms. You don't have 36 inch arms. So you're really not using your length to your effectiveness. So what I always say is look at, you know, let's just don't hammer these guys because of that. Yeah, you know, tackles, we have kind of a minimum out there. But if they're capable of doing things well with, quote, not the longest arms in the world. It's okay. Like Isaiah Wynn, Isaiah Wynn played left tackle in the Southeast Conference and was really good. And he's got 33-inch arms, you know? So he was really effective against a lot of good players out there. And so I just think that, you know, how good is the guy playing? Let's start with that first. Were there any other testing measurables that you guys had benchmarks for, whether it was the short shuttle or certain other things when you wanted them to hit a certain minimum at certain positions? You know, I think that you look at everyone's testing, you look at all their

measurable, height, weight, speed. I think that that's, you know, something that, you know, they get testing it, so let's look at it. And then all the, you know, vertical jump, the standing broad jump, there are parameters that you say, look at this guy, he's not very explosive because he can't vertical jump or all the rest of it. And I think some of that's true. But the bottom line, to me, all those things do, they just validate good players or they validate bad players.

And so let's see how good a guy plays. You look at a guy and say, man, this guy really plays very, very well. Oh, but the only vertical jumps 26 inch, but he plays really well. Okay. Let's look at that first and make a decision from there. And you said that you guys would give verbal reports to the scouting staff when you were done with your evaluations. outside of those few months in a specific draft class, how much communication was there between the scouting staff and the coaching staff

just to establish some parameters for what you guys were looking for? Obviously, they knew it all the time. And in what settings? Was it formal? Was it informal? How did that usually look? I think that at the beginning, everyone gives their opinion of what they want the pitcher to look like.

And I think the greatest communication should come between the assistant coaches, obviously the head coach and the scouting staff, they have to know what's important to us, okay? Like, as an example, I believe in toughness, okay? The three traits that I always look for, smart enough, tough enough, and athletic enough, okay? And you can't compromise toughness. If, you know, if that guy's not going to hit you in college,

he is not going to hit you in the NFL. He's just not. And so I believe that that's an absolute mandatory thing. They have to be tough enough to stand up to the guys that they have to block in this league. And I think intelligence is important. I'm not looking for a rocket scientist, but I also think... You didn't have one, though. Who's that?

Cam Fleming. Oh, yeah, all right. Yeah, now, Cam, all right. And there's... Look, I'm going to tell you, now, this is the honest guy who are true. There's a lot of dumb smart guys, okay? The guys are, you know, really high grade point averages, wonder-lick test off the charts. And when all the bullets are flying around them, man, they don't know what's going.

They can't process it that well. And then there's guys that have that Wonderlick test that has real, real low test scores. And some of those guys have those low test scores because they hate school. So they don't test very well. But now you ask them, you know, if we're getting blitz off of this edge, where's the safety's going to line? Well, they're over there, coach. They'll tell you all that because they love football. Now, I'm not saying you can take every guy that's got a five on the wonder,

like I think that that's going to be the answer. So, you know, you go somewhere else with that. And then really where intelligence is concerned is, until you set a guy down and you ask them football questions, specific football questions, you're not really going to know how much this guy can take in and process. apply it and then three weeks later recall it. So as you get done with that process where you present the information back to the scouting

staff, you give your reports, how many players would you typically attend a pre-draft workout for them in a given year? I would say I've had as many as 18 to 20 and I've had as few as 8 to 9. So really the way it works for us, Robert, is that, you know, would Bill give us a list based after all the information have been gathered. So I want you to go work these guys out for pro days or schedule a workout with this guy when you could schedule individual workouts.

And it would be, like I said, anywhere between 8 and 18. That list was given to you. You didn't have any input in terms of what that old was like. Oh, yeah, no, I would say, you know, like Ted Karras. I asked for permission to go work out, Ted. And because I really liked what I saw on him on the tape, you know. That was true for a number of other places. Shaq Mason. You know, I think Bill and I both were in agreement with Shaq Mason and that,

you know, I said, Bill, I said, I really like this guy. He says, yeah, I really like him too. And so I went down there to work him out and I was the only line coach there on his pro day. There were a lot of scouts there, but there were no other line coaches there that day. And I'm only saying that because I think he was devaluated in the draft because of his height or lack of height. and, you know, he played in a wishbone offense. But as a run blocker, he was a can of kickass. And you could, whoever he lined up against, man, I mean, they were in for a long, hard day against that guy. Now, the big thing you had to ask yourself, can this guy be a better pass block?

Because they didn't really do a whole lot of it. Yeah. And he proved that he can because he's low center of gravity, can't knock the back, pit bull, all the rest of it, you know. So that's just part of the whole process. How do you trust that? How do you trust that your imagination in that moment to say, all right, I haven't seen him do it, but I think he can do it. Did you just have to wait until you get him on the field to actually know for sure whether that's true?

I think that you can train a guy to do specific skills. Okay, we talked about run block. And pass protection is the same thing. You can train guys to be better. pass blockers or do a number of things that allow them to be an effective pass blocker. As an example, take a great set on a guy. Use your hands and pass protection. Keep your weight inside the midline of your body. You can teach those skills to them. And then you have to see whether or not they can sink the flow. It wasn't a case where he was a bad

pass blocker at Georgia Tech. It was a case where they just didn't do a whole lot. But when you watched him the times that he could, you said, all right, this guy's fine. Let's just, let's try to like anybody you bring on to your team. And this is true for all the coaches and all the line coaches in the NFL. You just try to make them better. That's what it's all about. When you go do those individual workouts, what can you gather there that you can't see on tape or from testing? What are the things that you can learn when you're doing that process?

Well, for me, I want to hear and I want to see. power. Now, how do you hear power? That guy hits a bag. You know, as in run blocking, you know, if you got a guy that's pretty stout here to hold it for him, you can, if you can hear it and you can see it, then you know it's okay. The same thing's true in past protection. That guy hits you with his hands. What are you hearing? Are you hitting a subtle slap, or are you hearing, is he hitting in your toe? Ooh, shit, look at that, you know. I got to hear it.

I got to see it. I got to, because I think you can see explosion. You can see power and all the rest of it. And those are the things I love for. Was there any workout during your time that you remember was particularly illuminating, where you really learned something about a guy that changed the way that you thought about him even a little bit? You know, I honestly would tell you that no, because I had certain expectations for him. And I had a pretty, I think I had a pretty solid idea of what they would look like.

There may be guys that were a little bit more pleasing to look at and more powerful than I thought. And so I take that in a consideration, but I don't come away and say, okay, wait a minute, I just watched them hit a bag for 20 minutes. That overcomes everything I didn't like about him when the bullets were for real. So you got to put a balance on it all. Okay, and I think that's important. How well does the guy play? During the process, how often would you have discussions with Bill about specific players in a given year? Would you guys sit down and talk about it?

I'm curious what your guys' communication looked like over the years. I think it would really be just a moderate amount, a small amount of times. I would come in and give them everybody. This is how I see it. And we'd go through it page by page. And you know, and he would, and you know what? To his credit now, a lot of people don't know. He looks at all those linemen too now.

So all the guys I was looking at, he was looking at it. And we would share, and he's going, you know, I'm not sure I see it the way you see it. And I would say, I'm not sure I see it the way you see it. You know, but look at that's his job. And so you respect that and you say, okay, I'm going to go back and look at more on this guy and I want to make sure. And then I think the most important thing, Robert, honestly, is when you have an opinion of somebody, you express that opinion. And if you feel strong about it, you express it in a strong matter. I really like this guy.

If you can say that about a guy, I really like this guy and here's why. Then I think that counts for something. That tension is healthy. It has to be healthy in those moments. where you're kind of pushing each other and figuring out, or what am I not seeing? It feels like if that tension didn't exist, then you'd be in trouble.

There's no doubt. You have to have checks and balances, okay? Not everybody's right all the time. Not everybody's wrong all the time. I think it is healthy, and I think it's something that can be very illuminating and allow people to look at guys and say, all right, we're all on the same page here.

We like this. Joe Toney, okay? There was nothing not to like about Joe Tudon. Dr. Mason, David Andrews. We looked at David Andrews. What's not the like about this guy? He's not going to be drafted. So, yeah, great.

We'll get them for less. And it just worked out. Thank God we got that way. And we've had our mistakes in the past, too. So you just got to move on. Was the tone of those conversations always like that, where you guys were comfortable pushing one another? and there was that kind of culture of professional disagreement,

or is that something that developed over time as you guys built up some success? I think professional disagreement is a real accurate way of saying, okay? There was never any heated conversations. Never, okay, between Bell or myself or the head of scouting and myself. It was never anything like that. It was just this is how I see him. And I think it was all very respectful. on both ways.

And I think that's true with everybody there. You know, all they want is your opinion. And, you know, and if you're doing your homework, you're giving your opinion and how it fits what we want to do and how we want to do it with the guys who want to do it with. And so, you know, that's just that's, I think that's just the way to approach things. When does your input in the process end? Is there any ever time during the draft where they solicit what you think about a guy or when that, When the clock actually starts, are you guys kind of removed from the process then?

We are to a degree. We're not in the draft room. Okay. Never have been in the draft room with Bill. They're just more comfortable having themselves in there. And I like that. Now, occasionally, you would get, you know, they'd say, you know, they want you down in the draft room. And you'd go in there and say, all right, what do you think of this guy?

Tell me one more time what you think of this guy. Here's what I think. and it didn't mean we were going to get him, but maybe they were trying to decide between an offensive lineman or a defensive back or whatever it was. Or there would be times where, you know, there'd be two offensive linens, side by side on board, who you want. Okay, and then you say, I want that guy for this reason.

And then at the end of the draft, as you get into the sixth and seventh rounds, you know, they call you in there and what do you think about the guys that are up here, who would you like to see maybe with the seventh in the seventh round as opposed to look at it. It was hard for us to get guys, I would call them priority free agents because a lot of teams to throw out a lot of money. If you're a priority free agent, Robert, you may be doing better than a guy that's a fifth round draft choice.

And you get to choose where you go. Yeah, exactly. And you may have access to a bigger signing bonus than guys that are in the sixth and seventh round. So it's not the end of the world for those guys if they don't get drafted. So, you know, then you'd look at it and say, you know, I say, well, I know that this guy has interest from other teams. I know he does. And, you know, and so I'd rather, if we got a seventh round to spend, let's spend it on that guy. Because I think this guy's going to be on our practice squad at least.

And that's what they're looking for. How difficult is it, like Joe Tunney, for example, you go into a draft. knowing you love him. And hours go by, dozens of picks go by. What is it like sitting there knowing you like a guy and not being sure whether or not you're going to be able to get him? I think I'm a big believer in letting the process play itself out. Look, there's a broader picture here than just the offensive line.

We're trying to staff a team and put a team together. And our team has multiple needs. And, yes, I knew that, you know, Joe Tuning, he was a left tackle at North Carolina State before that or tied in. And he was a good left tackle at North Carolina State. I mean, against good players, too, in that conference. But we all knew he was going to go inside. So, you know, I was totally willing to let the process play out that year. Just, you know, here comes the, I think he was a third round draft choice late. You was. And so we just said, you know, when they took him, actually,

I was still in my office watching it on TV off everybody else. Damn, we got Joe tuning. How about that? I was happy. When you guys are considering taking a guy higher, like Isaiah Win, for example, are you more involved in the process, less involved? How does it change when the possibility arises of using high-end draft capital on an offensive line? I think, you're all.

I think, again, the process plays itself out. You'll evaluate that year with Isaiah. Isaiah was a really good player at Georgia, and he actually is a good player here now. And then starting at left tackle, he's had some injury issues, no doubt. But the one thing that affected Isaiah in that draft was there weren't many tackles. And so we had to look at and say, outside, we had to get outside the box and say, okay, here's not the tallest guy in the room. All right, and he's got okay length, but he plays awful.

good and he's tough as hell. And so we just have to say, maybe we take a shorter left tackle that maybe in time if we are able to stock the outside edges with more prototypical tackle type bodies, then he goes inside and plays guard, which a lot of people thought he would be a guard. And so that was just part of the process. I'm fine with it. I was fine with everything. How much of a development plan do you have for a player when you draft him?

Is it three, four years? Is it we'll get him in the building and figure it out? I'm wondering how much foresight there is with guys. I think you bring them in and you give them exactly the same information and demand the same things out of him. You do that anybody that's been in there for 12 years. And you see whether this guy can sink or float. And you never put any limitations on them.

Okay? Everyone else will put limitations on them. I'm not. I'm going to see if this guy can. can be the player that I think he can be, and the player that he was at North Carolina State and see if that can transition into the NFL football, and I'm not putting a limitation off.

You know, if he has the traits that we covet, smart, tough, athletic, and up all that things, my hope is that he will. And if he does, when Joe came in, we went and played a really good Arizona Cardinal team in the first game of the year. and Joe was starting at left guard. Shack was hurt.

Ted was starting. Ted Carras, who was drafted in the six round with Joe. He was starting at right guard. And David Andrews, an unfinished or undrafted free agent was in his second year. And who cares? They all met our expectations.

And we didn't put any limitations on any of them. So, you know, we did all right with those guys. Clace Campbell was on that team. I mean, there's some real guys on the inside. Yeah. I mean, that's... Talking about dealing with some length when you're a short-armed rookie guard.

Yeah. I played against 6-8 Callais Campbell in your first game. Yeah, and he's one of the great players that's played in the league, you know. But, you know, I will be the first to tell you, you know, David was helping out a little bit on that side. You know, we weren't going to, we weren't just going to turn anybody loose on those guys. So at any rate, you know, that's all part of the process. the last thing I'll ask you, what would you say was the biggest difference

by the end of your career in how you evaluated the position compared to the beginning of your career? What's the most important thing you learned and what you were looking at for guys? I think I got better at it. Obviously, the longer you do things, the better off you're going to get.

It's the same thing in training alignment. The more you do some skill over and over and over again, the better you're going to get at it. So if you're doing it right, that's what's pretty important. But I was able to develop a way of looking at guys. And I think the one thing that really helped me personally was I developed a way of mentally measuring these guys from a football standpoint. Instead of asking them, you know, what great books they read over their college life, you know, it was, you know, it was more geared towards football and a question.

I would present something, a lot of stuff to them, write it on the board, show them the where's and the whys, and then I erased everything. Now it was retention time. How much do you just remember? So I was able to get, I think, a strong evaluation point from that. Hands on at the pro day, seeing what they did, how well they listened, how well they moved around, seeing if that really validated what I was seeing on tape. Again, when they block somebody, how much did it sound like? You know, with power and movement skills and all that. I just try to take it all in and put it all into the process. I think this, honestly, Robert, I think the greatest trait scout can have is when they feel really, really sound about somebody, really good about somebody, is to go and say, hey, look, I really like this guy. I think this guy fits the culture that's on our football team that exists our football team. You know, our scouts are in all the meetings. They're welcome into the offensive line meeting anytime they want to.

And they hear what's being said, how it's being said, and all the rest of it. And they stand by the practice. They watch everybody's drills. What are these guys asking these guys? How demanding are they? You know, what's it like out there for these kids? Are these kids going to all of a sudden come in? from college and they're going to shrink from that or are they just going to have you seen enough of them

the same environment or they're just going to flourish in that with that style? And I just think that that's the way you go about stuff. You know, it's all, we're all in together. You know, I'm part of the process that caused people to come into our program and hopefully develop people because I think that that's what we have to do as coaches. We have to develop players. In the NFL, you can say what you want to say, but there's a hell of a lot of developing that goes along with it, too. And we don't always get the best, okay?

We get a lot of other guys. But I believe this, and I'm not, I'm sorry, I'm taking so long, but I believe it's all my hope is that if you coach everybody in your room, So we have maybe 10 to 12, 13 offensive line. If you coach every one of those guys, and you let every one of those guys do the same drills. And we do that during the season. Everybody does the same drills.

Everybody does the same drills of the players that are going to start and the players aren't going to play much or the guys that are on the practice squad. But if everybody does them, how can they not improve? Really, think about it. How can those guys not improve? And so I think we owe it to them. Coach the whole damn roster. If you coach the roster, the roster gets better and your team gets better.

And I think that that's really the key to hopefully establishing and continuing on a good program. Awesome. I can't even tell you how much I enjoyed this and how much I appreciate the time and the insight. So thank you very, very much for taking it out sincerely. Now, you're welcome. Call anytime. All right, guys, that's all we got today. Thank you so much to Rick Spielman.

Thank you to Dante Scarnacia. Really fun show. Just an incredible opportunity to chat with both of those guys. I hope you guys enjoyed it. I know that I certainly did. Just a reminder, next Thursday night, me, Nate Tice, Dane Brugler, live during the first round of the draft.

On Friday, we will also be live during rounds two and three. Coming to you with analysis on every single pick from the first three rounds of the draft live from Las Vegas. You guys can watch it on YouTube, on Twitter, wherever you would typically watch the video content that we put out. It will be available to you. We'll also have a bunch of other writers kind of sifting in and out over the course of the couple nights. Lindsay Jones, Deontay Lee, Nick Baumgartner, one of our new NFL draft analysts. Please come check that out.

We are very, very excited to be bringing that to you guys. In the meantime, please rate and review the podcast on your podcast platform of choice. I'd very much appreciate that. Please subscribe to the athletic. The athletic.com slash football show. It's where you can read all of our great writers. Lindsay, Deontay, Nate, all of the content that they're putting out. Really doing a fantastic job this time of year.

It is impossible to properly follow and stick with the NFL draft without an athletic subscription. I highly encourage you guys to go get one. We will be back on Monday with me, Nate, and Dane. We're going to have one more little primer before we get to draft week. Excited about that show. Excited about everything we have coming to you guys over the next week or so. In the meantime, enjoy your guys' weekend.

I appreciate the time. Talk to you later. This was the athletic football show.