The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Evaluating the hiring process for NFL head coaches and GMs with Amy Trask, Domonique Foxworth & Joe Barry

Episode Date: January 12, 2022

Where do we look for NFL head coaches and GMs? What qualities should the candidate possess? Robert Mays begins exploring those questions with former NFL executive and current analyst for CBS Sports, Amy Trask. They discuss the business side of finding a GM, the importance of collaboration and her experience with the Raiders. Then, former NFL player and current ESPN writer and commentator, Domonique Foxworth joins the show to talk about how head coaches set the culture within a team. Finally, Packers defensive coordinator Joe Barry explains why he knew early on that Mike Tomlin, Sean McVay and Brandon Staley would be successful head coaches.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Football Show. The Athletic Football Show is presented by State Farm, because like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Get a quote today. Welcome to the Athletic Football Show. Today is Wednesday, January 12th. I'm Robert Mays. Really fun show for you guys today. I've wanted to do this for the last few weeks when we were kind of planning out what we want at the end of the season to look like.

This is a topic I wanted to hit. Where do we look for coaches? Where should we look for coaches in GM? What should the pool of candidates look like? What should the process look like? It's the holy grail of football questions, right? If you could answer that succinctly, you would have the answers. You would have the biggest answer that you need in finding success in the NFL.

And we may not land on the answer today, but I wanted to explore it at the very least. And I wanted to get several different perspectives to do that. We're going to chat with Packers defensive coordinator Joe Barry a little bit later. Joe and I had a conversation this summer when he was talking about assistance he's worked with, and the guys he knew would be really good head coaches from the moment he met them. He mentioned three names to me. Mike Tomlin, Sean McVeigh, and Brandon Staley. So I wanted to expand on that conversation with Joe and ask,

what about those guys? Why them? What stuck out to try to see if there was maybe a little bit of a secret sauce between that group that we could tap into? Dominique Foxworth from ESPN, who played several years in the end. NFL as a defensive back for some really good coaches. We talked about culture, how head coaches set culture, what types of head coaches can do that efficiently, where we should look for head coaches, what that job is like. Really enjoyed that chat with Dominique. Before we do that, though, I wanted to talk to somebody that had worked for a team that had been in a front office and an executive

role to kind of think about the business side of this, where we look for GMs and why. And that person is Amy Trask of CBS Sports, longtime Raiders' employees. let's get to our conversation with Amy. All right, I'm thrilled now to welcome long time NFL executives, spent multiple years with the Raiders in multiple roles, and also a current analyst, NFL analyst for CBS Sports. Amy Trask, Amy, thank you very much for joining us today. I really appreciate it.

Well, thank you for inviting me to join you. I'm thrilled to do so. So when I wanted to do this show, I wanted to try to get as many different perspectives on this topic as possible, because it's a wide-ranging topic. And I think that every time I talk to somebody about this, whether it's a current GM or a current coach or somebody that's been in the league,

I'm always, I always appreciate that I did. I always get something out of it. I wanted to talk to somebody who has been in the building, has worked for a team and has seen this kind of firsthand. So let's just start with kind of a broad topic here. The position of a general manager for an NFL team, as someone who's watched that job up close, who's worked with people that have had that job before,

what do we not understand about the demands of that job that you feel like more people should appreciate, just how wide-ranging it can be? Well, wide-ranging is a great way to describe it. When I'm asked, what does it mean to be a general manager or what is the role of a general manager? My immediate thought and reaction and responses, it depends.

There are 32 teams in the league, and each team is owned differently, operated differently, managed differently. So the roles of team employees, including, of course, general manager, those roles are different from team to team. And let me use my experience as an example. And by the way, you're very, very kind to say that I was with the league in the league for a number of years without actually saying the number of years. I did spend almost 30 years working in the NFL.

working with Al Davis, working for the Raiders. And I will use that as an example. Al really was our general manager. Now, Al is a team owner, was a team owner who came from a football background. He didn't come from a business background and by a team. He came from a football background. And I note that because he really was tantamount to the general manager in the sense that all football decisions ran ultimately through him and he had final say. Now look, ownership of a team always has final say full authority, full responsibility because even when ownership of a team delegates that authority, delegates that responsibility, ownership can yank it back at any time, proving the point that ultimately authority and responsibility rests with ownership. In our case, Al was tantamount

to the general manager. I remember when we hit some very, very rough years, my drive home, I went underneath the freeway overpass and fans had taken out a billboard right on that overpass that said, Al, hire a GM. And I remember as I drove home every day thinking, we have one. His name is Al. And I don't mean that in any way in a derogatory sense, simply noting that different teams are operated differently. So when you look at the role of general manager, you have to look at the team in question to determine what that role will be. And I think that's so interesting. And I've thought a lot, as you can see, the helmet behind me, I live in Chicago.

I am a Bears supporter, is how I will phrase it. And I've thought about it a lot in that context this week, because there are teams where you have somebody who is a GM, quote, unquote. But if there is a sort of precedent of football operations above that person, if there are other people in the football siloed aspect of the building, then the purview of that general manager can shift. in Chicago, that doesn't exist. The general manager is the football side of things, whoever they end up hiring.

That person has to assemble a scouting staff. That person has to have this incredible scope of their responsibilities. And as a result of that, I think that when people think about GMs in the NFL, who they want to be the GM of their team, all they think about is who's picking the players, who's the best scout, who's going to assemble the best roster. And I think that when you consider all the different hats that general manager has to wear, it's extremely important to reshift your focus and your understanding and expectations for what that job should entail and by extension the people who should be up for that job. Well, you used a word siloed. And I don't know if you noted the expression on my face when you did it.

But silos, siloed, putting people in silos. I think you can even use it as a gerund and say silo. Whatever form of the word silo one uses, that is the antithesis of what I believe is good business practice. I think the four most important words in business are communicate, cooperate, collaborate, and coordinate. And that's what I would want from every employee of any business I owned or any business in which I had a hand running. And I note that because your point is so well taken about what are the responsibilities of a general manager. It depends on how the organization carves up the varying responsibilities. There is player selection.

Well, is that what you want your general manager to do? Or do you want your general manager to oversee football operations and rely upon scouts for player selection? And then there's salary cap management. Is that something you want your general manager to do? or do you want to hire salary cap experts? No matter how you divide up all of those football roles, player selection, the draft, free agency, trades, cap management, coordinating with your coaching staff,

how to manage your football operations. If that is all to come under one person, there's going to have to be a lot of delegation. So everybody better do those four things, all of which begin with C, they better communicate. they better cooperate, they better collaborate, and they better coordinate. And I think the best organizations, not just in sports, are where we see employees do that. So I'm curious, if you were sitting in a GM interview right now and you were having someone who would be kind of the figurehead of the football side of the operation,

they would be in charge of creating the structure, understanding what their staff wanted to look like. They had a huge role and a huge amount of responsibilities. these. What would be the first couple questions you would ask that person as part of that interview process? Wow. That itself is a great question. I think the questions I would ask would depend upon the person with whom I was speaking. Was this someone who had been a GM at another organization? Is this someone who is coming from another organization in a different role? The first thing I would try to do is understand this person's perspective about business as a whole rather than being specific as to player talent or salary cap management. I would want to understand this person's background and outlook

on business. I'll tell you what I wouldn't do. I wouldn't ask some of those silly questions that I know are asked at the combine of players every year. You know, I remember a scout or a football personnel, gentlemen in our organization coming up to me after the combine and very, very proudly telling me he had asked a player, if you were a vegetable, what vegetable would you be? And I looked at this guy, like, and what is that going to tell us, whether he likes vegetables or not? So, you know, I'm using that as an example of things I wouldn't ask. But what I would want to know initially are what are your business philosophies? What is your vision for how? to best structure our football operations.

And I'd listen carefully to how collaborative this person would be willing to be in the role. And then we could get more specific from there. It's interesting to me just because, and I've kind of had to reset how I think about this, because I feel like we all have this understanding of NFL GMs, these super scouts, right? They have these guys, these abilities and these kind of, these talents for just kind of finding the right guys, right? These people understand the secret sauce for what makes players great. You have these visions of them in these dark rooms just pouring over tape and kind of finding

these diamonds in the rough and that's what the job is. And I was talking to a gym about it this week and that couldn't be further from the truth about what the day-to-day aspects of the job are. And again, I think bringing it back to the bear's side of this, you know, they've really cast a wide net with all the different candidates that they're looking at right now. And if you look at just two specific ones from the same organization, I find it really interesting. They're interviewing Glenn Cook, who is on the personnel side of things for the Browns, and Quasi Adolfo Mensa, who's also with the Browns. Their backgrounds are very, very different, right?

Glenn Cook is a football guy. He is a scout. That is where he comes from. Quasi comes from a very different place, and they have very different strengths. So if you're choosing between those guys, even though they come from the same organization and they'd be filling technically the same job, the ways that they're going to do that job are so immensely different. And I just think that that is such a fascinating thing when you consider what the purview of that person is and the considerations you have to put on it. I don't think it could be stated any better than you just stated that. You use the expression casting a wide net. So first let me note that I think that is so smart to do. If you are looking to hire in a position such as general manager or really any significant position, why the heck wouldn't you cast a wide net?

why and I hate that expression for me because I don't eat animals so I'm going to leave the wide net out of it but you know we understand what we're talking about which is why wouldn't you conduct a broad search which by the way brings me to a peeve of mine little off topic sort of but I just don't think interviews for general manager for head coaching other such positions should go on while you know if you're looking to speak to a candidate of a team that is still playing, I just don't think it's right. And then if you were to change the rule and say, okay, well, you can talk only to candidates that work for teams that aren't still playing. Well, then you're penalizing the candidates who are at the best teams because they're still playing

when other teams aren't. So word up to me, I would say, no interviews for head coach or coordinators, no interview for general managers until the day after the Super Bowl. Because let me tell you, when you are working for an organization that's in the playoffs, And people are asking to speak with your employees for their openings. It's extremely frustrating because on the one hand, you don't want to hold someone back from an opportunity. But on the other hand, that's your employee and you want them focused entirely on you. So I realize that's an aside. But there is no reason these interviews need to go on right now.

They can wait until after the Super Bowl. Okay, that said, my little rant aside. I think it's an important point, though. And I think it has real importance that's something else I want to hit. So we can get back to that in a second, but go ahead. Okay. My response to your other point about, again, looking at a broad number, a broad range of candidates from different backgrounds,

I think that's terrific. You noted that let's say they hire one of the two men you just mentioned. You're going to structure your football operations differently because of the background of the person you hire. If you hire someone who has worked their way, his way, her way up into the league through scouting, well then you've got someone who knows how to evaluate player personnel, pretty normally, and you're going to bring others in to handle cap management and other such matters. If you hire someone who has worked his or her way up on the salary cap or the contract side of the business,

you're going to need to make sure you have darn good scouts there to take care of everything else. I think when I think, consider all of this stuff, and I think the Browns are a really interesting place to look, and I think the Colts are another interesting place to look, and I think it's not an accident that the bears have requested to speak to two different people in each of those front offices. And I mentioned both of them because I'm somewhat familiar with just the overall attitude that they take in the football side of their buildings. And there is such an emphasis on challenging thinking. You know, why am I wrong about this?

What are my biases with this? Can you just give me a different perspective on this set of information that we're both looking at in different sort of ways? When you work for a team, how do you kind of foster that sort of environment of respectable disagreement, respectful disagreement to kind of push things forward? How does that actually happen? I wish I could leap through this screen and hug you right now. Look, I am one of the loudest advocates of disagreeing, disagreeably. One of the biggest misconceptions, I think perhaps the biggest misconception about the gentleman for whom I worked for almost 30 years, Al Davis, is that he wouldn't tolerate disagreement, that he wouldn't tolerate those who disagreed with him.

Well, if that were the case, I would have been fired roughly two, two and a half weeks into my job. And I'll give you a quick aside, he walked into a room where I was sitting with a colleague, and he ripped into this colleague like I can only imagine a Velociraptor would have ripped into flesh. And as he continued to talk, I realized he was wrong. So I said, and look, I don't have a dainty voice under the nicest of circumstances. So in a fairly loud voice, I said, excuse me, you're wrong. And I will never forget the look on his face when his head spun around to look at me. You know, there I am, a two week.

You know, I've been with the organization roughly two weeks. And I went on to say, look, if you were basing your conclusion on accurate data, on accurate facts, that would be a fair conclusion. But you are basing your conclusion on inaccurate information and you're wrong. And we went on to have a very, very loud, loud discussion. I would even call it yelling. Well, I didn't know at the time, but apparently lots and lots of people in the organization came and they heard us arguing and they sort of lined up in the hallway outside the room in which I was sitting. And I learned much later that one of them had even brought some cartons because she thought I would need to pack up and leave. The fact is, and the point is, many, many, many minutes through this argument, Al looked at me and said,

oh, okay, I got it. I got you. And we went on to work together for almost 30 years in which we disagreed more than we agreed. Disagreement can be healthy. Disagreement is good. You've got to encourage and foster disagreement in an organization to make it the best it can be. And yes, disagreement can be agreeable, but it can be loud and it can be heated and it can be passionate. but once the decision is made, it's the decision of the organization and it's everyone's responsibility to implement that decision to the best of his or her ability. I want to get back to the timeline aspect of this because I made this comparison very briefly on a show we did earlier this week and I wanted to expand on it a little bit. And we think about player acquisition and some of the ways that teams kind of rashly will

make trades in the draft and make trades up and have real conviction that they know. this guy is going to be a star. This is going to be the guy. And how often that tends to be wrong and turns out to be wrong. When you're thinking about the timeline these coaching hires get made up and how quickly teams are attached to this is the guy. And if I don't hire him now and we lose him, what are we possibly going to do? To me, it's the same thing. It's the same kind of misguided conviction that you know better and you haven't done all the vetting and all of the processes associated with this. So when you're thinking about how quickly these things happen, why does it happen that quickly?

Why are teams not willing to say, let's turn over every rock? Let's talk to these people multiple times. Let's talk to 15, 20 candidates. Why does it happen on the timeline that it happens? Well, I'll answer that question. And I'll also, but I'll start by saying it doesn't need to. The whole thing can be pushed back in my view. You push back hiring or interviewing and hiring until after the Super Bowl for the

reasons I stated earlier. I agree with you to you. And then you push back the combine a bit and then you push back the draft a bit. I mean, everything can be jiggled and juggled a couple of weeks. There's no rule that it has to stay as it is. But the reason for the pressure to hire a head coach is hiring the head coach is just step one. And Al used to take, let me let you in on a little secret. Al went through a lot of head coaches. And, you know, one of my frustrations when he would take what appeared to many to be quite a long time to make a decision had nothing to do with that decision. It's that if you take the longest to make the decision as to who is going to be your head coach, that head coach now will have fewer assistant coaches from whom to choose to bill out of

staff. Because if you assume there's five or six in any given year, and I think right now we're already up to six head coach openings, well, the Raiders have filled on with an interim coach, and that's a whole separate subject, but if the Raiders move on, six openings, I think there are right now. Well, if five of those openings or four of those openings are filled immediately, those coaches are going to immediately start assembling a staff. And that means if you take the longest to fill your spot, by definition, you're not going to get the staff, the assistant coaches that others have hired. Is that okay? Maybe in some instances it can work out, but that is one of the the reasons for the pressure. Yeah, that makes sense. And I think that often cited as one of the reasons.

It's just, I don't know, I think back to some of these examples. And I guess the Colts are not necessarily the best example because a lot of that staff that Frank Reich now has in Indianapolis had been assembled by Josh McDaniels. But I keep going back to that example where I think Frank Reich is a pretty darn good coach. The fact that he wasn't even their number one option, the fact that he was an afterthought in that process, I just think is a reminder that we should all, kind of check how certain we are about these things. And oftentimes the pool of candidates who can be really good at this looks different than it might seem at first blush here. Well, check how certain we are is a great saying for most things in business and most things in

life. I mean, and when I say most things, I'm talking about decisions. Check how certain you are. And I'll back up and talk about you better do that before you terminate your existing head coach. And I always say to people who say, you should fire the head coach, they should fire the head coach. They should cut the quarterback and do what? Because if you're going to make a decision, such as firing your head coach, you had better ask yourself and do what before you do it. And your answer to that question has to be at least as good as the status quo, at a bare minimum, as good as the status quo. And really your answer to and do what should be better than what you have. Because if you don't ask and do what and have an answer that's better than what you have now, then what are you doing?

Although I will note there are some instances where and do anything might be better. You, when we were planning to do the show, I believe that you said you sat in on one round of head coach interviews at one point. What do you remember about that process? What do you think was flawed about that process? Just your impressions of how it typically goes. Well, you are very, very gracious and kind to say that I referenced it. What I did was what the kids today call humble brag. And I don't just as a footnote, I don't think there is such a thing as humble brag.

That's an oxymoron. If you're bragging, you're not being humble. So let me just own it. I'm bragging. In my eight years of the Raiders, it was only one instance in which Al involved me. in a head coach and search. And he had me meet privately, just me, with each candidate for as long as I want, wanted to do, for as long as I wanted, and to ask anything I wanted and to conduct myself

in those meetings in any manner I wanted. Talk about anything, ask anything, proceed as you wish. So I met with every candidate that he brought in. And after I did. Remember how many there were? Obviously. Just ballpark. At least four is my, I ballparked four or so.

maybe it was five, maybe it was three. I think it was at least four. And by the way, just to be clear, I wasn't the only one who did. Al obviously spent the most time with the candidates that's stating the obvious. And I think one other person in the organization, I know one other person in the organization did.

So this was just my only chance to do that. And after I met with all the candidates, he said to me, okay, which one would you hire? And I didn't hesitate. I said Bill Belichick. Well, he went on to hire a different head coach. And I thought, that no one would ever know that I recommended Bill.

And then a number of years later at a press conference, Al was very, very, very generous and told the assembled media, yeah, Amy told me to hire Bill Belichick. Kid knows how to pick a head coach. So I was touched that he did that. And yeah, I'm bragging. What I was impressed with with Bill, his intelligence on every topic we discussed. Given that he's with the Patriots, I'll use a Boston expression. Wicked smart.

I was impressed with his intelligence. I was impressed with the manner in which he communicated. He just was a bright, shining light. What aspects of the job do you feel like go underappreciated? If you were talking to a coach and you were outside of intelligence, whatever he projected to you, what else would you want to know? What other things, other boxes, would you need checked if you were trying to vet some of these candidates? Interesting that you use the expression checking boxes because I don't know that you'll ever find someone who's going to fit every single box.

So then you have to prioritize what's the most important. In other words, you may not find a candidate that just hits the mark on every one of your ideals. So you then have to pick the candidate you think is the best fit. And one issue that I think is overlooked is that person's communication skills and leadership skills. Because as you noted earlier in our conversation, this position often involves overseeing so many different areas. If the general manager is given responsibility over the scouting department and over the salary cap management department and over the football ops department, for example, that's a lot of people

And that's a lot of coordination and that's a lot of communication. And you need someone who understands how to do that and or how to delegate to others and give them the authority to do much of that if that's what you choose to do. And again, I would prioritize someone who is willing to listen to different views that would be near or at the very top of my list, someone who says, I welcome differing opinions. I want to create an environment in which people are comfortable, disagreeing. with me when they tell me when they think I'm wrong because if you build a business, any business, and you don't want people to feel welcome to disagree with you and tell you when they're wrong, I think that's a big problem. And I feel like that's, you keep saying business.

And I think that's an aspect of this that I don't know if I appreciated it two, three, five years ago that whoever you bring in as a GM specifically, they run a business. Like, they are a person who has the responsibilities and all of the different tasks that they have to handle that somebody who runs a very large business would have to. And I just think kind of setting the vision, setting the organizational agenda, trying to keep eight, 10, 12 different people working for whatever your personnel department looks like on the same page, moving in the same direction, working in concert with one another. those are the sides of this that I didn't appreciate enough until you actually start talking to people who do these jobs. And I just think that as we sit here over the next week, 10 days, two weeks, if your team needs a GM and you're looking at the candidates and you're thinking about what they could be in that role, don't just look at how well X team drafted. Don't just look at where the player selections were made. That's not what this is.

That's not what's going to be important here and it's not what should be important here. there's an aspect of that, right? But there's so much more that goes into it. And I just want to keep harping on that because almost just to remind myself that there's so many different layers to the people we're going to put in these positions. And again, it goes back to something you said earlier in our conversation, which is how do you define a position? Because if your general manager is sort of, and I use this word uncomfortably because I don't like discussing people in terms of seniority. I mean, you're all on a team, and if you're all teammates working for the same business, that's what you are, your teammates.

But if your general manager is, rather than senior most, let me use the word sort of overseeing the most. If your GM is overseeing your entire football operation, that's a huge responsibility. If you divide it separately and say to the GM, you know what, I want you entirely talent-focused, oversee the scouts, oversee the draft process, trades. free agent signing, but I've got someone else to handle all of the business, the salary cat management, the football ops. That's a different structure than if you say to the GM, you've got to handle all of that. So a lot of it goes back to where we started this conversation. How to each of

the 32 teams define the role? Yeah. It's a fascinating topic. It's a fascinating consideration. I am going to be paying a lot of attention to it here over the next week or so, next two weeks or so, as all of the different candidates are announced for the Bears GM, for all of these jobs that have come open. Amy, thank you very, very much for your perspective on this. I sincerely appreciate the time.

Well, I appreciate that you invited me to join you, and it's just a terrific conversation. You asked great thought-provoking questions. Just a lot of fun to talk about it with you. All right. Now I really wanted to get, as part of this conversation,

perspective from someone who played, someone who was in the league, has been in locker rooms, has had to deal with NFL head coaches, on a day-to-day basis for a huge portion of his life. Also, while trying to get on someone that I can't believe we have not had him on the podcast yet. So two birds, one stone. I'm very excited to welcome ESPN's own, Dominique Foxworth. Dominic, thank you very, very much for doing this. I really appreciate it. No problem. Thanks for having me.

Absolutely. So I want to start just with a big picture question for you. As you're looking at the process that organizations follow as they look for in higher head coaches, what do you think is the biggest mistake that teams make as part of that process the way it currently exists. Yeah, I mean, honestly, it feels kind of like a crapshoot because we talk about this often, or I did a bunch when like I was considering like a different path professionally where I was actually looking at some executive roles. And often if you hear about hiring people, you always hire, you want to hire someone who has shown an ability or propensity to do the things that the job is going to require.

And unfortunately or fortunately, I don't know how you look at it, but being a head coach is a unique job. And there aren't like being a coordinator is kind of the stepping stone. But the things that are required for a coordinator are not the same things. Like things that you have to be good at to be an effective coordinator are not the same things that you have to be good at to be an effective head coach. And there's lots of different ways to be an effective head coach. But one thing that always pops out in my mind is that all,

your offensive or defensive acumen can be replaced. Like you can hire someone else to do that job. But the kind of marshalling of the team's culture is the kind of one job that I feel like no one else can do, no one else is positioned to do in the same way that a head coach is. So I think that's what it boils down to is there's no way to test that because no one else has had an opportunity to do it. You can look and see other guys who've done it before. But if you're trying to find a new person, like you can't look at their team and figure out how well they are, how well they do that job because they've never done it. And many of them, I think, don't know that they have to do it going forward. It's all of those points are fascinating. And I want to dig into like each of them individually. So the word culture, just in general. I mean, one of my questions here was what is culture? How do you build it? How do you do it? Like that to me is like the kind of the holy grail golden answer here. Right. So the way that I define culture is.

like organizational, acceptable, like behaviors and practices. Like that is the culture. So you think about the culture and your family. There are some places where it's like, all right, we're a type of family that wakes up at 6 in the morning and we all get our workout in and we all eat breakfast. We don't drink. We're like a disciplined family.

Like that to me feels like culture. And there's organizations that thrive on creativity and you wonder how they're able to come up with all of these new innovations every so often. And it's because the culture encourages those sorts of things. I like to think about it as like evolution in many ways. Whereas the environment around you or any animal, like it is conducive for certain things to survive. That's how giraffs get long necks or whatever like that.

Essentially is like a way that I think about culture is that you create an environment that encourages certain types of people and certain types of behaviors. and that is how you establish the culture. The tough thing I think about coming in and everyone talks about culture, we're going to bring in this culture. That's the first line of every new head culture, change the culture. We're going to be this kind of culture.

I think the mistake that a lot of them make is the belief that you can instill a culture. Culture, like, inherent in the word, is to cultivate. It's not something that you can install. It's not something that you can bring with you. It's not something that you leave behind. It's something that exists in an organization. Even if you aren't deliberate and big,

building a culture, a culture will develop. And when you arrive at an organization, you're one new head coach. There are more people remaining than there are people that you bring in, even if you bring in a whole new staff. So that culture still exists. And I think that that's another mistake that coaches make is that they come in and they want to be still a term from my man, Dan Arlowski, is they want to be Timmy Tough Nuts. And they think that, all right, we're going to install the culture. This is the culture. No, there is a culture that exists.

and if you think about it as like a color spectrum, like let's say you get there and the culture is green. You're not going to make the culture red overnight. Like you have to move it in a reasonable direction. I don't know what's closer. Like you go to blue or something or greenish blue. I'm not familiar with the color spectrum. But you get the point.

You get the point is that you can't just come in and show up and like, this is how shit is. This is how we're going to do it. Like that to me doesn't work. It's more effective. You have a better chance of doing that if you have a track record. So Bill Belichick moves to another team or Tom Brady is a perfect example. Go somewhere else.

Yes, a culture can move and change quickly because they're like, oh, this guy, we respect. This guy comes with cash. That's why it's funny when you hear guys like Joe Judge as an example. I remember his first press press conference was like, yeah, culture, culture, culture, tough guys, we're going to, we're the type of team does this, does this, does that. Like you've got like three years of coaching experience and no real impressive things on your So you have to like earn that. I think, yeah, I don't know.

I get to rambling on this thing because it's something I think a lot about. I find incredibly interesting, but like no one else does. So we really get to talk about it. Because nobody, yeah, I guess like in the general sports media, like I'm going to get up. They're not going to give me 30 minutes to break down culture. That's all. So I and I, this stuff is fascinating to me because I'm so curious about like that. Like how do you change the color?

How fast can it happen? And what ways do you do it? What are the most important tenets of this? I've talked with coaches and DMs and people about this because I'm endlessly interested in it because I think it's so, so hard to define. So if you were trying to think of, all right, even if it's incremental ways, you can change the culture, whether it's a head coach, an executive, whoever, what do you think are the pillars of a culture that you would try to build from scratch, even if we concede one already exists in some form? Yeah, well, I think that's the hard part about answering that question is I think you need to understand the one that exists first. first, you know, before you can build on it. But I do think, let's assume that I'm Bill Belichick or someone who has the type of resume that I can go and throw my weight around and people

are going to fall in line. I think that the first thing you need to decide is what's important to you. You work backwards from what's important to you. And you find out what's important to you and then you work to find the behaviors that emphasize those things. The most valuable thing that you can have because it's not basketball and that there is a 12-man roster and the culture is kind of defined by the best player. But in this, it's a 53 man roster. And like, you are siloed in your position group. Like those are your friends, those who you hang out with. And you also have a family and whatever. So like they're like it's a really tough thing to build and control the culture. So I think another incredibly important thing is you got to win over

the team leaders. Like you need the same way that in a basketball team, you need the head coach and a star player to be aligned. You need the head coach. And, the respected guys in every position. It has to be multiple positions, too. It has to be all over the field to be aligned because it's not hard to have fissures in a football team, which doesn't mean you automatically can't succeed. But when you're on those teams, I've been on teams that have been really good on defense and have a quarterback who turns the ball over a lot.

If you don't have a strong culture, those divides kind of pop up. And to the other point about like developing cultures, it's something that you have to like continue to cultivate once it exists is you can't let it like there are new people coming in there are people going out there's like complacency sets and there's a bunch of different things that happen and you have to be like deliberate and conscious of it and to the point of getting the buy in it's like you need them to police themselves i remember when i first got to um to baltimore it was harbaugh's second year and i remember he said something that came across is really stupid to all of us in the team meeting but it made sense he was kind of

of advocating for snitching. And it was like the way they delivered it was really like clumsy and weird. But the point was like, I'm not going to be there. Like, do you want this? Do you care about this? Are you here for X, Y, and Z? Like, I can't control you. Like, when you're in the weight room, if you're the guy, like, we have workouts

kind of laid out for us throughout the week, two times a week during the season. And there's like two strength coaches and 50 of us. are you the guy who goes in there and like ducks and dodges a couple sets because the strength coach can't keep up or are you the guy that's like hey you better get to your last set like that's a small thing that probably isn't impactful but it's a kind of culture thing it's the type of team that you're on it you hear about like nick saibing teams at Alabama doing this a lot where we give a lot of credit to nick saving but those guys come in and they know what's important to them and so often they bring back successful guys to

help remind them like this is who we are this is who we're going to be what elements and they've been able to do such a great job of just kind of continuing this thing we talked about it on last night show like the ability to go from newsome straight to de costa what john harbaugh has been there it's just this competency machine in a way that so many other franchises fail to do it what would you say outside of that example were kind of the tenets of the culture that existed there it was an interesting culture but i do think think when I got there, there were strong personalities there. Like, it was Ed, it was Suggs, it was Ray, like most of them on the defensive side of the

ball. There were strong personalities, and there was a desire to impress them. And it felt like in, not only impressed them, but like fall in line. So like they had that respect that we talk about that you need. And I also believe that they brought a lot of the, like Miami, like the, the early 2000's Miami culture where it was very much like it felt like team player run teams and it wasn't there was not a culture so like there was things there were things that we would practice that I guarantee you most head coaches would lose their mind about so like if we catch an

interception and practice we're pitching we're trying to score like we're practicing that that's a thing that we're practicing that I was like shocks and so that's like there's no one way to have a culture but we're practicing in that not because like the feeling didn't come across like, man, this is fun. This is like play. Let's have a good time. Let's practice all this stuff. It's like, no, we're practicing it because like we believe that we could be good at it and it was something another way to give us an edge. And that was the mentality where it was also like every week we'd, all the DBs would meet at one DB's house to watch film away from everybody else. It was just like, and I don't know how much we picked up from that, but it was a mindset where it felt like we didn't need a curfew when we were away on

in hotels, whereas all teams kind of have a curfew. It really felt like if somebody knew you were out, if somebody knew you weren't taking it, like you felt that you were letting your team down. And I think that starts with Ozzy. He's the guy who kind of instilled it from the start. But it was a lot of like respect and expectations. Like we had respect for each other so much so that it wasn't a ton of like yelling

and degrading and whatever. But it was because you had expectations of each other to live up to it. When I went to Green Bay, a couple years ago, the first year the little fluid was there. I remember a story about kind of why things were different there. I remember talking to guys there, and it was little stuff, right? The fact that they could pick the music at practice, when it used to be all oldies that would be on a set playlist Mike McCarthy would make.

And they had a system where you could request songs, and that's how they would make the playlist for practice. They changed kind of the ways that meeting rooms were decorated, where it was all these older pictures of legendary players in black and white replaced by photos of current players. a linebacker there told me that they, over the course of McCarthy's last two to three years, had met as a defense outside of the building maybe twice. And during Lafleur's first year there, they met weekly. Offense, defense, whoever.

The tone of things had changed there. And I think a big part of it was the tenor that Lafleur sat when he got in there. Is that shit real? Does that shit matter? Yeah. I mean, I think it matters. It sounds like I'm waffirce. But no, I believe that it 100% matters.

But I think it matters that how the players receive it. I don't think it works to come in and kind of put your foot down and like, this is how things are going to be. Not with grown men in the NFL. And again, unless you have some track record that demands respect in which case, you don't have to do that. Guys are coming up to, I promise you guys were coming up to Tom Brady and wanting to know the things that they can do to be more like him.

So I don't think that works necessarily, but you never get a second chance to make a first impression. It's like a real thing. So yes, I think it does matter that you come in with certain expectations. But being flexible and respecting people matters too. And I think it matters more now than ever. It feels like while we're far from like some sort of level playing field where players and management have the same amount of power. But it feels like we players have more power and influence than they ever have like starting in college. and probably even earlier than that, all the way through the NFL.

So coming in and acting like you are the big boss man, I think is more likely to backfire than it is to benefit you. But I do think that you need to come in and be serious about the things that are important to you and be flexible. So like music is a perfect example or phones, like the phone policy. I remember the thing you're talking about away from when I first got to Denver, where I first got drafted, once a week we'd have. an entire defense dinner. And it was like a thing that was weird. I hated it in part because

the rookies had to pay sometimes. So that was like annoying, especially on my third round salary the one time I had to pay. It still still breaks my heart. Where was it? Do you remember? Yeah, it was 15,000, which was equivalent to my my check. So I played for free one week. But that stuff, I do think it matters. And when you're young, you don't think it matters. You're like, all right, he's got to play. But having a level of comfort and having those like water cooler conversations, because we're at dinner. We're not talking football, but sometimes it comes up.

Sometimes anticipating particular routes or ways to communicate, like those things come up. And it makes it easier when you have that relationship and you get to know someone away from the field. You played for John Harbaugh and Mike Shanahan, two guys that have been successful. Mike Smith in between. And Mike Smith in between. Yeah. What would you say is the biggest difference between how you would define culture on a Mike Shanahan team and a John Harbaugh team or in those organizations? I mean, that's a tough question. I do feel like there was a difference in that the Mike Shanahan was the centerpiece.

It felt like when I got there. And he was the kind of arbiter of the team. And that felt different in Baltimore. where it which I honestly like they were both successful teams they're both really well run organizations I got lucky in in those cases but I do feel like the the Ravens culture was more player generated and player focus and and I don't think that not I don't think I know that John Harbaugh would not have instilled had he had it his way a culture that was as loose and kind of fun as what we had in Baltimore. But he understood that it was effective and he was going to build around it. I know he was hired to as like an answer to Brian Billick, who people kind of

considered a players coach. And I think that things probably did get a little bit tighter. I wasn't there for the transition, but things probably did get a little bit tighter when he showed up as opposed to when Billick was there. But in general, it was a very loose culture. There weren't a lot of mistakes because there was a respect for each other to be prepared. But like the amount of fun and I remember we would do anytime something that happened to me, anytime someone knew came on the team, you like introduce yourself at a team meeting and they would, everyone would yell, let's give him a him. And then everyone go him.

Fuck him. Like that was the first, that was your introduction to every player coach no matter who showed up. And it was always that type of culture. Well, it was a fun thing to be around. fun thing to be a part of. And it was a blunt culture. Like I, I wasn't my first year there, the first several games were not good for me personally. They came right to me. It's like, look, this shit ain't going to cut it. Like, and that's like, it's just the way it was. And you

would come and sit down and like, they're going to work with you. Nobody's trying to hurt your feelings, but like, this shit ain't going to cut it. And it was very straight and direct. It was very different in Denver. While I, I got traded. And, And it came completely out of nowhere. It wasn't like something that I was being talked to about or like, hey, you might move on. It was whatever. But it was just a different kind of. It felt top down and insular almost as opposed to like what felt more like a Democrat, closer Democratic in Baltimore.

It feels like over the last five to seven years especially with the implementation of how aggressive they've been in some of their decision making, how analytics driven elements of the organization. are, the willingness to pivot so thoroughly to what Lamar does well, that there's like an intellectual openness with the way the organization operates. Could you sense that as a player even? Yeah. I mean, they're there. And again, I hate to keep harping on the same thing, but the players were involved in game plan. You know, like, I wasn't at that level, but like the guys who were at that level, we're involved in the game plan. And they'd ask like in the team meeting. So the coaches would make the game plan. They give us to give it to us on Monday. And in those meetings, we'll be in a DB meeting. It's like if the guys feel uneasy about something, which like if one

or two guys at the bottom of the roster do, that's one thing. But if it bubbles up to the top, then it gets changed. Like that's a and like going into the game plan, I imagine some guys were involved in putting it together. Like that's a level of. of collaboration and flexibility that I didn't, I didn't experience elsewhere. However, I will say in Denver, there was some flexibility. I know we had some injuries on our front in Denver, my rookie year. And we went from playing like a cover four style defense to pretty much zero pressure every third down.

And we ended up having success. And that was like, it changed the technique that we're playing with. Like, that was a flexibility. I think that is like the, the defining characteristic, I think, of the long-term successful teams in the modern NFL. And players, too, frankly, is like that flexibility and that versatility is something that that is like, it lives in your culture. Like, just to say, we can change from here to there. Like, no, you have to have a culture that supports that. and is ready to do that.

And I think that's one of the Belichick things, why he is always focused on, like, mid-tier veterans. He's not going after big money-free agents. He's going after, like, guys I can trust and guys that are versatile. It feels like, and this is a buzz term used by front offices around the NFL, but, like, growth mindset is a big thing. You hear that term thrown around a lot with coaches and GMs. And it manifests in interesting ways, right?

Like, there are some staffs where they'll have their assistance interview for whatever their promotion would be. They'll take them through that entire process. Like, where do you want to go? There are cultures created where there's a lot of challenging ideas on purpose. It's like, let me lay this all out. Why is this wrong? So that's kind of what it feels like.

And the Patriots are kind of a quieter example of that, right? How they cross-train assistance, just kind of always trying to push in these small ways and having that openness and flexibility for trying to tap into like a through line between some of these teams. That does feel like a commonality between them. Yeah, I mean, it goes back to the evolution example that I made. at the beginning is you're testing them. You're trying to see if their neck is long enough to reach the leaves at the top

or you're encouraging them to stretch their neck in that way. Like that's what it feels like to me is you'll find out who this guy is and you might need it. Like you never know when those things are going to come up. You might need, he might need those skills at a certain point. And I also think that a culture, an effective culture and like sustainable culture, like it comes down to people. and we focus so much on X's and O's,

but people are more emotional than they are rational generally. Like most people are more driven by how they feel, how something makes them feel than they are about, like, the actual analysis in a situation. And giving people more and more challenges, giving them more and more responsibility, challenging them. Like it leads to someone who has a more flexible mind and someone who's also like more satisfied in their role.

And that means that they are, happier. They're not sitting at their locker or sitting in our office bishing about how, like, there's nowhere, there's nowhere else for them to go. There's nothing else for them to do. This is a dead-in opportunity and X, Y, and Z doesn't respect me. Like, that to me matters too. It's interesting because John Harbaugh comes from a very different place than a lot of head coaches, right? Being a special team's coordinator. And it just feels like the archetypes of coaches we look for, like you mentioned, is kind of wrong from the start because the skill sets are different. So if you were in a head coach interview, if you were the one making these sorts of decisions,

what would be like the first two or three questions you would want to ask a prospective head coach? That's a tough one. First two or three questions. I don't know. I mean, I think I would try to find examples, try to get them to show examples of that type of flexibility and growth mindset. And also ask them straightforward as like, can you define the type of? of culture that you will want to create here. Like those are the things more open-ended and less specific questions and let them take me to

to where they think is important, which is like, I think it also, that culture stuff like matters above the coach too. If you're the general manager or you're the owner, like coming in, like, this is the answer I want is a bad thing to do if you're trying to create an organization that is flexible. So like I would try to give as much room as possible to find out from them what mindset they brought in there. So, like, I'd be, I'd be a bit trepidacious if I'm like, if I ask them something open-ended, like, what do you think is most important? Or what are you excited about? Something like that. And they come in with some elaborate scheme. All right. Yeah, like, that's great. And maybe that

works for a year. But you're not the smartest man than the NFL. Like, you're not going to be able to out coach everybody. And no matter how talented our roster is, we're not going to be able to out talent everybody, even if we're able to for a year. I hope we win a Super Bowl that year because the following year, everybody is going to have stolen what we have done, what we do, or taking our players off our roster. Those are things that are not sustainable in the same way that culture is sustainable. When you see the Steelers and the Ravens are some of the best examples of that, they have not had good teams in the last couple of seasons as far as injuries are concerned, a roster construction is concerned. But somehow they maintain a level of consistency that,

like, you can't point at it, you can't point to anything in particular. It has to be the culture that creates that. It's not, because they're not going to out draft every year. Like, you're just not going to do it. And you're not going to out coach, out scheme everybody every year. So it's something else. It's funny talking about how you can't want an answer. When you ask that question, you can't want an answer as a GM or an owner or whoever. And I feel like that's when these teams that are really considering where we need to go, like the teams like Chicago, in my opinion, that need to take like long looks in the mirror.

After that old Cruz anecdote a couple days ago where they offered him a job making 15 bucks an hour to be an assistant. It's like this is the type of stuff. I want to ask a coach, what do we need to change? What do you think it needs to change here? The antidote that I come back to is Sean Payton when he got to New Orleans. The story is that the ways that they used to even separate players in hotel rooms and how much they used to pay for assistant coach hotel rooms and all that stuff, that's the type of stuff he wanted to change.

And that to me feels like the hard questions that need to be answered in moments like this. It's how far are you going to go to kind of change the actual fundamental aspects of who we are as an organization within reason, like you said. You can't change it overnight. But it's stuff like that that that I feel. like I'm more attuned to now than I probably was five years ago. Yeah. And I think this also comes with age because this is the stuff that I would have thought was dumb when I was 25. Yeah. Exactly. You know what I mean? Like if someone would have told me like the hotel room matters like,

what? Get us better players. Draw up some better things. And like maybe the hotel room like matters a quarter of a percentage point in the grand scheme of things. Obviously having T.J. Watt is more important than having the proper hotel room configuration. But it does matter and it's something that we can change. And there's no offensive tackle trying to block our hotel rooms. You know, so like let's get the advantages. If we think that's an advantage, you get the advantages that we can get without, yeah, without having, before we even get to the field and the actual hard stuff, let's fix the easy stuff first. If that's something that we want to fix, because I mean, I don't know. It seems like you have to start on those things before you can get to the other things. But again, if I was going in to be interviewed, like you asked what questions I would ask. If I was being asked that question, I'd be hesitant because like I have to be honest, I don't know what's wrong. Like I need to talk. Like just what we see on Sunday, you're worried about those results and everyone knows like process of a result. It's a cute thing to say and people. But like, yeah, if I don't know the processes, then I can't.

tell you how to fix the results. Yeah, it's one of those things that I think challenging your own biases and preferences in these moments is really important. And for years, I've said this, and I still believe it. I think that if I were starting something from scratch, I think that having that play-calling offensive head coach in the mold of a Sean Payton or an Andy Reed or Sean McVeigh, whoever, Kyle Shanahan, is the easiest way to sustain success in the league because offense is sticky, right?

Like, it's just having a good offense every year is the easiest way to be good. But I think if you look at organizations like Pittsburgh, like Baltimore, to a certain extent, like New England, it's impossible to deny how consistent they've been. It's harder to win nine or ten games a year for ten years than it is to win 14 games in a Super Bowl once. So I just, I keep sitting there thinking and looking at those things and be like, what is it? Like, what can you tap into from those teams as you try to remake your own? And I don't know the exact answer, but I really, really want to know what it is. Yeah, I mean, if it was an easy answer, people would jump on it. But I do think it's about organizational alignment.

And that's one of those things that's really hard to get going. But once you get it going, like it's a snowball, it's also hard to stop. And sometimes it backfires and that's okay. Like I think back to a couple years ago when the Steelers lost Ben Rothersberger and we all thought it was a lost season and they had, they were going to have a high first round pick and they could try to get the quarterback of the future. And in that moment, they chose to trade away their first round pick for Minka Fitzpatrick. And like, in that moment, I'm like, this is stupid.

Yeah. But then I step back and I look at the big picture. And it's like, no, this is the culture that they want to build. It's not even the culture we want to build. It's what they sincerely believe. We don't give up. Like, we fight. We have faith in you guys.

And that's what we're, and that's who we are. And like that, at that moment, maybe they be in a better position quarterback wise. But making a different choice, I think Colbert made the choice. choice that aligned with the culture. And that's, I think that's a hard thing to do too is when you have these really pivotal decisions is you want to make the right decision. You want to make the best decision for the short term and the long term. But sometimes those things don't align. And you have to make the decision that aligns most with your team culture. And when you have the security that Colbert has, security that Mike Tomlin has, you can do stuff like that. And you don't have that

security elsewhere, you can't do stuff like that. So it's, it's hard. I think that speaks to like, it's really difficult when you have, when you know the leash is so short too. It's like, I need to get results. What is going to get me the results? Or I need to give them a reason to keep me, which is not always the best thing for when the, the timelines aren't aligned for the coach and the GM and the organization. It leads to some really bad decisions. Part of reason why a job is so damn hard. Even keeping the defense engaged through that season is like such a quietly impressive thing to have you know how hard it is to have an offense that can't move the ball and not just a good defense but the best defense in the league like it just it even like

human nature creeps in like it's so hard to play that hard and to care that much when the other side of the ball is completely a zero like that is a testament to what they have there it's a small thing, but it's a big thing. When I was on those Ravens teams, that was why we pitched a ball in practice. You got a fumble, you pitched it or you got to intercept, you pitched it. All jokes aside, like, we had a second year quarterback in Joe Flacco

who was like showing some promise, but I remember in being in games, they're like, hey, they ain't going to score, that means we have to. It's like, all right, that's a mindset, whereas on different teams, it's like, they ain't going to school, fuck them, and we're mad. You see the helmet behind me?

I'm very aware with that mindset and you need to bring that into a game with certain offenses. So I get you. Dominique, I really appreciate this. There's so much to chew on. I just think it's, again, it's a fascinating subject and there's so many different ways we can go with it. I sincerely appreciate your perspective.

It's always great to chat with you, man. No problem. All right. I'm thrilled now to welcome Packers defensive coordinator, long time NFL assistant, more than two decades on NFL staff, which is why we wanted to chat with him about this. Joe Barry. Joe, thank you very much for taking the time. do this. Absolutely. Fired up to be here. So in training camp, you and I sat down in the dungeon-like

interview room below Lambo Field where I've had many conversations in my life. And we were talking about just some wide-arranging schematic stuff. But over the course of that conversation, you mentioned something that had kind of stuck with me since, which is why I wanted to chat with you about this. And you were just talking about your time as an assistant in the league. And you mentioned that there were three guys that when you met them and started working closely with them, you could just kind of tell they were a little bit different. The three guys that you said to me were Mike Tomlin, Sean McVeigh, and Brandon Staley, with whom you'd worked with all of them as an assistant

when they were assistants over the last 20 years or so. And I just, it stuck with me because I was so curious about that. And I'm, I feel like it's kind of a wholly grow question of what are these linking features between these guys who are really, really good coaches? How do we identify that? So just on a broad level, if you were trying to do that, if you were trying to connect the between those three guys. What do you think the similarities are about what initially stood out to you?

Well, I think first and foremost with all three of those guys. And, you know, I told you the story that I knew with all three of them, you know, within probably the, you know, the first 10 days or two weeks. Because with all three of those guys before going into the work environment that we were in where we were working together. I didn't know them before. I didn't have relationships with them before. So, you know, I came to this conclusion with all three of them within the very quick

timeline that these guys are incredibly special and unique. And I think if I had, you know, you asked the question, if you had to narrow it to one feature, I think all three of them are incredibly smart. They're, you know, you hear about that all the time with people, you know, do they have, you know, how can they remember things so well? Like with Sean, people always, you know, you know, they're in the media. It's always talked about that he has a photographic memory, you know. Now, I don't know if, you know, if he was scientifically studied, does he?

but he's just able to recall things so effortlessly. And I think that just goes to, he's incredibly sharp. He's incredibly smart. But I think you could say that with obviously with Mike, Sean and Brandon. And as I got to know them and as I, you know, I worked with Mike for seven years. I worked with Sean for six years. You know, I only worked with Brandon for one year. but I think that's what would and I think that's hard in sometimes in the in the interview process,

especially when you're trying to find head coaches because, you know, I would assume, I mean, I have never gone through it, but I would assume that the people that go about trying to find these candidates for owners to hire, you know, it's, you don't, you don't have a lot of time on your hands where you can, you know, really get to, like I said, you know, I knew within the first, you know, two weeks of working with someone, but that's still a lot more than a three-hour interview. Sure. And that's my point. You know, it's hard. So, but I know for a fact that that's, that those three guys, I knew within a week of getting to know them and work with them that I'm like, you know, you talk about that it factor, whatever that it factor is, all three of them had it. And with my, I mean, obviously

when these guys stand in front of a room, whether at a press conference, you can kind of tell the type of communicators there. They have command. I remember having a conversation with head coach last year and we were talking about what those traits should be. And that's the first word he mentioned to me. It was command of the room. And when you're the boss, it's easier to see that. But when you started working with Mike when he was the defensive backs coach, right? Just another position coach on staff. So how do you, with him specifically, how did you sense that it factor early on? Well, I think a little bit of it was also the fact that we were, we were so young at the time, you know, when we got when tony dungy hired us you know mike was 28 years old he was replacing herm edwards

um i was 29 years old i was replacing levy smith um so and i was you know very arrogant and cocky and confident back in my youth um and you know i thought i thought i was pretty special and like i said here's mike who was you know a year younger than me. You know, I had been in, you know, I'd been in the league for two years. Mike, we hired from college. We hired from the University of Cincinnati. So I thought, you know, I was going to have to be like, okay, you know, I've been in the league for two years. I'm a year older than I'm going to have to kind of show them, you know, show them the ropes. And like I said, within two weeks, I was like, this dude is special. This guy's different. And like I said, we hadn't even, you know,

I hadn't even seen him, you know, this was in, you know, February and March when we got hired. We were just, you know, coming together and learning the system and learning the defense down in Tampa. We hadn't even, you know, done anything as far as had a meeting with the players. So I hadn't seen him even interact with players yet. It just, it just, it was a no-brainer. I knew right away. I was like, this guy is, is incredibly special. Was it the way that he saw things, the way that he communicated things?

Was it ideas that he was bringing to the table? What jumped out to you? I think all of the above, you know, I think it was just, I think when people do have, again, you always say that it factor, that it factor can be, you know, it could be 10 different things. But he had all those qualities. You know, it was the same thing when I got hired in Washington, you know, you know, Sean was, shoot, Sean might have been 27 or 28 at the time. And it was the same thing.

It was just, you know, just the way they're able to interact with people, the way they're able to lead people, the way they're, you know, again, their recall, their knowledge. It's just when people have it, they have it. And, you know, like I said, Brandon was the same way. I knew instantly working with Brandon. I'm like, holy cow, I'm getting the same feelings with this guy, just knowing him, getting to meet him the same way I felt about Mike, you know, 15 years ago, the same way I felt

about Sean six years ago when I first met them. You know, you know it when those guys have those qualities. You said something about both Brandon and Sean that I found really interesting. And this has been talked about with Sean before, but I would love to kind of dig into it a little bit more. Just this idea of not seeing the game through a keyhole where you have a certain background as an offensive or defensive coach and even as a position coach, right? Sean was a tight ends coach, which kind of is a unique background on its own. But if you're an offensive line coach, you see the game like an offensive line coach. If you're a receiver's coach, you typically tend to see the game as a receiver's coach. Some of the best coaches, though, see not only every position on the offense, but understand

the defense and how it all fits together. How did you see Sean's natural curiosity play into his success as a coach by studying and understanding those things? Yeah, I mean, I think another thing, too, that goes with, I mean, all three of those guys are incredibly smart, as we've as we've said. But I think the work ethic and the grinder mentality that all three of those guys have, you know, a lot of times I think people just assume that, oh, they're so smart, it comes so easy for them. Well, I really do think it is easy for those guys in the sense that they're sharp.

They're able to pick up concepts. They're able to see things. but by no means does that mean that I mean those three guys the it factor the intelligence but all three of those guys might be three of the hardest working guys that I've ever been around as far as studying and game planning and turning over rocks to find new ideas and new thoughts and look at things differently I think all three of those guys are incredibly the same in that sense that they're tiredless when, I mean, Sean especially. I mean, Sean's in the office every day at 4 a.m.

I mean, and it's not it's not just one of those things. Okay, year one, I'm going to do this to set the tone. You know, every day that I worked with the guy, which was, you know, six years, two years in Washington and then four in L.A. I mean, it was it was the same way, same thing every single day. So I think the work ethic obviously can never go unnoticed or unmentioned when you're talking about these guys. Because like I said, a lot of times people just think, oh, they're incredibly smart and incredibly gifted. It comes easy for them.

It does, but they also are freaking grinders, man. With Sean especially, I think the idea of him understanding defensive rules and how to kind of manipulate them. How much time would he spend with you guys just talking about that kind of stuff? What were those conversations like? Did you have set times to do it? I'm always wondering how a coach from one side of the ball goes about really understanding the other side. Yeah, that's the thing I think that was, that's where Sean and I really got to be close and really forged the relationship that we have right now is that when I got hired in Washington, you know, I thought it was very cool that, you know, not only was he the defense coordinator, I was the defensive coordinator, but. we had such a football friendly relationship where we were always talking football together.

And I think he was, he loved just, you know, all of his questions were loaded in the sense that, you know, everything was, hey, I want to get a leg up on defenses. So I want to, I want to enter your brain. But I think that's just what makes him so special is that he was always thinking, of, you know, sometimes offensive coaches just think of offensive plays. Hey, I'm going to put this play in. Hey, I'm going to put this run scheme in. Hey, I'm going to put this pass concept in.

But Sean kind of always looked at the counter. He wanted to know, hey, if I do this motion, how does that affect, you know, defensively? How does that affect how you guys adjust to it? So he always took that approach on how can I manipulate the defense. Then I'll put the play in to attack the defense. but, you know, which I think is what makes Sean so special is that he not only is incredibly, you know, Sean was a quarterback, you know, he was a high school quarterback. So, I mean, he always has that, his brains wired that way.

But I think the thing that really makes Sean special from a play caller standpoint is that he's not just throwing plays together. He's throwing plays together to attack defense. So he's always trying to, he's very inquisitive. with all the defensive coaches on his staff that he was always asking, well, if I line up in this split, what does that mean? How is the corner going to change his alignment? Or if I get this split between a guard and a tackle, how is that going to affect the three technique?

That's just how his brain works. So he's going to want to know the inner workings of how that defense is. Then he devised the play. And I think that's what makes him the play caller that he is. It's so funny because when you, I think during your time in Tampa, I remember Monty Kiffin told me a story about how when Kyle Shanahan first got there in Tampa as a really young assistant. Sure. He was our quality control. Yeah, and defense, right?

So he would sit in defensive meetings. And well, no, Kyle was actually, he was John. He was our offensive quality control. But usually just again, you know, and I only worked with Kyle those two years and he was a, but. you know, Kyle can be very easily put into this, this conversation because just to show you the type of guy that Kyle was, now granted, he grew up in it, you know, he was arounded his whole life with his father, but whenever Kyle would have, you know, an hour of time, which when you're a quality control working for John Gruden, you know, you don't have a lot of free time on your

hands. But Kyle would do that. We'd find ourselves all the time. Like I'd be coaching the linebackers and I'd be in a linebacker meeting, and I'd look in the back of my meeting room, and Kyle would just be sitting there. And he did that all the time. Whenever he had a free moment from, you know, his job, he would go sit in Mike's DB meeting. He would go sit in my linebacker meeting.

He would go sit in Rod Marinelli's D-Line meeting or in Moni's defensive unit meeting, kind of with the same mindset, what Sean was doing. he was trying to, at the time, he was learning defensive football because he knew, okay, as a play caller, I have to learn the defense to be able to know what to implement, to call plays to attack that defense. And that's, that's, you know, that takes, again, with that work ethic thing I was talking about, you know, he very easily could have just,

you know, gone and worked out or, you know, gone in the cafeteria and just, you know, looked on his phone. But instead, hey, the defense is meeting right now. I got, I got 45 minutes. I'm going to go sit in the back in the meeting and try to learn something from the other side of the ball. So pretty special. And it feels like Brandon is similar, but the opposite, right? Where he has said multiple different times that he tries to see defensive football through a quarterback ones.

Well, again, Brandon, you know, college quarterback. You know, Brandon is, Brandon is wired. Brandon is he was brought up as an offensive, you know, as a quarterback. And how does that change the way you see defense? Well, I think it's, I mean, I can't speak on that because I was, you know, I was raised and brought up as, you know, I played linebacker. I'm a defensive guy through and through. And I wish that I had that lens to be able to look at through an offensive mind. And that's probably what I learned the most out of just that one year.

I think I shared this with you back in August. That was, that was, I wish we could have spent more time together. Brandon and I, because I really learned that that's what I learned from him. Not that I could, I can jump into that because, again, I never played quarterback. But that was the coolest thing on the outside that I learned from Brandon is just looking at, you know, as a defensive coach, he looks at it through an offense's lens because, you know, like I said, that's how he's wired. That's how he was brought up. He played the position of quarterback. So he coaches and teaches defense through an offensive lens. And it's, it's,

I think that's why he's, you know, he's as good as he is because, again, he's able to, I can't look through that lens because I didn't, I didn't play that position. I didn't, I didn't play quarterback. I have defensive lenses that I got to look through, which is okay, which most people do. But I think that's same thing with Mike Tomlin. People don't realize Mike, Mike was the receiver. Mike played offense and then became a defensive coach. So I think those guys are able to see defensive football a little differently because they're looking at it through the lens of an offensive mind. Do you as someone, that person is that obviously you didn't work with these guys when they were head coaches. But when you're in a building and you're working

for a head coach that has that quality where there's a curiosity to the way he sees the game, he wants to understand it. He derives enjoyment from the learning process. Can the rest of a staff feel that? Is there a trickle-down effect if that's kind of the overarching mindset that an overall coaching staff has? Oh, yeah. I mean, I think if probably the number one attribute that a staff, that an entire staff has to have, I think is collaboration. And I think that when that starts with the head coach, you know, and then bleeds down through the coordinators to the assistance, I think, you know, when you have great collaboration, it's going to lead to great things. And when it starts at the top, you know, I think, you know, Matt does such a great job here of not only just, you know,

being the head coach or being the offensive coordinator, you know, he is very, very much like Sean that he's, you know, he's talking to defensive coaches. Not, I mean, number one, to get, you know, to have that relationship and have that bond with his defensive coaches, but to also, you know, get that collaboration between, you know, hey, I was thinking about this. If I, if I manipulate Devante's split,

what is that going to do to the safety, you know? I think that that collaboration that you can have as a head coach or a coordinator with your entire staff, I think it leads to great things. Is that not always the case? Have you been places where it's more siloed than that? Yeah. You know, I think it's a lot of the times, you know, everyone just kind of fits into their roles and just marches and does their job. But I think when you can collaborate as an entire staff, offense, defense, special teams, head coach, coordinators assistance. I think when you have that, you know, if you can collaborate between 20 people and, you know, share information and not get feelings hurt and, you know, not really care who gets the credit when someone does come up with a great idea, I think when you have that as a collective

staff. And again, it starts at the top with the head coach. When you have that, it leads to really great things. Awesome. Well, I won't take up any much more of your time. Congratulations on what's been a great season. You guys officially have the buy, which is amazing. Yeah. That's all I got. I really appreciate the time. It's always great to chat with you.

Okay, Robert. Thanks, man. All right, guys, that's all we got today. Thank you so much to Joe Barry. Thank you to Dominique Foxworth. Thank you to Amy Trask. Really enjoy chewing on that. There are so many different ways we could go with that.

I'm sure it'll be an ongoing conversation, honestly, as we see these hires, we see these candidates. It's going to be one of the dominant, subjects in the NFL here over the next couple weeks. We will revisit it as some of these hires happen. So really appreciate you guys taking the time. I will not be back tomorrow. Lindsay is handling the recording tomorrow.

She's going to talk to some of our athletic writers about this topic, about some of the candidates that have emerged, some news around the NFL. So please go check that out. I will be back on Friday with Nate and Sheel, previewing all of the wild card games. Until then, if you guys could rate and review the podcast, I'd really appreciate it.

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Theathletic.com slash football show. Please go check that out. We will be back tomorrow with Lindsay. I will be back on Friday. Until then, I appreciate you guys listening. We'll talk to you later. This was The Athletic Football Show. No.