The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Louis Riddick on how NFL front offices approach free agency + Russell Wilson trade rumors & rule changes with Nate Tice

Episode Date: March 5, 2021

ESPN analyst and Monday Night Football color commentator Louis Riddick joins The Athletic’s Robert Mays to assess free agency through the lens of NFL front offices. Riddick discusses his time as a pro personnel director, the influence coaches have on the process and the importance of relationships in the locker room.Later in the show, Nate Tice talks about his time as a scouting assistant before diving into the Russell Wilson trade rumors. Finally, they examine the Bills and Ravens’ proposed rule changes. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic football show. Welcome to the athletic football show. Really great show for you guys today. Nate Tice is going to be joining us a little bit later. We're going to talk about some of the Russell Wilson rumors, some of the proposed rule changes that came up today from the Bills and the Ravens. A lot of fun stuff that we got to. Before we do that, though, I am absolutely thrilled to welcome ESPN Monday Night Football

Analyst, and for our purposes here, a former pro-personnel director in the NFL at two different organizations, Lewis, how are I, man? I'm good. I'm good. Thanks for having me. Absolutely. So when I was thinking about the ways I wanted to talk about free agency this year, I wanted to try to hit it from as many different angles as possible. It's kind of the benefit of doing three podcasts a week when there aren't any games going on. And one of the things I really wanted to get into was the way that it looks from the team side because even as somebody who covers the league, I just don't think I know as much about it as I should. And I'm sure most general fans don't.

And you're in a unique position to talk about it just because the roles you filled in front offices over the years. So I just kind of wanted to take people through what that process is. When you're a team looking at the landscape and free agency, the players you want to chase, all of that, how do you build the plan? So let's just go back just if we're doing this hypothetically. So for the 2021 class of players, the guys that are about to hit free agency here in a couple weeks, when do you start putting together a list of guys, potential targets, all of that?

I think, you know, as a pro personnel scouting department, you're compiling all that information. And you're basically, you're building your report base on that coming year. year's free agent class all the way back in in the summertime, basically. It's almost the same as college in the sense that, look, you know as soon as, as soon as this free agency period, more or less after the draft is for all intents and purposes over, and you're moving on to the 2021 season. You're already thinking way ahead to the next crop of free agents coming available the next year, which would be 2022.

too. So let's just go back to last year, you know, as you start heading into training camp, in a typical offseason. I mean, obviously last year, a lot of things were thrown into disarray. You're already starting to prepare during the season to look at as a general manager and as a pro personnel department, looking, you know, talking about your director of pro personnel and all his scouts. Who are those guys who are going to be unrestricted? Who are the guys who are going to be restricted who are the guys who are going to be exclusive rights guys who more than likely you know obviously you're not going to have a chance to get unless they're unless they're released and you're starting to look at those positions and really you're you're writing reports and evaluating

all of them you're you're building you're entering all the latest information into your database and then obviously as the season goes along and you're looking at the strengths and weaknesses of your football team you're trying to determine okay based on what our salary cap situation is going to be in that next coming year, what other team salary cap situations are going to be in that next coming year, what other teams are looking for in terms of adding free agents to their football team, who would be the best targets for you going forward? So now once you get into, once the season is over, and you're in early January, you're probably, you're at that point, you're, you are deep into free agency meetings and kind of really whittling down this list as to who is it,

exactly, you know, that we want to retain on our end, who are our free agents, and then who do we want to prioritize that we want to go after once the New League year kicks off? And you basically have a draft board that's just a free agency board. I mean, you're kind of trying to organize these guys and rank these guys, stack these guys, both vertically within their position groups, and then horizontally across all 22 positions. And it's very similar as far as how you would look at the draft. It's just that you're doing it for pre-agency. And then once the new league gear kicks off, well, actually, once the tampering period kicks off, a lot of the stuff is already done anyway. I mean, that's really how, that's really how you go into it. I mean, and so it's a

year-long process. I think everyone's philosophy is different as far as once you're able to really officially legally start talking with agents and talking parameters of contracts. I think Everyone kind of has their targets, knows what they're willing to spend, what they don't want to spend, what their philosophy is going to be as far as do we want to be in this first 24, 48-hour window where, you know, the players typically have the leverage and the biggest money is spent? Do we want to sit out and wait for the second wave of free agency to hit? Do we really want to go bargain basement shopping here later on in the pre-agency? You know, as the draft approaches and after the draft, everyone looks at it much different. It's pretty wild because I've always been involved with it, you know, in my experiences where the people who are making, you know, final decisions both in Washington and Philadelphia were very, very, very active right from the get go. So even back into the summer, they were a part of the process.

I'm talking about when it came time to actually start talking to agents. Gotcha. And trying to get deals done. I mean, in Washington, as you know, in the early 2000. we made we made all the headlines every year and then you were there in 2011 in philly too right exactly the dream year yeah yeah that was coming out of the lockout yep and it was i mean it was super wild that year because i mean we were signing i'll tell you what i was finding out we were signing people as i saw them coming out of the training facility up there in lehigh in death

MPA and I'm going, oh, we signed him too. Oh, we signed him too. Oh, we got, I found out we got that Nam D. Awesome was signed as I saw him walking out of the building for practice. That's how I mean, that's how much decision makers at that time were just going all while. And it usually doesn't, it usually doesn't lead to a lot of success when you are that active, that early across the board and free agency because there's a lot of pitfalls that come

along with building your football team that way. So when you, I'm curious, the list that you guys would start building in the previous fall in the summer and when you were thinking about targets and thinking about needs, how accurate was your assessment of the needs you would have in the winter and spring all the way back in the summer? How often would that picture change for you? Yeah, I mean, that's a great point. I mean, a lot of times, look, and, you know, your needs today don't necessarily match up

with your needs could be tomorrow. So you're trying me, but that's the business you're in. You're in the business of projecting. And you may have to make a left turn from where you thought you were going to head, the road you were going to head down based on what happens to your football team. Or rather based, or, you know, from an injury and availability perspective, or what happens from a performance perspective, meaning you thought you were going to be strong in one area and you're not.

You didn't think you were going to be very strong in an area and you wind up developing some players and or getting some guys during the regular season, either from another team of practice squad or before the trade deadline that just totally outperformed your expectations. You always have to be flexible. But I think by and large, you kind of have a good idea about where you're going to head once that new league year kicks off and the pre-agency frenzy starts. And, I mean, again, you're not going to bat a thousand. it's not going to always pan out exactly the way you want because if we could predict, you know, human behavior and human performance, you know, with that kind of batting average, then we'd all be doing a lot more lucrative things than being scouts at that time.

But that's part of it. That's part of it. But yeah, you need it to be light on your feet. And I think, you know what, that's why you didn't just spend time evaluating those positions of need and or those guys who were your premium targets. that's why you evaluate everyone that's a free agent. That's why as a pro personnel department, you evaluate everyone in the NFL every year because you don't know when someone's going to unexpectedly pop up as being available.

And you don't know when your needs are going to change. And then you're trying to play catch up as far as, well, what exactly is this guy like? I haven't looked at him in two or three years. And you're behind the eight ball. I mean, time to decision, time to, the time it takes. for you to make a decision is what it's all about in the NFL because if another team is more organized and or has that information at their disposal right away where they can make

an decision be on the horn with that team's agent or that team's GM trying to make a trade or trying to sign the guys a free agent they can do it faster than you you're done you're trying to huddle up your scouts and go here let's take a look at a couple games here well that guy may already be striking and deal with someone else so yeah that's why you always every year. It was just a long grinding process of making sure you evaluated every team and every player, especially the free agents, especially the guys who were going to be targets. You put more eyes on those guys, had more people get involved in that process.

And I know that sounds like a lot of tedious work, but a lot of scouting and personnel work is tedious. That's what it is. That's the discipline, right? I mean, are you willing to do that? how did the staff look and what was the information transfer like? So let's say on average, what would you say the normal pro scouting department looks like? And how does that travel? Like, is it a weekly thing where you're getting reports from people?

Like, what is the pool and how does the information move upward? Yeah. Well, I mean, the pro department is always more or less in house. I mean, there's usually a pro scouting director and probably two to three pro scouts, maybe one to two pro scouting administrators. So usually the pro scouting department is about maybe five to six people deep. Wow. That just doesn't seem that big.

No, it doesn't. And then also, you know, whatever, if your director of player personnel is a guy who splits his time between being in-house and on the road. So maybe that could be seven. Your general manager, he could be eight. Now, this all depends how much time the general manager spends actually looking at tape versus is taking care of all the administrative duties that he has and, you know, meeting with the owner and holding his hand and all that. It just depends how much time he has.

So during the season, I mean, that's probably about your typical pro scouting department, somewhere between, you know, maybe as little as five upwards of seven or eight. Some guys have more people working in it than not. And what happens is guys are responsible for a certain number of teams to cover during the season. depending up, and so they will be responsible for tracking all of the comings and going to that specific team and who the free agents are going to be for that coming year, what kind of transactions these teams are undergoing, who's hurt, who's not, who's playing well, who's not evaluating everyone on that football team and basically being an expert on that team. And these are things that as the pro personnel director, you're constantly in communication with your scouts who are responsible for those teams. basically on an everyday basis. I mean, that's your job to know everything that's going on with the league as a pro director.

And then your pro scouts and their respective teams have to be experts on those teams. So it's a continually evolving process. Now, as a director of player personnel or a GM, as you're moving through the year, as you get into October, November, December, obviously you're going to start narrowing your focus as a decision. on those guys who you think are going to be available, who you think specifically are going to help your football team in particular, because you're not going to have a GM book at every single person. You're going to rely on your scouts, then your directors,

to filter that information to you so then you can put your eyes on the people who you think are going to best help your football team based on what your needs are going to be. That's basically how it works. They build the base. They start to whirl it down. obviously the analytics department may get involved as well based on you know taking based on like what what the track record has been for teams and for you as far as what kind of players do we want to go after what are the specifics of the players we want to go after which guys statistically

will give us the biggest bang for our buck make our transactions be profitable and productive and then you know it just keeps getting narrowed down narrowed down narrow down to the point where then you have your hit list of people that you want to go after once free agency starts. And after the season's over, the last thing I was just going to say is the coaches get involved as well. And you come up with a very definitive plan about how you're going to use a player when you bring him in, how you're going to get them acclimated to your system. I mean, there's a lot, man. I mean, we could talk about this for five, six hours, just about how the best get the bang for your buck and free agency.

because it's not as fantasy football-ish and as interchangeable as people think. As a matter of fact, a lot of free agency needs to be more detailed as far as how you're going to bring a veteran player into your system than even bringing the draft pick in. It's more detailed because those guys are so used to doing things in a certain way for much of their career that you have to be very adaptable. you have to be very open and honest about how you're going to use those players. So there's no shock to them. So you're not shocked by their resistance to how you're going to use them because you didn't communicate with it.

There's just a lot, man. I mean, I have so many stories about free agency. We need three, four, five hours. I wish we had it. So that part is fascinating to me because when you're building a board at a certain position, right? Let's take, for example, maybe safety in this class, okay? Yeah. The guys in that board, a position you think about all the time, I'm sure.

Let's say Marcus May, Marcus Williams, John Johnson, all of those guys that are in this class, they're such different players with different skill sets. And the ways that they're deployed in their specific defenses may be different in the ways you'd want to deploy them, especially in the case of like a John Johnson. If you're going to pay him a lot of money, the way the Rams used him, it doesn't seem like, Like that's a player you want to spend a lot of money at. So all of that stuff just seems like kind of treacherous territory. So when you're trying to build that board of safeties in this class, for example,

how would you try to differentiate those skill sets in the way that you build the board? I mean, what are those conversations like? Because it seems extremely naughty. Yeah, I mean, look, your board has to be tailored specifically, as you're, you know, as you're alluding to, to what it is. that you fundamentally and philosophically are trying to do as a football team. And that board has to reflect that for you. Meaning so if you look, if you're looking at it and you're looking at a picture of it,

the way in which you stack them vertically in that position group has to be reflective of how you think these guys rate in your system and how you're going to use them. And see, this is what I'm talking about with bringing players. especially better in players and how tricky this can be, right? So, for instance, John Johnson played in a quarters-based system in LA and Brandon Saley's defense. And that system is much different than a single high-based system where you basically have a strong safety and a free safety. One guy's going to be down the box a lot.

The other guy's just going to roll to the middle of field a lot and play center field. There's much, they're much different skill sets. It's much different mental requirements, much different technique requirements. And so you have to, then you have to be very specific about the kind of people that you target and then rank them appropriately. So if you're trying to think of another team that plays a lot. All right. So if you're Chicago, right, and you're Sean decide the new defense coordinator, or if you're Denver and you're Vic Fangio. Now, obviously, Brandon Staley is a guy who comes from that same kind of background.

So if you were, let's just say that. Justin Simmons was available, which he's not going to be. But let's just say that he was because he's going to get franchised in Denver. I mean, you don't think for a minute that a team like the Chicago Bears if they were looking for safety, obviously they would have Justin very, very high on their board. Because of scheme familiarity, how he was used, you wouldn't have to teach him a whole bud.

You wouldn't be putting him into situations or in positions where he was a guy that that had to learn a whole bunch of new things. Maybe he'd be resistant to it. He wouldn't be comfortable. And I mean, those are kind of mistakes you just can't afford to make. Whereas, all right, if you're just a team like the Rams or you're a team like Denver or a team like Chicago. And let's just say Jamal Adams is up for free agency. And he's a guy who you're looking to acquire.

Now, I like Jamal. I think Jamal doesn't get a whole, you know, as much credit as he should get as far. as far as his ability to do different things as far as the safety is concerned. But you may have him, although people know that he is an all pro and a pro bowler, you're going to have him ranked a little bit lower if you're the Rams or Denver or Chicago because of how what really he's very good at, which is you saw. He's a halacious blitzer and pass rusher, tremendous bog player. I mean, you know all these things about how they use him.

So if you were just visually, we're going to look at a representation of the Rams or the Bears or the Broncos pre-agency board, if you just saw it up on a wall, you'd be like, well, how the hell is Jamal Adams ranked that low? How vertically in that safety stacking? Why is he down there? Oh, because your board is supposed to reflect what you think that players value is to your team and your scheme and your system. Not the rest of the league or not what the writers think about him or not what his pro-ball accolades say, or rather his pro-bowl selection say, but how he's going to be used in your system. So it has to be very specific. You have to be very detailed.

Guys who are familiar with what you want to do and who have played in your system are obviously going to be bumped up a little bit higher as they should be. Because that's really what it's all about. And again, beyond their familiarity, you also, there's less guesswork. You almost protect yourself

because you don't have to do as much projection. Of course. And that's exactly what you want to do in free agency. Free agency is not the time to be messing around with saying, you know what, I'm going to ask a guy to do something that he's never done before. Simply because I believe in my system, he's a guy who has all these physical traits. Hell, he should be able to do it.

You don't want to do that. You don't want to do that because when you miss and it doesn't work or you don't, I mean, from a physical perspective, or you miss and it doesn't work because the player says, I've never done that before. I don't want to play that. I don't want to do that. That's how you get fired. That's how you have owners going.

What the hell did you do? Why did you do that? Why did you bring him here? He never, he's done. Look, let me, the perfect example, let me just go back to Namdi awesome. All right. 2011, we bring him in there from Oakland. What was Nomdi his entire career? Man heavy. The guy is six four who's got like six foot two inches of legs.

I mean, you know, his hips are like up at your face level. He wants to be up on the line of scrimmage. Or rather, he needs to be. He wants, he needs to be pressing. he needs to be playing in a single high press man-based system. We were transforming that year with Juan Castillo as a first-time defensive coordinator, has spent a lot of time down at Alabama that spring and summer learning Nick's two safety-high type schemes, playing cover four, playing cover two, things like that.

A lot of pattern matching stuff that we used to do in Cleveland that Nick took with him to college ranks. That's where he went to learn a lot of the intricate. season especially a pass coverage. That's where he spent a lot of time. Well, we signed Nomdi, and we try to have Nomdi play that kind of scheme. A pattern match course, yeah. Yeah, playing off, seven, eight yards, playing from a pedal, playing with square

shoulders, not having his hips. Are you kidding me? And it was a wreck. It was an absolute disaster. Disaster. Who else did we acquire that year? Dominic Rogers Camardi. All right, who had been with the Cardinals before that.

Great outside lane corner. Can play off, could play press, blazing speed. Blazing. Wasn't the most courageous tackler, not a good blitzer. Wasn't a guy who you really want involved in the run front very much. You want him out on the Autobahn where he can use that length and that speed. He was like a Greyhound. What do we do?

We put him at Nickel in sub. What? at nickel so he can now he's a part of the run front he has to be he's used as a blitzer he's not a good tackler and he's telling you i don't like all this action in here i don't like all the different assignments and responsibilities i have to learn as far as what my run fits are from a force bill perspective what my gap responsibilities are where i'm supposed to hit this blitz i just want to know who i got to cover but we put him in there that's why i think those are those are kind of mistakes that you can make in free agency.

And I also think that that's why it's so that tons of mistakes and tons of missteps are made in expanding roles for guys who were, I guess, quote unquote, role players within their offense, right? So let's take, let's take a guy like Juju Smith-Schuster this year, okay? Yeah, guy who played 75, 80% of his snaps in the slot most of the time. If you're going to pay him $16, $17 million a year in free agency, you're probably going to want him to be a 1A, 1B receiver where he's going to be asked to. do some things within your offense that he was not asked to do for most of his career, but you feel obligated to expand that role because of the premium that you're about to play

with the guy. And it seems like number three, pass rushers are like that. And that's just why that expanded role becomes so much more difficult. So with that in mind, do you think that there are specific positions that are worth kind of investing in with free agency? Like Offensive linemen, for example, because transition from college can be difficult. You're not necessarily projecting role changes as much with those guys. So, were there a couple different spots that you feel are safer to invest in with those free agent dollars? Yeah, I mean, offensive line, well, I mean, okay, you can invest in offensive line center guard, right? Okay, so let's just say you can invest in it, but I think when you're, depending upon the position you're talking about, it's a matter of when you invest in it.

All right, I wouldn't want to jump into the first 48 hours of free agency for a guard, right? I just, I wouldn't typically, all right? I wouldn't want to be paying premium prices at that time unless I thought the guy, you know, was then, you know, John Hanna. Unless I thought he was going to be in the Hall of Fame and he was going to make, you know, like that much different. Or let's just say, unless my team was one that was totally built in such a way, like say that, remember the Saints of the late 2000s? when they had Carl Nixon. Carl Nixon. That's the guard, right?

And there was a reason why, okay? What is Drew, you know, Drew Breeze is a six-foot passer, likes to step up in the pocket, needs to be protected inside out. Tackles weren't paid a whole lot in that system relative to what the centers and guards were because that's where Drew needed his protection. So if you really are, if you think philosophically,

you're that specific about how you want your offensive line and look, then fine, go ahead out there and invest in. That's fine. Most people, though, are going to want to protect their, their edges because of the scarcity of premium offensive tackle. So if one hits free agency and let's just say, you know, a guy, you know, a guy like David Bakhtiari would become available in free agency, which it'll never happen. But let's just say that he was, then yeah, invest in it.

If you can get him, get him. They're unique. They're different players. In that vein, what positions would I be looking at? look, if you have premium pass protectors like that, and I don't care if they're left or right, because as we all know, Von Miller wrecked the Super Bowl rushing from the defensive left, offensive right, and they can just get up and walk around. Clay Matthews wrecked plenty of games from rushing from the defense, left, offensive, right.

If you can get edge protectors, if you can get past rushers, obviously if a quarterback ever came free, if you can get premium corners and you have a system, okay, when you're talking about corners, in particular, if you totally understand how you're going to play that player and you're willing to accept how you're going to play that player, those are the positions I would go after. Pass rush, corner, tackle, wide receiver. Now, wide receiver is another one of those where I've had great success and been involved with teams who've had great success and then where we've screwed it up. In Washington, for instance, right?

We bring in Santana Moss from the Jets. Santana, now this is also where you're talking about with Juju Smith-Schuster. You got to know what you're getting. If this is a guy who has the skill set to where he can play all three primary positions, X, you know, X, Z and the E position in the slot, then go ahead and pay up for it. Go ahead.

Santana was one of those guys. You put him in the slot, he was this halacious. He's like Tyreek Hill in terms of he'll kill your nickelbacks and he'll kill your safeties if they ever wind up getting singled up. You can put him out on X where he's stationary on the line of scrimmage and he can still defeat press and get off the ball. Or he can play the Z where you can back him off, moving them around in motion, get him away from some of those jams and create some space for him that way.

Pay up for those guys. That's fine. Brandon Lloyd, who we also signed at one point in time in Washington, this is a guy who's not a three position wide receiver was not a three position guy couldn't play in the slide probably needed to be a z could get jammed up on the line when he was playing x you don't want to pay up for that guy you want to be a little bit more careful so that's what you're talking about when you're talking about jujou smith schuster right yeah you really want to pay that guy one number one money can he really move around in those positions he really a movable chess piece that you pay a premium

for because this guy can just ball and beat anybody and defeat anyone no matter where you put him. No, he's probably not. That's where you need to be careful. You know, there's a great study in that, although this isn't great and see this is the draft. And this is where you kind of actually have to be a really good scout too and really be,

you have to really be dialed into a player's skill set. Justin Jefferson last year in the draft. Yeah. Right? Or Justin play, obviously. Well, he had Jamar Chase. So Justin spent most of his time. I don't remember what the percentage was.

I know it was real high. It was by like 75%. at least what I would guess, yeah. Exactly. So we saw him this year on Monday night up there in Chicago. And you guys saw, everybody watched them all year long. He ripped everyone a new one all year from all three, like wherever they put it. Okay, so you can take chances on that. And I mean, and Justin was drafted in the first round now.

So, I mean, it's not, I mean, they took a chance. And they thought he was going to be a good player no matter where they played it. You wouldn't just require some imagination though, right? You still have to see it. That's right. You do. You do. And the player has to be willing to do it.

The player has to buy into it. You know, there's a lot of things that go into that. So it's, it's not an exact, I mean, there's some gamble and there's some risk involved when you're talking about wide receivers in particular. And when you move them around like that. And that's where I think in free agency, you have to be even more, you have to be even more conscious of risk because you have to understand what the consequences are when you're wrong. And I've lived through it too many times. And then those consequences obviously are associated with what you paid and how soon in the free agency process you jumped in and what the corresponding prices are going to be.

There's just a lot, man. And there's a lot that good. It's funny having this discussion with you because it almost gives me anxiety like it used to then. You know, thinking about all the risks involved with it. You know, I was, I was talking to,

I was talking to a GM last week. And we were just talking about, you know, I would get excited about the players available in free agency and how much cap space the team had. And he would just walk me back, walk me back slowly over the next thing. And it's like, don't get excited about it.

It's, you shouldn't be excited. That's not how this is going to work. And I just, as somebody who, you know, I like this time because anything's on the table and all the player movement. It is fun to talk about. But when you really dig into it, you just don't want to pay A plus prices for B minus players.

And oftentimes that's what a free agency ends up being. So talk one more thing I wanted to ask you about with the risk, because I think it's really interesting. And a conversation I had a couple years ago with a general manager about this idea. And it was just that when in terms of the guys and what they're like, you don't know until they get in the building. There are pre-draft visits. You don't get to spend a day with these people. So when you were gathering information on personalities, on how guys would react to money,

on what they would be in the locker room, all of that, what are the challenges of that when you don't get that pre-draft type thing? Because you have to do your due diligence, but there just don't seem to be as many avenues to do it. Yeah, that's where you're having to rely on your network of people who are going to really give it to you straight and not just, you know, protect their own interests, so to speak. And so, you know, if you have coaching friends and or scouting friends that work at those,

you know, at those respective clubs where this player has been, you know, will they give you the straight story, the clean story, the unbiased view of what this player actually brings to the table, especially if you have no previous connection to this player in any way, shape or form in your order. It's hard. I mean, that's what you're relying on. And that's why, you know, obviously, you know, scouting staff construction is important. You have to have people in your college and pro scouting department who have those contacts and have those networks because of situations like this. Because, you know, they're information gatherers in many, many ways. They're private eyes in many, many ways. And that and the character evaluation. and information gathering part of this whole equation when it comes to team building is as important, if not more important than the actual evaluation of the players individual skill sets. Because a lot of times, you know, skill sets, and I mean, they're there.

They're evident for you when you look at the tape. And honestly, you know, scouts like to take a lot of credit for finding players and want to, you know, pat themselves on the back and consider themselves a genius. But they're, you know, they very much so and very often times have very little to do with whether a player succeeds or fails. It's really about the coaching staff and everyone involved in the actual on-the-ground football operation that really determines how players succeed

and how well players play. I mean, that's a whole other discussion. But I'll say this, too, when you're talking about, all right, how do you reduce the risk of being wrong and getting the right kind of player in there where there is no surprise? You know, you're not surprised by how this player is as a person. and how they're going to react to your environment and your locker room and all.

The most success I've had in terms of reducing that risk has been when we had brought in players that someone on our coaching staff had some kind of familiarity with or had coached at some point in time before or was real tight with people who they've coached with before. They played in a scheme very similar to yours. And when they come in, they hit the ground running and they just kind of assimilate themselves into your environment and your culture and you take off. When I was in Washington, we did a few good things there, a few. London Fletcher was a slam dunk free agency signing.

Greg Williams had had him in Buffalo. We were running the exact same scheme in Washington that London ran to Buffalo. He was a guy who was a captain in Buffalo very well respected there. As soon as he came in, everyone loved Fletcher. Loved him. slam dunk. When I'm in Washington, we signed Philip Daniel as a free agent. We had Greg Blas, who was our defensive line coach in Washington,

who had coached Phillip in Chicago. Came in, hit the ground running. No issues whatsoever became an instant leader on the defensive line. Instant leader. We brought in Walt Harris from the Chicago Bears, brought him into what? Walt Harris. This came in was perfect. He was the third corner behind Smoot and Sean Springs after Champ Bailey left.

No issues whatsoever. I mean, this slam dunk. And even in Philadelphia, here's the last one again. Love him or hate him, Jason Babin had had that great year in Tennessee and then came to Philly. He came to Philly because Jim Washburn came to Philly. And Jim had coached him in Tennessee. We were using the exact same wide-nine scheme that Jim had used in Tennessee. That's what Jason had had a huge year on.

Jason came in for us, year one. Picked up right where he left off in Tennessee. those are the things that those are the kind of transactions that you really are looking for in order to really you know as far as reducing the chances of you being wrong and a player busting out on you in a bad way and making you look foolish that's how you try and set it up to increase the likelihood that you're going to look smart when you start going off the beaten path and doing the nom de awesome type of crap and putting him in situations where he's never had been before from a schematic standpoint and you have no idea what kind of person he is or

player he is and that's not to say anything bad about nom because he was a plus player i mean a plus person but you're just setting yourself up for failure and setting yourself up to look foolish and we look real foolish that year doing that it's also one of those things where you have to balance just the way that you try to reward people in and out of the building because if you're going to try to build your team through free agency. And you're going to bring in that group of guys. And it just sends such a strange message to the guys that are already there. And I think that the most recent.

Strange is a nice way of putting it. You're sending a terrible message. It's just a hard thing. I mean, I think Jacksonville is the best recent example of that, where you're going to go out in 2017 and you're going to spend all this money on guys like, on guys like who came in there, Clias Campbell, AJ Boy, everything else. And then Jalen Ramsey is going to be sitting there being like, all right, well, I'm the best player on this team. And I'm not getting extended, but you're going to go out and you're going to give this deal to a free agent corner. It's just a difficult thing.

And I just, that's a part of it that I don't think I really understood or appreciated enough before I started talking to people about how you balance that dynamic. Players who have been drafted by a team and who perform should be rewarded. because what they wind up doing is passing down to the rest of the guys who come in there who are drafted that, hey, you come here, you put on our colors, you ball, you'll get your money, and then it just continues to grow. That positive culture continues to grow. You get paid, and that loyalty grows because guys, it then almost becomes like a collegiate type of atmosphere. right the guys who are drafted by that team paid by that team you know they promote the team internally and externally they talk good about the team they recruit other players to come there as free agents they're the guys who are out in the community constantly busting their rear end to represent the team in the right way this and they just lift the entire morale of the entire organization that's how that's what you want that's the kind of precedent you're

you want to set. You don't want to set the precedent of constantly trying to nickel and dime players and treat players who have, you know, left it all in the field for you that you drafted. You don't want to treat them in such a way where they feel as though they are not valued and they're nothing but a expendable asset and then show all the love and fawn all over, whoever the next, you know, greatest free agent that happens to hit the market and come down the pike. You don't want to then start showing those guys all the love because I'll tell you what it'll do. Is that player who you could have had be responsible for growing all the positive culture with inside your locker room and inside your building?

I promise you, he starts talking to other guys on that team and other pre-agents in the NFL saying this, look, man, this isn't the place you want to come to. Yeah. This place has no loyalty. This place doesn't understand culture in the least. And then all of a sudden you're wondering why agents are directing their players to go elsewhere, especially if the money's close to being equal. You're wondering why you can't land anybody. And here's the latest example of that.

See, when people get all excited and see, this is how the whole fantasy football type of mentality can become dangerous. When you're talking about, well, Dallas should go ahead and trade for Russell Wilson. Can you imagine what that locker room would be saying, given what DAC has given to that team? in terms of performance and loyalty and doing everything the right way, if they went ahead and traded for Russell and Russell's a great player, okay? Don't get me wrong.

And didn't reward Dak at this point in time? Can you imagine? I mean, if I was in that locker room, I'd be like, man, please. And that's how you do it here. It's the wrench with the quarterback stuff. And it's the human element to it that I think it's so easy to say,

all right, our guy is merely the Cogina machine. we think we can get similar production out of a guy on a rookie contract, even if it's not quite the same and we're taking a slight risk. But by moving on from that guy and just tossing him back in the pool, you send a very mixed message to the rest of the guys in the locker room in the building. And it's just, it's a tough thing. I understand it both ways, but it's just one of those things that the human element of this and the messages you send with the ways you spend your money,

that's a real part of this, again, in ways I didn't appreciate when I was 25. Andy Reid, Drew, to drive that home to all of us. And I know many one-on-one conversations he used to emphasize it to me, in particular during his time in Philly and my time in Philly, the relationship aspect of how important it was to always remember that this is a relationship business, both within your own building and then throughout the NFL as a whole. And if you ever lose sight of that, and you ever think that this is just quote unquote fantasy football, or you think it's just about you and what you want to do and how, and you just want to kind of turn this into a transactional type of business, eventually it's going to knock you right over the head

and eventually right out of the league. If you don't respect that aspect of it, and clearly some teams don't respect that aspect of it. And that's why the same teams every year late in January, Usually it's the same group of suspects that are always fighting for the championship. And the same ones are always selling hope at this time of year talking about, look how much cap space we had. Look how many draft picks we had.

Oh, everybody, you know, renew your PSLs and your suites and all that and your season tickets because this year we have a ton of cap space. And look at where we're picking. We're in the top 10 and we're going to get a great player. And it's just like, and fans, they buy right into it, man. And that's why the NFL has always went. because they sell hope better than anybody. And look, I get it.

Before I was a player, I was a fan. And now that I'm not a player, I'm still a fan. I love the NFL. But fundamentally, as far as how many teams conduct their business, it's flawed, man. And it's flawed because it's too transactional and not enough relationship driven. And you're right on the money with that.

And it's something I think teams, the good teams pay a lot of attention to, The others pay a lot of lip service to it, but they don't really pay a lot of attention to it. The same teams are in the running for the real championship every December and February, or every January and February. And the same teams are in the running for the offseason championship every March. Yeah, unfortunately, I was on a lot of those teams that won the offseason award a lot. In Washington, we used to kill it.

You kidding me? There were people who were more excited for February than they were for September. Well, that's what it's like in Jacksonville every year now. So we have similar kind of. thing going on. All right. I know you're an extremely busy man. I sincerely appreciate you taking the time out to do this. Always great to talk to you. And I hope we can do it again sometime. Anytime you're around, happy to do it. So thanks a lot. Louis Riddick, thank you very much, man. Appreciate the time. No problem. Thanks. All right. I'm very excited to welcome now. My good buddy. Nate Tyson. How are you,

man? I'm doing great. Another week. Here we are. Still in the off season. Somehow we're still in the off-season. So I just, housekeeping, full disclosure. So the way we're kind of doing these off-season shows, we're going to have some guests, but I always want to have you and Lindsay on just to keep the show like it's familiar. Like, people feel like they're putting on a sweater, their favorite, like, comfy on-the-couch sweater. And I always love talking to you. So that's what we're going to do all off-season. Even if we have more guests and even without the schedule, you're going to be on at least once a week. That's the plan. So

we don't have a day lined up yet because I'm still figuring that all out. But you will be on regularly so people can look forward to that. So we just finished a conversation with Louis Riddick about free agency from the team's perspective. And I wanted to ask you what your experience was like because you were on staff with the front office in Atlanta for two years, right? So I'm curious, as a grunt in the front office, like what is your role in the free agent process? Yeah. So I got kind of like a double whammy because I got the grunt experience and then I got kind of like through my dad like osmosis of kind of like the head experience kind of like what he has shared with me over the years and I can touch to that in a minute but it's as the grunt you've all that kind

of dirty work you're doing so it's you're setting up logistics um it depending on what the team situation was when I was in Atlanta of course the uh the scouting coordinator that does all the travel and everything went on pregnancy leave so guess guess guess who's last that got put on. Or maternity leave, I'm sorry. But it's, so with all, like, you have to put together tapes, like a highlight tape. So like, I shouldn't say a highlight tape. We call it a POA tape, point of attack.

And sometimes it's just watch four games, five games, and you're finding all the good plays and the bad plays. And anywhere where this player say it's a receiver, any catches, any times he's blocking, if it's offensive guard, every time he's a main blocker or something like that, you do that for all free agent prospects and all college draft prospects for for the kind of the big ways to kind of give like a little glimpse of the guys what's the timeline on that for for like the 2021 class when would you have to start putting those together i would say end of january mid-johner is when you're starting to put that stuff together you're coming back from the senior bowl is kind of like when free agency starts kind of like that's when that little section of the offseason starts before the combine starts and so so like all this kind of logistical things things. You're putting cutups together. So you are actually watching lots and lots of games. They might be a guy. I'll put a, I got to remember the guy's name, Derek Morgan from the Titans. And then Brooks Reed, they were two free agents we were looking at in Atlanta. And kind of same realm of how much they were going to get paid.

So what I had to do was not only watch a four or five games and kind of highlight and low light, and it's about 40 to 60 plays with those cutups will be. I also had to do every time they deflected a ball, every sack, every TFL, every time I thought they blew an assignment. every time they dropped into coverage because we were looking at them we were transitioned to dan quinn who was a you know the four three seahawks defense and or hybrid but whatever we're looking at the sam position so i was doing stuff that was sam specific um the sand linebacker position so i had to see if i'm dropping the coverage and stuff but what you were doing is you're tagging all this you had to watch an entire season of just one player were really two players for this instance and that was just to see narrow it down for the guys the decision makers so that's part of the process and also like a

I said, the logistical things. The big time free agents that you know that the guys are really, like, they're five-star recruits of the off-season for the front office, maybe not as much interaction between the grunts and them, maybe picking them up from the airport, picking them up from the hotel. If we with these big-time, say, yeah, like Brooks Reed and Derek Morgan, we're kind of like more of the five-star recruits for that off-season. The big-timers, the GM, the head coach, the position coach, they go to the nice steak dinner. The scouting assistant hangs out there in case anybody needs to get driven home anybody needs to you know they need someone to pick up something that's where you are you're hanging out in the bar just chilling i mean that's your role just sitting next to the hostess at ruth's chris

yeah that that's okay yeah perfect picture of russ chris everybody else is at the big table laughing wine everything you're at the bar don't don't not gonna complain about free russ chris dinner but you're off to the side just having a little fun over there but that's that's your role in all this but what i always i always thought is sometimes the grunts have the best feel on these guys because you literally have to watch every single play. You don't get to go, you don't get to watch the highlight tape and go, oh, yeah, he's a good player. It's like, no, you literally watch every single snap. And sometimes it's great to get the Grants perspective because they have to watch these guys.

It's like Clockwork Orange. Like you don't get to go, oh, yeah, I watch five games. I'm a grinder. And then the coaches watch actually like six plays. You know, like everyone's going to say they check the box. But you have to do this because you might get fired if you don't do it if you're a scouting assistant. So that was like that's kind of the steps, the process for that. When you get to like the middle of free agents or low level, maybe those one year rental types,

you really have a lot of interaction with these guys. So you'll pick them up. You'll go to physicals, tryouts. You set up, you set up the workouts if they have to do. Say, like you bring three free agents and you're doing an offseason tryout. You do all the logistics on that end. So they, you have the pro director. This is in Atlanta.

We are a pro director. He'd come. Whenever I heard him coming down the hallway, I was like, oh, you know, time start booking some flights. And you know, you'd be like, all right, make a cut up of this guy, this guy and this guy. you know, wide receiver A, B, and C, okay? We're going to bring them in. We're going to work out tomorrow, done, done, done. Okay, so I'd book the hotel, do all that stuff.

And then go into the workout. I was a quarterback. I would also throw during the workouts. So it was, you kind of did everything. You got to wear everything in this kind of a guy. How rusty was your arm at that point? Oh, this is a funny story. So when I first joined the Falcons, I had been about two or three months off from,

I finished as a G8 pit in January. I started with the Falcons in April of 2014. So about three months, not really doing much, just kind of watching. film, watching movies, and moving to Atlanta. And my first week on the job, we had a top 30 day, which is for the college draft, where you invite the top three. Oh, I'm sorry, no, it wasn't a top 30 day. It was a local workout day that every team has. So it's all colleges or if you went to high school in a certain radius of your facility, you can invite these guys to have a local workout.

Some guys just you want to interview. Some guys are like low level one double AA guys you want to look at. So I had to go there. One quarterback backed out. He was from Flower Branch, Georgia. He went to South Carolina, I'm blanking on his name. He backed out the day before. I've been on the job for four days. All of a sudden, the pro director comes in my office. He barely even knows my name. He's just like, Nate, how can you throw right now?

And I was like, I can do warm-ups and stuff. My arm might fall off after about 10 throws. And he goes, okay, so you can do a couple routes tomorrow, right? Yeah, yeah, sure, sure, yeah, definitely. So we go to the tryout. There's seven receivers, four tight ends, three running backs. It's me and the quarterback from Appalachian State at the time. And I'm blanking on his name.

we go in oh no it wasn't 10 throws it was an entire hour and a half throwing throwing go balls posts deep comebacks i had to go into the gun because i was i couldn't drop back i was exhausted like i honestly just stopped dropping back i was just like hey just snapping the ball i'm just going to catch and throw it like like that it was just like i was so out of shape and all that and my arm basically did fall off like i honestly couldn't lift my arm for a week after that like no wraps had a good day throwing i will say that uh but but that's what you you have to do it. You have to wear all the hats. When you're in those types of roles, it's it's the more you can do. You're like, hey, can anyone throw out. It's like,

even if you can't throw you. Yeah, sure, I can. Hey, can anyone catch. Can anyone do Excel sheets? Can anyone do this? You're like, yeah, yeah, sure, I can do that. I can do that. But that's just, that was just a role. It's a lot of fun. But it's sometimes you're a little sore and everyone's making fun of you. And you're kind of like, yeah, yeah, you're welcome. I'm sure those guys got very familiar with that Hampton Inn on 23 there next to the publics in Florida, Georgia. That's where it is. That's exactly. Oh, I'm I was best friends with the manager there because I would drop you pick these people up from in the Atlanta airports like an hour and 20 minutes from the facility through Atlanta traffic. If you're if you're really unlucky, it could be like two hours.

So like a top 30 visit. I know this is college, but we had Jadavia and Clownie in. And it was him, Jake Matthews and one other guy. And oh, I'm like I was named. Oh, Lannon Collins. No, no, that was before. It was somebody else. But anyway, no, it was a little year before.

But whatever. Three guys going up. We're driving up. I picked them up at like 9 p.m. We're going up up the highway. It's taking like over an hour. And finally, Clowny just goes,

man, you guys should be called the Georgia Falcons. Because we were, so true. No, nowhere near Atlanta. And I looked at him. I was like,

you're right, man, we should be called the Georgia Falcons. He's like, this sort of facility is. He's like, are you taking this to South Carolina? And I was like,

it's like, nope, this is where it is. And you know, and you drop them off at 1030 at night. And you're like, hey, I'm picking you up at like 530. If this guy was working out,

We have to get the physicals, do all that stuff. But it was, that's some of the stuff you have to do every day. And you just do it. It's just so normal. But it's funny. It's hard to explain sometimes like, hey, guys, we're going to get you to our hotel in about two hours from now. It's like, I just landed.

It's 10 p.m. I'm not getting into bed until midnight. And I can work out at 5 a.m. As someone who's done plenty of work trips to Atlanta, well, flowery branch, Georgia, I have felt the same way. When you got to see it up close, what would you say is the thing about the free agent process that would shock people from the outside, just an element of it that is either not as fully formed as people from the outside might think. Maybe it moves a little quicker and more slapdash

than people think it would be. Like when you actually got to see the inner workings of it, what was surprising to you about it? How much kind of almost seemed predetermined kind of like, hey, we, we're talking to these two guys. Okay. Like not looking at seven free agents. It's like they already, by the time I heard, you know, I'm bottom of the wrong. By the time I heard anything, it was like, hey, we're watching these two guys. It basically comes down a contract. Oh, okay. And sometimes it's just the negotiations.

It's like, you might really like a player, but you're like, hey, it's out of our realm. It's like, yeah, we wanted that guy, but it doesn't make sense for us. Sometimes that surprised me. It's like, it's the knowledge that, yeah, we might have let a better player go. You know, or it might be sometimes maybe a coach influence. That kind of stuff really surprised me. Also, just the, the, like, I, I kept saying the five-star recruit treatment, that surprised me, but it shouldn't because when my dad was a head coach, he recruited the hell out of Antoine Winfield.

And his nickname the entire offseason was Billy. That's what he called him. He just said, we have this free agent, Billy. And that's all he told me because he thought like, I would tell the media. I was like a ninth grade. And he's like, you know, like, he's like, yeah, we're going after this guy, Billy. And I was like, okay, okay. And it was Antoine Winfield, it turned out.

And the Jets almost signed Winfield. And like it should have. it was like an 11th hour thing. And I think his agent leaked the news and it ticked off Antoine. Like he was like, he's like, what the hell? I didn't sign with the bills yet. Or I didn't sign with the jets yet. No, I didn't do that.

So they had to, uh, last minute, my dad had a call in a favor to get a private jet to fly him in at the 11th hour to fly him into Minnesota to like sign the deal like basically like stole them basically from the jets. And it's like all these communication stuff. And I didn't realize how much recruiting goes on. Like say, you know, Antoine, it was the end of the day. It was fine. And sometimes you, like Neil O'Donnell was a quarterback there looking at. So my dad, he went to Maryland. So it was my dad, Scott Linnahan, Sean Hill, and another guy that went to Maryland on the staff.

Brian Baker, I think it was, I think it was all Maryland guys. So that was part of my dad's recruiting process. It's like, hey, we're going to sing the turp fight song. We're really, this guy was like 33 years old quarterback. Like that was my dad. He was like, no, we're going to make it good for him. It's just like a college player like when they give him the jersey. Like, hey, like you're number two if you come to pit.

You know, like it's like the same type of thing. It's just really funny. Like seeing all of a sudden, it's like they get to NFL, hey, you have to be a pro. You have to be all this. And all of a sudden they get to a free agency. And they're like, hey, you're the prettiest girl at the dance again. Like remember this from recruiting? Like we, it's just a weird mood whiplash.

And as soon as they get in the building, it's like, okay, you're a player again. Like recruiting, do you recruit you? That process is over. I mean, the JJ Watt thing seems like a perfect example of that. Just the fact that he was enjoy, he seemed to enjoy being courted by the Cardinals, which I can understand that. If you've been in the league for 10 years and you know, you are just somebody in the building, even if you are a superstar like Hall of Fame type player, I can get why that that would be enjoyable for somebody. Yeah.

We're going to talk a lot about the player side of this next week. We have a former player coming on that was an in-demand free agent at one point because I'm really interested in what it's like from the player's side because I think there are a lot of misconceptions about what the public thinks from the player's side of things. there are guys that I've talked to specifically. I'll say this now. I don't mind. I remember talking to Zadarius and Preston Smith together a couple years ago. We were sitting there in the little tiny interview room they have near the podium at Lambo. And both of them essentially told me like, my agent handled this.

Whatever the highest offer was, that's where we were going. He told me where I was going. And that's how a lot of this goes. A lot of it is dictated by money. and there are some tiebreakers, you know, whether it's destination, quarterback stability, but a lot of these guys on second deals that are trying to cash in for the first time, whatever the biggest money offer is, that's where I'm going. Adrian Amos essentially told me the same thing because they had that huge splurge in free agency that year.

So I think a lot of people are thinking, you know, where do you want to go and who do you want to play for and what kind of offense do you want to play in? the dollar figure matters a lot when it comes to those second contract free agents. And again, I think that that's somebody people don't really appreciate. All right. The NBA big, big market thing doesn't really apply to the NFL. It's totally different to animal. That is so true.

And I knew that, but it was like, it reaffirmed me when I was with the Falcons. And all of a sudden I was like, oh, okay, yeah, these, the GM already knows who the guys are. Like, we're only talking to these two guys. These are in our realm. we are a finalist already. And it was like, that was day one, a free agency. And it was like, okay. All right.

That was kind of like, because everyone knows by the combine who's going to offer what, even though the tampering period starts 48 hours beforehand. Oh my God. What was the receiver contracts that happened? Like three contracts were all within like $500 of each other. They all got released at the same time. It was like 2014-ish, 15-ish.

Like two or three guys signed new deals. Was that like the Des AJ Green? Yeah. Dez, AJ Green and Julio were all at the same time. Yeah. I remember that. And it was like, but like two of the deals. were identical.

And it was like they're different agents. And it was like, somebody was talking. Like, yeah, somebody communicated something. All right. I want to have a conversation about Russell Wilson because we have not talked about it on the show just because we've been doing some bigger picture looks at stuff that have taken precedence over the last week or so here. But I feel like I should talk about it in some capacity because he put the bears on his

list of four teams, which at first glance seems crazy, right? So anybody who hasn't read the story that Michael Sean Dugar, Jason Jenks, and Mike Sando wrote about essentially the relationship with Russell Wilson and the Seahawks and kind of how it's deteriorated, what the treatment that he thought he deserved, how much he's being heard in the building. It's a fascinating bit of reporting. I could not recommend it anymore. If you haven't read it, you don't have an athletic subscription, you're screwing up. So go do that.

Then come back to this. And so obviously there is some friction there. And there's plenty of friction there. I thought it was hilarious that the agent felt compelled to come out and say, we are not requesting a trade, but here are the teams that we would be traded to. But it's a big old butt in that one. It was incredible. So you look at it, and it's a fascinating collection of four teams, right?

Cowboys makes total sense. Everybody wants to play for the Cowboys. I can understand why it would be an attractive place to play for a quarterback for anybody in the NFL. The Raiders, same kind of deal. I mean, it's, John Gruden is there. I think players are interested in playing for John Gruden. They've done a really good job in free agency, courting guys they've wanted over the last couple years.

It's an offensive-minded head coach. I can understand why he'd want to play in that offense. New Orleans speaks for itself. People love playing there. The locker room there is notoriously good. And you get to play for Sean Payton. He's seen what Drew Brees, a guy he looks up to, has done with Sean Peyton over the last decade.

Chicago is a total wildcard. And it really does seem, based on the reporting that's come out, Jeremy Fowler from ESPN has done a really good job kind of keeping his finger on the pulse of this. And he's talked about all of the different reasons that Wilson is attracted to Chicago. And when the Bears were first on that list, my initial thought was he understands what it would mean to be the quarterback of the Chicago Bears and succeed

and the ramifications that would have. And for somebody with as much, as many ambitions as Russell Wilson has and the grand ambitions that Russell Wilson has beyond just his success on a football field, I don't think it's that crazy that he would want to play in Chicago, even with some of the concerns about the line, the offense, everything else. Yeah, Chicago or Chicago, Russ is definitely a big picture guy. He is a guy that understands a legacy. And I think... Was that even obvious to you when you guys were younger? Absolutely. As soon as he came into Wisconsin, he came to Wisconsin. The biggest reason he came to Wisconsin, yeah, it was the talent we had, you know, of course. But he said he went there to prove that he could throw the ball in a pro-style offense with big offense alignment. That's why he came to Wisconsin. It was to prove himself. Okay, a guy thinking that way already, he's thinking about his NFL draft stock. And it's like, okay, so that's one sign. And we talk more and more and countless stories of Russ. But, you know, with Chicago was, we played Northern Illinois in at Soldier Field our senior year.

And I think it was a second game this season, maybe third. His brother lives there. Harrison, I believe his first name is. And Harrison lives there. So he, Russ really likes Chicago. Every time he goes there, he doesn't do so much anymore, but he used to. He would ask about the purple pig, which I think is closed now, the restaurant. Yeah.

It's right there on Michigan Avenue. Yeah. Yeah. And he would ask about it. And like, every time he went, he was like, my dad knew somebody. So he's like, hey, could you hook me off? I'll always be like, it's not me, Russ. I don't know anybody there.

But yeah, I can, I can push you up with somebody. But Russ like Chicago, Russ is a big picture guy. Russ understands the legacy. Chicago makes all the sense. It's Chicago. I mean, it's New York, Chicago, and L.A. Like, those are the three biggest markets. And if you make it in Chicago, it's just like the line with New York.

You make it here. You make it anywhere. Same with Chicago. They want to love you. If you're the quarterback, you're the first Chicago bear quarterback that can be like, be a guy, like, or bring a championship home. Like that you're there, you're a God, right? I mean, you know it.

Like, if you're a winner there in Chicago, you're a God the rest of your life. There's a reason that Dick a won one, won Super Bowl there. And also I go to Dicka Steakhouse all the time. And that's like, you know, San out and everything. And yeah. Oh, it is. Purple Pig is still opens. Dick, Dick is closed.

Yes. Okay. Maybe I mixed them up. Okay. But yeah, but Dick is closed really. Oh, man, I love the bar there. They had, they had a little plaques there for the regular. So it's great.

But the, but that's what Russ understands that. And I think the Vegas stuff, makes sense to me too. The Raiders are a national team. Like, Raiders could honestly just be a one-name team like SEAL or like Madonna. Like they could just be the Raiders. Like, you know, Las Vegas is secondary to that. And that was the reason they moved to Las Vegas, really, when I was with them in Oakland,

they knew that Las Vegas is very easy to travel to so people can just make it a weekend out of it. Raiders are a national fan base, one of the top three or four teams that have the, you know, just fans everywhere because it's just, they have that tradition of, of, of, of, of, that legacy, I should say. say of, you know, the play, how they play. They're the bad boys, you know, so people are attracted to that. Just like people are attracted to the Cowboys, they're America's team.

And it's, that makes sense to me. The Raiders not so much, Gruden does make sense, offensive coach. He'd fit right in with that kind of scheme. It's heavy, you know, play action, all that good stuff. But also, I just think it's also, and he's a Vegas. And you could be a God in Vegas. You could have Frank Sinatra. Like, Jerry Tarkhanian is like the only real big sports legacy here.

He has like three streets named after him here. I live here. And he's YonoV's basketball. coach. You know, it's like, you know, that's, that's the type of, they love sports here. They just have nobody that they could have latched onto, you know, it's not like Randall Cunningham is, you know, like some of the UNLV star, but it was like, you know, that's, that's his legacy. So that one makes sense to me. And then Dallas and Normans just, like you just said, it's just, just easily makes sense. I just think the Chicago thing is all about legacy for him. He wants to be a Hall

Famer first bout. He wants records. He wants to be considered an all-time great. And what better way to be considered an all-time great when you're doing it with in a big market that's going to market you as an all time great and you're going to always have that chatter about you if you're with one of these national teams you're always going to be talked about even if you're average you're always going be talked about it's just how it goes and he understands that he's smart enough to understand that i also think it's really interesting that he's played in chicago twice during his career the two times he's played in chicago oh the first one it was in 2018 when the bears were a playoff team and it was a monday night game that they lost and then it was in 2012 when the

Bears were 8 and 4 and it was December. And I'm telling you, man. That was his breakout game. And that's the fact that he, the two times he's played here is when the bears were good and relevant, when the bears are good, you feel it. Oh, yeah. It is. And I'm not trying.

People that don't understand this city and what the fan base is like, it's a great sports town, right? I mean, the teams have been terrible. It's a great sports town. But when the bears are good, it's just different. It is different than anything else. And there is a feeling in the fall when it happens. And I am not surprised that those are the two exposures he has had to Soldier Field is when the Bears were on the verge of the playoffs late in the season.

Like it makes total sense to me. That does. And that was his breakout game. God, Lovie didn't challenge. Do you remember that game at all? Forte got stuffed up. I don't remember that game. Oh, I do.

I remember all the losses. This was the stretch where I was, watching games at Bill Simmons's house and I had to fight to get the bears on a TV. It was like one of those things. It was like just one of those tiny little TVs in the pool house that I had to fight to get on. You had the TV with the VCR on the bottom. Exactly. Exactly.

I had the pity TV in the corner while the Patriots were on the main TV. Forte got stuffed at the one and it was an easy touchdown and Lovie didn't challenge it because it was marked down. You know, it wasn't like the reverse, the automatic score. And that has stuck with me because that's the 10 and six year that they should have been in the playoffs. I agree with you. I'm probably going to I I, my dad or myself have been with several franchises and I still say his time with the Bears is probably my like one of my, God, Viking fans are going to slip my throat. But like, but it's, it really was. It was my favorite time like to be a fan of a team of an NFL team.

Raiders is a little different because I was working for him. So you kind of don't get that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Same love with it. Like you're, it's your job. But like Bears, I was still a fan. I was in college and it was just great time. was a great times just period in my life.

So I have flawed memories with the Bears and Chicago fans. So I understand that Russ has been there three times, has three wins, and it's had three great experiences there. So it makes a ton of sense to me. All right. So from a schematic perspective, I think there's a lot to consider.

The Bears, again, I think that he's doing a lot of projecting about other stuff when it comes to the football side of this. The Raiders to me is easy. I mean, that is, I could see that in my sleeve. him doing what Carr does for the Raiders and just being a little bit more dynamic. Dallas, I still don't know what to make of the Dallas offense.

You and I talked about this last week. I didn't watch the Cowboys for like two months and no one did. So I don't know how he would necessarily fit in what they want to do offensively because I don't think we've really seen it. The Saints to me is really interesting because you'd have to go back to a prior version of what the Saints were offensively in the earlier days of that Breeze-Paeton partnership, I think to understand the right ways to unlock him. But those early days, I mean, whether it was, you know, 2011, let's say even, there were

some kind of down the field, aggressive, they played a different style under Peyton earlier in Breeze's career than they did in the back half. So I think there's a version of what they do where you could really use him to great effect in New Orleans. That's what always stands out because that's what's been so weird for me. And I've touched on this in the pod was when I was at Wisconsin. and pre-Ross, we would watch the Saints every summer and watch the film because they did so much play action overs and posts. And guess that's, you know, what concept Ross is really good at is play action with overs and posts.

And we did, we watched it all the time, all the time, all the time. Of course, Wisconsin, we copied a lot of that stuff actually. But that's, it makes total sense. And it's just Peyton, Sean Payton going back. It would be like the Taston Hill offense, but souped up. Like that's kind of if you want. Great way to put it. If you want to picture what the Saints offense would look like with Ross.

It's what they ran with Taysom Hill, but then it would just be better. It would be a guy with actually get complete these balls consistently. But that's what it is. It's more vertical. And the Bears version would be what they ran with Mitch when we talked about the improvements, when they run the slot, hip slot stuff. God, don't give me hope with that. That sounds amazing.

I know. But that would be what it would look like. It wouldn't be the RPO, what they wanted to do with foals and all that stuff. It would be more like the Mitch trying to make it easy. with training wheels with Mitch, but that offense is really friendly to Russ, who is a one-and-done read guy before he does Russ things. That is what you want. So I could see the easy picture image for all these offenses. And the Raiders make sense because that's the exact same thing, too. They like the same types of stuff. That stuff all makes sense. And then Dallas, yeah,

I don't know, Dallas would just, I mean, that's some high, some Frankenstein's monster of Lennahan and Mike McCarthy's offense that they go on down there. Well, we talked about it with Lewis earlier. I just think that you would have a mutiny on your hands if you traded Dak Prescott for Russell Wilson and with the guys in Dallas. That would be a really, really hard sell to your locker room. But the other ones make sense from a we would want Russell Wilson perspective. And I think one of the advantages that the Raiders have is that they could send a quarterback in the other direction. And that is the downside to what the bears might have to offer. I am fully of the opinion that if you were Chicago, you would do everything you had to do to get him.

I would give up three first round picks for Russell Wilson without even thinking about it. Because most of these avenues out of where the bears are right now are miserable. They're dead ends. There's no way to get anywhere. Trading a first round pick for Carson Wentz doesn't get you anywhere. I think trading three for Russell Wilson gets you somewhere. That even gives you a life if this regime doesn't necessarily work out. So they should do everything they can to get him.

The question is, would Seattle be attracted to that? I was talking to somebody about it the other day. That was their thought on this, is that because they wouldn't have an avenue to get a quarterback, I'm talking about the Seahawks now. It's just not as appealing to them. If you're getting picks in the 20s for the next three years, including 2021, you don't have an obvious way to get a guy. And that's just harder to justify because if you're the Seahawks, what are you doing? You're a year removed from trading two first round picks for Jamal Adams. That's a finishing stroke on a championship window type move.

If you trade Russell Wilson, where are you now? And I think that's just a little bit tough. Also, financially for Seattle, his signing bonus was insane. I mean, he's a $39 million dead cap hit if they trade him before June 1st. So that's just something to take into account. If they do it after, they can spread it out. But his base salary this year, I want to say, is something like $19 million. And he's got $13 million in proration for the next three years.

So the way they handed it out, to me makes a lot of sense if you know you're committing to a guy long term, right? give him a massive signing bonus, you're fine paying down the road because he's going to be a pillar for you. But if he's not going to be, then you're eating a lot of money in the short term. It's just, it's a really difficult thing to get over. But if that relationship is fragmented and you feel like it's time and you can get a lot for him, maybe you do it. But I think for the Bears, it's a no-brainer. You do everything you can. I would just be calling John Schneider 15 times a day.

Oh, I'd be annoying the hell out of them. It's hilarious that two of the top. five quarterbacks if we're including DAC three are available. It's like it's like available through trades, you know, between Dak, Deshaun, and Russ. It's like that. We may be doing a podcast about that on Monday with Mike Sando. We might be doing it. I won't bogart on it.

Please check back into the athletic football show next Tuesday. All right. Last thing I wanted to hit before we got. Do you have anything else you want to talk about with Russ? I think that that was basically what I wanted to hit. Yeah. It makes sense. It's just,

it's exciting times. It's one of those where I, I'm just curious. The league has never been like this. And I'm all for it. I'm all for it though. I, whatever.

And people want to complain about player empowerment and all that. Screw that. Like, get the money, like make it happy. It should all be putting the best product out there. All the teams should be putting the best product out there. Let's like,

let's just get these teams going. Like, I don't know. I love it. Loyalty is dead now. Like, yeah, you want to be loyal,

but guess what? Only the best players can be loyal because they get this long. contracts. It's like, so who cares? Kyle Van Nuoy got cut after one year in Miami. One year. One year. One year. He was a team captain. Yeah. I mean, it's loyalty. Teams are, somebody I was talking to on the player side of this last week said this to me. And I just, it's totally right. And when they try to instill into

players, this is not a family. When they tell you this, that is a way for them to kind of get you to buy in a way that's not necessarily beneficial to your financial upside, your career, everything else. It's a family until it's not convenient for them anymore. And I think that we're seeing a shift in the public perception and how goodwill on the public side of this goes. I think it's more toward players than it's ever been. And I think that's part of the equation. Again, we're going to talk about this with Mike next week. But I definitely think it's something to take into account. You know what changed this all for me really more than anything was Andrew Luck. It's just, I'm tired of that. I don't want another guy being ruined. Like I just don't want that with a team not putting

with Andrew Luck never demanded a trade or anything, but I'm just saying like a guy just getting beat up by a bad situation. It's like, I don't want to see that anymore. Like I want these guys on good teams. Of course we do. But it's making sense now. And now that these younger GMs or guys that are more,

uh, creative with this stuff, it's, it's going to get some creative. And have a bigger risk appetite, I think, as well. Yes.

Yes. I think, I think it's because now the fans are starting to get more realizing what the situation is. So it's easier to swallow for them or explore. why they did things now as opposed to if you did this five years ago everyone was like whoa like what i don't understand that and now like midseason trades are happening pick swaps like all this stuff's starting to happen now it's like okay fans are learning to tolerate it learning how to digest what's going on so it's

easier sell to everybody because you're not doing some crazy wild thing now because you can point at other trades that have happened and get you have you know have established marks now so i think it's just now NFL fans are going like, okay, they're getting a little more used to how maybe how other professional sports leagues operate, especially the NBA, where this is just cranked up to 15. I'm really curious and I'll be a little bit discouraged if we have all of this smoke over this month and a half here and then just nothing happens, which I think there's a chance that happens. I think that there's absolutely a chance that we're going to spend all of this airtime and all of this energy thinking and talking about Russell Wilson and Deshawn Watson and neither of them

change teams and we just have all the same group of quarterbacks that we have and i do think that it's already changed a little bit the fact that stafford wence and golf are all on different teams already and it's march second i do think represents a change but with the bigger name guys that would be a step that i think would be unprecedented all right before we get out of here some really interesting news today so this is the time of year where teams can submit rule proposals and these can apply to a bunch of different things and to me the two more interesting ones that came out here over the last 24 hours were from the bills and the Ravens. The bills came out and put forth something that I think makes a ton of sense.

So under this proposal, this is our own Matt Fairburn reported this from the athletic. Teams would not be allowed to hire for coaching or front office vacancies until after the Super Bowl. And we'll see, I think, the obvious concern with this is whether teams would just work around it. But you can say that with any rule change. And I still think if you put a rule in place, it would still provide a little bit more order to this. And I still think it would be a solution for some of what we saw. If you had guys like Brian Dable and Leslie Frazier,

both of whom were getting interviews as the bills were still in the playoffs, what happened with Eric B. Enemy, Byron Lefwich, Todd Bowles, everything this year. I don't know how much it would change. But I do think that it would give a fuller picture of the types of coaches that were available and what they would be capable of. And I think overall it would be a net positive for the league if it went in this direction. How enforceable it would be is an entirely different question.

Yeah, guys are going to find loopholes. But I like it standardized. It's like, hey, free agency starts this day. Hiring period starts at this day. Exactly. You know, draft is standardized it. Otherwise, you know, it's, I'm going to speak a little bit both sides of my mouth because like the other thing is I'm all for a team being smarter and finding a

competitive advantage. But it's kind of more like, is it like, is that really being smarter or is that just being like, you know, first to the thing or like, whatever, you know, like, is that actually a harder work to like find that advantage? I don't know. So that's why I'd rather just have it standardized. It's like, hey, the hiring period is February 5th or, you know, whatever it is. I don't mind it. I can argue both sides. I find with it if they did want to change it, though. I think that's actually a good change because that way you just get out of this. You handicapped some of these good coaches because some of these guys, too, on top of it,

if you're in the middle of a playoff run and all of a sudden you get an interview or something of that sort, you're game planning and then all of a sudden you have to put together some heck. I've always found that crazy. Insane. The idea that you're trying to interview for a job the same week and on an off day where you're trying to prepare a game plan for one of the biggest games potential of your entire life has always been nuts to me. And that's a misconception as people think, oh, it's an off day. And off day for a coach is Monday morning getting in there, I don't know, 6 a.m. And we were between 5 and 7 a.m. grinding the film and already put in the game plan.

We usually have to have your team reviewed. That's when you get your off days. That's a great way to put it. Yeah. That's when the off days happen is after the draft is when the off days start. And it's not that many. But it's Monday is not an off day. And that's when these guys, so they'll have a game, a playoff game.

And then they're prepping for another playoff game. And that's exhausting. And then all of a sudden you have to do like a three hour half day interview. where it's like they were talking about offensive philosophy, team philosophy. What do you like at each position? What do you think of our roster right now? How do you think of our draft picks? Where they're asking you a thousand questions.

So not only do you have to know your team, I have to know the team that I'm about to play the playoffs next week that probably have barely studied so far. And then I also have to whatever team I'm interviewing for, some garbage team that just fired their head coach. I have to talk to them and also have to know the dynamics. I have to know the politics of that. Because what if the GM is trying to hire you and they just draft this guy you think sucks? All of a sudden you're going, oh, yeah, this guy can't. play. The GM's going to go, well, screw this guy. He hates my first round pick last year. He's going to get me fired. So you have to deal with that kind of stuff too. It's, it's exhausting.

And so I think if it's standardized, yeah, some guys are going to cheat the system or whatever, but at least might give some of these guys a deep breath to take a chance or get a chance to take a deep breath and then do the interviews. So I think that's the plus side of all this. I spent half a day prepping for this stupid podcast three days a week, let alone a job interview. You do I just, I just don't, I never, never understood. It's nice on the Sunday's back, isn't it? It is kind of nice. But I have just never understood how that made sense in terms of getting, just vetting

candidates in the right way and having guys present themselves in the best possible way. I've always thought that it was such a difficult thing to ask guys to juggle and I completely understand why they'd want to change it. The other one that's created a lot of wrinkle, of a lot of ripple effects today and a lot of stirring in the NFL world is the proposal that was put forth by the Ravens. So what they're calling this is the spot and shoes rule that would completely change overtime rules in the NFL. So you have reacted to this today.

So I want you to explain this rule to me like I am Michael Scott with the lemonade stand is a five-year-old. Okay. Yeah. And I may explain it through board games and stuff. No, but I love the mechanic or anything to make things fair in a way to make things fair in life or anything. say like we had a piece of piece of cake is hey we're splitting this 50 50.

All right. Well, who choose what's 50 50. Okay. How about I cut it and then you pick what side you want. So that's a way to make it fair. You're you're dictating your own choice, you know, or the choices that are available to the other person. So what they're doing with the playoffs with the Ravens proposal is one team,

which is funny because they're probably going to come down to a coin toss to decide this. So there's chance anyways. There will be a coin toss in some capacity. But limiting the impact of the coin toss. is worth pursuing. Yes. Yes. So one team gets to pick the yardage that either team starts at.

So if I'm, I'll just make it up, I'm the Bears. I'm playing the Vikings. Bears play the Vikings. I'm the Bears. I win the coin toss. I go, I'm just, we're going to start the ball at the minus 40, our own 40 yard line. The other team, the Vikings in this case, would then go, okay, we're starting on offense or we're starting on defense.

And it's sudden death from there. And that's where the fun comes in because then it's, well, So everyone goes, well, why don't you just put it at the 50 yard line? And then, you know, well, every yard closer to the end zone is a lot more valuable. First off, second off, the other team's choosing. So then you have to take into the game situation, opponent situation going like, well, no one has stopped our offense all day. Like, yeah, we'll start on offense. Or, but what if the other team goes, hey, you start the minus one.

You know, you start your own one yard line or minus 10 or something of that sort. So that's where all the game situations and all that kind of come into place. But that is what they're, that's what they're proposing, the Ravens is. I pick a spot. the other team decides whether they start on offense or defense, and then we go sudden death from there. It's fascinating. And it throws a hundred different facets, a hundred different considerations in the equation. Who's your quarterback?

How well you've been playing? What's the feel of that day? Mathematically, what does it say? I'm sure that there would be a million spreadsheets to the end of time about what the best way to handle this would be. And the coach would say, well, I know what the spreadsheet says, but I was feeling a certain way this day. And it gives an advantage to teams that have strategic advantages. If you're a team like the Ravens, right, your coach has shown a propensity and ability to understand fort downs in ways that most teams don't because you're an analytically forward organization that

has gotten through to its head coach. They have garnered an advantage in that area. This would be another place where they could in part because they have a CEO head coach who is only doing strategy. That is what he does. If you were a play calling head coach and you've got to be worrying about the play you'd call if you get the ball first and then now that you're going to be worrying about the play you'd call if you get the ball first and then now this is something else,

you're again at a disadvantage in the way that I think a lot of play calling head coaches are in now when it comes to strategic decisions like this. So there's a lot of stuff that you have to weigh in balance here. So it's a drastic change that I absolutely do not think will be put into place, but it's a really interesting idea. I love it.

Any rule or anything that happens that rewards smart play or smart thinking, I'm all for. I'm for incentives towards. intelligence that is like my motto in life like i i just want everyone to make the right decision always of course that's life but it's i think this rewards smart teams and so that's why i like it um and also it provides so much fodder for twitter uh as soon as someone goes oh why they pick defense first you got shredded for 400 you know oh my god i please let this happen like this is going to be so much fun like i'm telling you like that would be so much fun to like just go

like some team goes some team goes hey we're running the ball great you know and they average like three and a half yards and then they decide to start on offense at their own 20 like stuff like that would just be so rewarding i i mean anytime they just decision making comes out like or decision making where we can decide as well that's a lot of fun and i get it this is so much fun for me because i'm not involved with it but it's but the but i exactly what you're saying it's going to reward that CEO type of coach or a team like the ravens that has like 10 analysts on their team like an analytically minded people in the front office. It's like it's going to reward those teams.

But guess what? The nudge to all the other teams to get those types of people. And this is an incentive for them. It nudges them towards that types of thinking. So I'm all for it. And I love it. I love any type of these kind of changes, anything to tweak over time to make it a little more exciting

because it usually just turns into a don't lose battle. And I just want teams to try to win. You always want teams to try to win. That's why in soccer it's three points for a win and one point for a tie, not two points for a win at one point for a tie. because a win is three points that much more valuable. And so any time do you have an incentive like this, I like.

I'm totally for it. I think the overtime is just so boring and anything to inject a little bit of excitement into it. I completely support. All right. Yeah. That is all we got. Thank you so much to Lewis Redick for stopping by.

I thoroughly enjoyed our conversation. It's always great to chat with him. We'll be back next week. A lot of fun stuff for you guys. Mike Sando is going to be here for Tuesday's show. We're going to talk about some of the quarterback movement that's happened in the NFL. We have a lot more on tap for next week as it relates to this free agent class,

but also free agency in general. We're going to kind of continue with these bigger picture looks at the way that free agency has worked, the way that it does work for specific parties throughout the league. So please come back and check that out next week. Please rate and review the podcast on your podcast platform of choice. That would mean a lot to me. Please subscribe to the athletic. There's so much free agency coverage on the athletic right now.

It is just, and draft stuff. Dane Buegler, everything that Sheel is doing, there's an endless amount of stuff. It is indispensable if you were caring about and learning about the NFL at this point in the calendar. The athletic.com slash football show. Please go check that out. We'll be back next week. Always good to talk to you guys. We'll talk to you later.

This was the Athletic Football Show.