The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Offseason Interview Series: Colts GM Chris Ballard

Episode Date: July 2, 2021

Robert Mays continues the Offseason Interview Series by welcoming Colts GM Chris Ballard to the show. Chris details his time in Chicago, the move to trade for Carson Wentz, his biggest weakness as a general manager and much more.Subscribe to The Athletic with our exclusive discount at theathletic.com/footballshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic football show. Welcome to the athletic football show. I'm Robert Mays. Very excited about today's show. It's the next installment in our off-season interview series. Really have looked forward to this one for a while. I've been meeting to get him on. Colts General Manager, Chris Ballard.

Chris, how you doing? I'm good. Thanks for having me on. You are coming to us from an idyllic lakeshore recording spot, which is making me, there's a lot of envy on this side the microphone. I can tell you that right now. We come to northern Wisconsin every summer. And this is the only seven days we could get away. And really, it's only going to be five for my son. And I think, well, either my wife or I, whoever gets, has to take him back to Cincinnati

for a baseball tournament. So with five kids, it's hard to get away. And, you know, a few years ago, we asked our children, we said, well, they loved coming up here. So we just kind of made this our permanent spot. It's incredible. It's beautiful. The weather's great. It's about 70 degrees right now and just not a cloud in the sky, not a, the water's light glass. We're the same same thing over here after it being rainy and awful for a week. It's like 70 in Chicago, which is awesome. So we don't have a ton of time. I want to start off with the pressing question, the one that everybody has been asking. If Jay Cutler does not get hurt in 2011, do the Bears win the Super Bowl? That was, was a great team. I thought he was one of our best teams in Chicago. And we were seven and three.

We just beat a really good San Diego team. And really, we had already gone through the hard part of our schedule. And it was unfortunate, but I mean, I thought it was better than the 2010 team. And, you know, we were humming and, you know, Jay was, Jay was playing really good football. You know, defensively, we were, you know, it was this good a three-year run. 2010, 11, and 12 that I've been a part of in 21 years in this league defensively. And unfortunately, you know, you got to win a Super Bowl for those defenses to get recognized. But when you just look at the players defensively that we had, I mean, it was incredible with, you know, with Peppers and Briggs and Erlacker and Tillman and, you know, Tim Jennings was playing at a really high level.

Daniel Manning. Chris Harris, we brought back. Chris Harris was back. Oh, yeah, is he a Donaget? I mean, Henry Mountain was starting to come into his own. I mean, it was a freaking good, it was a, who had a good defense? It was a great defense. And then offensively, and it was a shame.

Holy cow, just remember the games we lost. We lost, we lost, we lost to Kansas City. They hit a Hail Mary. Remember this at the end of the half. Yeah, I do remember that. And then, and then we lose with the Tebow game. We lose the Tebow. It's the Marion Barber game.

Marion Barber goes out of bounds and stops the club. block. How I can't believe you remember that. Also, tight one in Oakland. I mean, Caleb Haney was, it was playing quarterback. And then, you know, believe it or not, that's when we signed McCown at the end of the year. You know, Josh. And, you know, you're kind of looking back on it. You wonder if you had Josh the whole time, if we might not have been in a different spot. But a great team, unfortunate. But,

but, you know, that was a really good run there. You always laugh when people say that Jay, you know, we didn't win with Jay. I disagree with that statement. You know, nice. First year, I think we went 8 and 8 or 7 and 9. But then after that, you know, 2010, we went to the NFC championship game. 2011, which we thought was our best team. That was the only finished, I think, 8 and 8.

And then, you know, 2012, we went 10 and 6 and we didn't make the playoffs. But I thought Lovie had, Lovie and Jerry had the formula. You know, we're going to play defense. I'm going to run the ball. Then we're going to play action. pass and you know that's when jay was at his best i've always used you as an excuse to talk about that so i appreciate that you're letting everyone know and reminding everyone that that that could have happened if that hadn't happened so thank you very much i did that's good it was a good that's a good

run man it's probably silly to people that we started off that way but you and i have lamented that before and i wanted an excuse for you to be the one saying it and not me no i still oh look i still root for the bears i want it's a it's a it's a unbelievable sport city um what i mean the The NFL's better when they're good. And, you know, the fans deserve it. I'm rooting hard for those guys and want them to do well. So let's stick with some heartbreaking moments, okay? You guys go 10 and 6 in 2018.

Andrew throws 49 touchdown passes that year. You guys trade back in the draft. You get Quentin, Darius Leonard, Braden Smith. You're clearly heading places. It's your second year on the job. And then Andrew retires. And, you know, you've talked about this, said nausea, but the thing that I'm really interested in is over the next couple of years,

suddenly the most important piece of your plan, what you were building around, is now gone. At any point before this year, were you ever concerned that with the sequence of events that happened, you guys might be left in no man's land a little bit, where you were too good to draft a quarterback, but you didn't have a long-term answer that could get you over the top? Was that ever a concern over the last couple off seasons? No. I mean, Frank, I mean, one beautiful thing about Frank now, he believes he's got great confidence in his coaching ability.

That's what I love about him. I mean, he just, you know, whoever we put in the game at quarterback, we're going to find a way to win, you know, that's his mentality. I'd be lying if I sit here and tell you, it wasn't a, it didn't sting when Andrew retired. just, you know, we're talking about a top five quarterback in the league. And we had, we had finally thought we had got things around him that were going to be really pretty spay. We, we were going to do some really special things. We ran out of gas in 2018, you know, the one in five start. And then,

you know, we, we went on a great run and then beat Tennessee the last game of the year to get in the playoffs and went to Houston and won a big playoff game versus a, you know, division rival. And then just, you know, got beat by a better team in Kansas City and running. out of gas. So going into 19 with the entire team coming back, you know, we thought, you know, loaded with draft pick, we thought, man, we got a chance to really set this thing up for long-term success. And then, you know, Andrew retires. And I remember Frank, Jim and Frank, Mr. Ursa and I talking and, and, you know, kind of all of our message was we're not going to, we're not going to make an excuse. I mean, there's not going to be an excuse. We're not going to, we're not going to let

anybody flinch, you know, during this moment. We're going to keep moving forward. We're going to keep building it the way we know the right way to build it, or try not to make any true panic moves and keep doing, you know, things the right way. And we'll get to where we want to go. We'll evaluate the quarterback position, you know, each and every year. Philip, you know, we went with Jacoby the one year. And he got unfairly criticized. I mean, Jacoby could have done some things better. I think he would tell you that. But also, I thought he took some unfair criticisms. And then we had the opportunity to sign Philip and you know it was just a unique opportunity you know here's a future hall of fame quarterback and you got the head coach and the offensive coordinator who both are familiar

with him and have been with him and coached him so it i thought he was a seamless transition last year offensively because he knew what he was coming into now to get used to the players and how we did things and we're dealing with covid but you know that was fun i mean that was that was that was this fun of season as i've ever been a part of as hard as it was with covid it was his fun of a football season because of Philip. Philip made it fun. Every day was fun for Philip. I've never been around a guy that loves playing more than Philip Rivers. You know, and then we go into this offseason and the opportunity to get Carson, who Frank also is very familiar with. We weren't going to make an excuse. We're going to continue to turn over every stone. We'll continue to

evaluate the draft like we do every year. The funny thing I always think, Robert, is like everybody thinks these court, like just because you take one. I said this. at the end of the year. Just because you take a quarterback in the first round, don't make it right. The guy's got to be able to play. The pressure that comes, the pressure that comes with being a first round quarterback or a first round pick in general, the expectations are really are really high. So you need to be right. And patience, we think our patience will pay off. Carson's a young guy. He's 29 years old. He's got to do things better. And he knows that. He's got to play better. But I think that combination.

of Frank and Carson together with Marcus Brady and the pieces we've put around them, I think it's going to be a good thing. But saying all that, like until we know, we'll continue to evaluate the position each and every year. I want to ask you about Carson in a second, but when you were looking at the quarterbacks in this year's draft, did you think this might be a year where you could have made a move in the first round if necessary because it might have been your only route to getting a guy for the future? No, it's a good question. Look, I think any year you want to get up if you really believe like if you believe you're going to get a franchise

quarterback you do whatever it takes it doesn't matter i don't care if you're sitting at 32 if you're at 32 and you believe in the guy and you're willing to give up i mean would anybody what would you give up for pat my homes right now what would you give up for aaron rogers and his when he was you know when he was a young player for a superstar quarterback you really have that conviction you do whatever it takes to go get him so i think in any not just this year's draft, but any draft, we're going to have the mentality that if there's a guy we like, we would go get him. And there was guys in this draft that we liked. But we, you know, one thing we did is we compared Carson, you know, coming out to who was in this year's draft. And we thought

Carson measured very favorably against them. And he's been in this league and he's performed. And he's played it on a really high level. So I'm curious how that conversation unfolded with Carson and about Carson. Did you go to Frank and say this seems possible, or did you ask about his interest in Carson before you started trying to go down that road? Look, I mean, one thing Frank does is he builds great relationship with players. So I remember when even in 2018, he would, he would always just compare like, hey, Andrew does this really well. But, you know, Carson does this really well. So I had a good indication that he liked him. But, you know, after the season, when we started hearing that Carson could be available, we had long discussions about it.

And when I started talking to Howie and Philly, you know, we really delved into it. And it wasn't just Frank and I. We had a lot of, we have some really good scouts in our building and some really good coaches. Ultimately, Frank and I and Jim made the decision. But we wanted to get their take on what they thought. look, Carson's got some things he's got to do better. And he's got some work and he's worked really hard this offseason on him. But I think it's going to be fun to watch this year.

I think it's going to be fun to watch Carson and our team come together and play together. It's not, it's always great because everybody just think it's going to be rosy right from the start. But there's always going to be a bumpy road. I mean, there just is. I mean, last year with Phillip, like the first four or five games of the season. You know, the sky's falling. Oh, the sky's falling at all points, you know. And you just, it's a long season.

You've got to be able to handle that. Carson will handle that because Frank and Marcus and our staff will do a good job handling it. What do you think is the most important thing Frank said to you about Carson, what he still saw in him that made you feel good about making the move? What's the most important nugget you got from Frank during that process? I believe in him. It's easy. I believe in him.

That's all. I mean, it's hard to, when you've got a coach that is, as good as Frank is. And I think he's really special. I believe in Carson. Now, we studied it, and we saw some things on tape that we thought he could do better that needed work. But I believe in him.

I mean, when your head coach is your offensive, you know, he's running the offense too, heavily involved in the quarterback position. When he said, I believed in him, then, you know, it's hard to, it's hard to argue that. Now, of course, of course, I play devil's advocate at times. But I like to, you know, I'm on board with it. too. I like Carson too. Loved him coming out to North Dakota State, had a connection with his college coach Craig Bowle who recruited me in college. So I had a lot of insight to Carson when he was coming out. And then my connections in Philly with Howie and Doug and listen to them talk about him

through the years. So we knew there was for all, everybody focuses on the latest negative, but there was sure a lot of positive early in his career. And look, I credit, I credit Howie and Philly. What an easiest deal to get done. But I think at the end of the day, we both, worked into getting a deal that was fair for both sides, which is always kind of what I want to get done. And you have so much faith in Frank and what he's accomplished and what he is as a play caller and a coach. And I know that. What would you say you've come to appreciate working with him up close that other people probably can't really understand from afar? He's got tremendous conviction in his belief as a coach. All right. And he's very, sometimes I didn't always come across because he's so

humble. He's such a humble servant. He's a tremendous leader. He's got great presence. But it's his conviction. I mean, he has got unbelievable conviction. I mean, even even the first off season that we were together, it was funny because he goes, Chris, we're going to, we're going to win Timelham games. You know, and I just, I'm coming off four wins season. And I'm like, holy crap, right, man. We, you know, we're about to start with about four or five rookies here. We got a lot of work to do. Andrew, we're still trying to figure out if Andrew's shoulder's going to be right. So that's just him, though. I mean, that's just strange.

So to get Carson, you guys had to trade away multiple draft picks, which I know hurts you, like deep into your soul. You guys consistently trade down. You consistently acquire picks. And I'm curious how you personally approach uncertainty in the draft. Because I think there are people who would claim that admitting there is uncertainty, admitting that it's a 50-50 proposition at times can minimize the scouting process and minimize how important it is. So how do you square the uncertainty of the process with the hours and hours of work that you guys put it?

The character of the player. We want to minimize risk by getting the character to the player right. And it's easier said to die. And it's hard to do. It's hard to find out the truth about the players you're bringing into your building. and but you know we are scouting staff and brian decker um and you know all our coaches we dig we dig countless hours on character and to me that helps us minimize some risk and like this is the first i you this year was hard on me not trading back um until like in the sixth round

and you know because that's just our that's just i mean that's who we are and we do understand the uncertainty in the draft and the more picks you have, the better chance, you know, to hit gold. But we think also, even when we don't have as many picks, we're going to create more certainty and, you know, take that 50-50 up to 80-20 just by getting the character right. We can get the talent right. I mean, we're not perfect and we're always going to screw it. But to me, the hard thing is to get the character right, not the talent we can all see. The character is the hardest part to to get right. There's so much on these kids right now. You know, and they're coming to a league and they got time and money on their hands.

But at the end of the day, man, they got to love to play. They got to love to compete. At some point in their life, it'll be nice if they've overcome something because they're going to get their ass whipped and they're going to fail in our league. And they got to get up and overcome it. And that's hard for, that's hard for people that's never failed before. So we thank character. and then being disciplined with it, I'm the worst. Like, you have no idea. Like, I get credit for everything, but that ain't the truth.

I mean, I got a great group of scouts, and they keep me sober at all points. I will keep guys up on the board until the last minute, and they just fight tooth and nail like Chris, he does not fit. We do. What would you say is your biggest weakness when it comes to picking players? What's the blind spot that they have to check the most? Oh, it's the character. You're talking about a guy that came from King.

Kingsville, Texas, Texas A&M Kingsville, we coached and they came from all over. And look, I've got a, I've got a real flaw. I think I can fix everybody. I do. I believe in people, and I think everybody has good in them, and I can fix them. But the problem is I'm not coaching them every day. And I'm giving a coach, a player that, you know, has issues, and he's got to be in there handling it every day and I'm in my office watching tape on next year's draft.

So that's not fair to them. So and it's a and look, it's a, it's a fine line. I, we're not drafting, you know, perfect children here and perfect players from a carry. They, all of them got a little something going on. But they better love to play. They better love to compete. They better love to work. They've got to have a certain sense of empathy for others and humbleness for others so they can really. fit into the team concept. All those things we're looking for. And when I see a really talented player, I've got to be beat on the head that he doesn't fit us. And look, it took me a long time to Lerdness. Jerry Angelo, and I thought Jerry was really good. Jerry was big on character. And I would

be the one in the building all the time. Like, man, we just take this guy. It doesn't matter. Jerry would be all right. And he always would warn me. And he was right. How I'm curious, you know, you have your weak spots and you admit them. I'm wondering how as a GM you improve at drafting players. What goes into that? Is it post-mortems? Do you study trends associated with positions? How do you actively try to get better in that area as a general manager?

Well, I mean, we evaluate everything right after the draft every year. I mean, everything we've done. I've got a great staff. And like one of the things that I've, like, want to be challenged. Like it, what sucks? Sometimes it sucks having the title of general manager because I want to be challenged. But the title, like people see the title and they treat you differently. But when we're, when we're making decisions on players in player acquisition, whether it's pro, collie, whatever we're doing, I want to be challenged. And really, I want to be

challenged on everything because that's how we get to the right answer and that's how we improve. And that's how we continue to try to improve our draft hit rate. And look, you're never going to be perfect. You're going to have misses. Lord knows we've had them. But we want to be as close to the hole and get as many right as we can. But the only way as a general manager I'll continue to improve is that I have people that are willing to challenge each and every day my thinking, because I'm challenging their thinking. I'm not challenging who they are. I'm challenging their thinking. And I want people to challenge my thinking. There's days I don't want to hear it.

There's days that, oh, crap, man, I don't want to deal with this today. But I have a tremendous group. I mean, from Ed Dyes, the Kevin Rogers to Morocco Brown, to John Shaw, Joey Ellum. I can name them all, Jamie Moore, you know, Chad Henry. I mean, I just got this great group, all of them. And they've gotten to a point, like a few of them always would challenge. But now all of them are challenge. And that's when you know you've got something good.

And we can't be scared to admit our mistakes. Like when you screw it up, just admit it. And let's move on. Let's grow from it. And let's learn. You don't dealing with my son playing baseball. And baseball is hard sport. I mean, baseball is really hard.

It's a, it's a hard one to play. It's a hard game. It's a game of failure. And we learn more through our failures than we do our successes. You used to tell me this all the time. You've got to survive your mistakes. And he's right. And Lord knows I've had them.

But to me, that's the only way you're going to grow. You've got to have enough mistakes. You've got to have enough mistakes. You've got to survive them. And then that's when you really grow. I'm curious because you can admit that when you don't know something, which I've always appreciated, what area of either football or scouting do you think you currently need to know more about? Where is there a gap in your knowledge that you think you can work on? Well, I mean, I'm always been intrigued with the analytical end of it.

And I've suck at math. I'm not going to lot of you. I'm not very good at it. But it's we want to be able to find edges and create our 1% that gives us a gives us an edge. And you know, John Parker, our director of football research does a tremendous job. George Lee, what's the edge? You know, how are we going to use all this data that we have now to really, to really create an edge for us? And I, and it kills like if I could go back, if I could go back to in the eighth grade, seventh, eighth grade, I would have paid attention in geometry. Like, I would have paid attention to be better at math so I can understand that.

Like, it gets frustrating when you, when you don't understand. But the good news is I'm smart enough to get the right people around me, you know, to know, to know. Like, it's still football. Like, and I always put this in perspective because even as the game evolves and changes, it's still football. And they still got to perform. and, you know, it's still blocking and tackling. So the evaluation piece, like, I think you're always growing.

And I think you always, I think the more tape you watch, the better you're going to become, the more and the more you get to listen to other people and their opinions when they're watching a tape with you, they're going to see the game differently. Rod Marinelli was great. And he used to tell me he would watch players, you know, three or four different times, the same game, three or four different times. And so I'd start doing that. And he was, I'd always see something different. I'd always see some little nuance that I didn't see the first time. And I'd pick something up each and every time. And I always thought that was, that was a really good piece of advice that I've carried with me, you know, throughout the rest of my career.

And with the analytics, it's almost the same type of thinking, right? It's more just being able to look at something from a different angle. So even if you're looking at it again, just with someone else kind of informing the way that you're looking at it, even if you don't totally understand it, it's just a way to gain a different perspective. It's another tool. I am just right now. I'm all about decision making and, you know, how do we continue to have the right processes to make the right decisions?

Because judgment, our judgment is everything when you're making a decision. And why not use all the information? And that's what analytics does. And that's what scouts do. And that's what your coaches do. That's what the care. Like, you've got all this information. And I've always thought that, you know, whoever has the best character information, the best medical information, the best analytical data, they're the ones that are going to be the most accurate in the draft.

And that's what we challenge ourselves to do, is to, we want to have the best information out there. We're not perfect, but we sure strive each and every day to do that. So the last thing I want to ask you, you guys clearly want to build through the draft, develop, retain your own guys to the point that it frustrates your fan base a little bit. And if you look around the league and you see a lot of successful teams that blend and free, agency and in-house development to great success recently. So I'm just curious, what do you see as the pitfalls of free agency? What do you think early forays and free agency prevent you from doing elsewhere? Unfortunately, I've made some stupid statements in the media and they run with them.

That's okay. And then we're not the biggest spending team. But here's my, and we've been active in free agency. Like, always laugh when, like, we've got good players out of free agency and we've been successful. We're just not big fans of right out the gate free agency where you're paying B players A plus money, which is going to affect down the line. Like that's what people don't realize. Like when you pay somebody, like we went through this with the forest, like when we traded the one, well, now we're going to pay Buckner $21.5 million a year. There's a cost to that. And so we had to

know we were going to get a dominant player that was worth that money, which she is, both from a character and playing standpoint. And he was going to be able to handle it long term. But whenever you start doing that, you've got to be careful free agency wise because when you pay somebody else that big money, well, the guy that you got in that locker room is looking at it going, hey, I produced just as much as that guy. Why am I not making the same contract? So we think just picking our spots in free agency, trying to get it done with her own,

which is not easy. It's even harder now, Robert, the, you know, because you have the expectations of a cap that, you know, I think we're, what are we, 182-5 this year? And so you're talking 25 to $28 million swing of where it would have been without the pandemic. But we'll work to it. And our players know we want to keep them.

And we've done a pretty good job so far, keeping the players we wanted to keep in-house. We feel like we have a really good, I know culture, gets thrown around, but we do. I think we have a really good culture. It's one of accountability, one where they care about each other, one where they want to win, and they want to do special things. And we take care of them. Unequivocally, we take care of them, but we push them too. And we want good for them. And they want good for their teammates. And I know this kind of bled into the free agency thing, but when you've, when all of a sudden you look up, and I think when

we got here, we were one of the lowest homegrown teams in the league. It was in that post. like Goster chairless, like all of that wave. Yeah, I think we're in a, I think we're at a, I think we're starting to get at a spot where I'm, I'm feeling really good where we got enough homegrown players. Because now when you do bring in people, players from the outside, they train them. I mean, they train them. They know the expectations. They know what, what goes on day to day.

And they're the ones looking at each other in that eye and the eye. And that's, and how we do business. They'll teach them that and they'll show them the way. So I'm curious, like specifically with a position group, like, let's say you're receiving core, right? You brought back TY, but that was really the only move you guys made. What's the thought process of standing pat at a position like that or even corner? I think there are a similar conversation. Like when you're looking at those groups, what leads you to say, you know what?

I'm comfortable with what we have. Yeah, well, I'm betting on Michael Pittman, who I think he's got a chance to be really good. I thought he ended the year strong. He had a big playoff game with over 100 yards. Everybody just ignores Zach Pascall, but all he's done is catch 14 touchdowns over the last two years. And then getting Parrish Campbell back is a big bonus. And he's looked great during the offseason. So we think we're a little better than other people do.

I mean, even last year, I want to say we finished in the top 10 for Yak, I think even higher. I don't want to give up. But even with the group that everybody down, a talented group, I mean, is there a, is there a, is there a guy that, you know, you just line up and go, holy crap, man. How are we going to stop this guy? Maybe not. But they are really damn good players. And T.Y. Yilton can still play.

He can still play. He's a competitive. T.Y. Hilton is a competitive and good a teammate as I've ever been around. I can't, like, I couldn't be more proud of a kid over just watching him since I first walked into Jordan now. So we like our wide out group. And then at corner anymore is not the best nickel in the league. And he can do it all. He can cover.

He can play his own coverage. He can, I mean, it's like a linebacker position for us. We blitz him. We do a lot of different stuff with him. And Xavier, getting Xavier Rhodesback was big too. We really like Xavier. And we think he's got a really, you know, he's got years left. And he ended up being a really good leader for us on defense.

And then, you know, now with Rock, it's going to be a big year for Rockieson. But we think he showed some signs where we think he can do it. Bringing T.J. carry back. who can play multiple spots. And then getting Marvell Tell, this is one that people, because he opted out last year because of COVID, we thought he played, started some games for us in 19, getting him back. We think we've got a pretty good group with also some added young players in there that

we think's got some upside. And it seems like you don't want to block your young in-house guys from developing. You want to give them every single chance to succeed. Is that part of the thought process too, where you don't want to cut their legs out, from under them development-wise? Well, you've got to play to get better. You know, I mean... Yeah, exactly.

And when you... I mean, when you just start looking at the cap with it going down, so what's going to come down the pipe in the future? Like, we can't go... You know, your quarterback's making good money. DeForce is making good money. Ron Kelly's making good money. You just start looking.

You know, we've got to pay Braden Smith, got to pay Darius Linder, got to play Quentin Nelson. There's a lot of players on the roster, and we can't pay them all, unfortunately. So you can't just have a team full of full up vets. You've got to go through some growing pains with some of these young players and still win going along the way, which we've been able to do. I'm pretty sure the last position group of yours were before the season.

I was like, I don't know if they have enough there, was the secondary last year that ended up being full of guys like Julian Blackman and Carrey Willis and Xavier Road. So you deserve the benefit of the doubt at this point. I'm going to give it to you. They always give you benefit of the doubt until something. bad until something bad happens and then they then they kick you in the teeth that's all right i take it all right i'm going to let you go enjoy that nice lake and your vacation and the time off

that you have very much earned i really really appreciate the time it's always good to chat with you i'm sure we'll catch up down the road talk to you soon yeah same here rob be good man stay in touch i appreciate you