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Press Pass | Brian Thomas Jr. Introductory Press Conference · Press Pass

0:00
Speaker 1: Hey, Brian, congratulations Gene Furnette with the Florida Times Union.
0:05
Speaker 1: When you look at this team's receiver room, the experience
0:09
Speaker 1: that you have, you have already there with with Gabe Davis,
0:14
Speaker 1: Christian Kirk, including tight end Evan Ingram, and you look
0:18
Speaker 1: that Trevor has already been in the league for three years.
0:22
Speaker 1: What are your expectations as a rookie given all the
0:28
Speaker 1: mentorship that you have both in the receiver room and
0:31
Speaker 1: in the starting quarterback.
0:33
Speaker 2: My expect my expectations are to just come in earn
0:37
Speaker 2: the trust of the quarterback and the trust of my
0:38
Speaker 2: teammates coaching staff to know, like, when opportunity to present
0:43
Speaker 2: this Stuff'm gonna go out there and give my give
0:45
Speaker 2: my all, go out there and make the make the play.
0:48
Speaker 2: I would say that was my expectations coming in.
0:51
Speaker 1: As a follow up, could you just talk a little
0:53
Speaker 1: bit about your level of excitement. Obviously, when the drafts happen,
0:56
Speaker 1: you you have no idea where you're going, and all
0:58
Speaker 1: of a sudden you land on on this particular team,
1:02
Speaker 1: and you are obviously familiar with coach Peterson a little bit, right,
1:06
Speaker 1: and what the Jaguars have done and what they have.
1:09
Speaker 1: What was your level of excitement that Jacksonville was your destination.
1:13
Speaker 2: I was super excited to be on my way to
1:15
Speaker 2: Jacksonville and just being able to share that moment when
1:18
Speaker 2: my parents have my family there. It was a great
1:21
Speaker 2: experience for me. It was a great, great time just
1:23
Speaker 2: to have them there with me and Jacksonville or somewhere
1:26
Speaker 2: I felt like I could fit in at So I
1:28
Speaker 2: was very excited.
1:32
Speaker 1: Mike Draco with ESPN, pretty good legacy of LSU receivers
1:36
Speaker 1: in the NFL, especially recently, kind of feel like you
1:38
Speaker 1: kind of have to live up to that.
1:41
Speaker 2: I'm just trying to be myself. I don't feel like
1:44
Speaker 2: I have to live up to know expectations. Just gonna
1:47
Speaker 2: come out there, work hard, do what I can do
1:50
Speaker 2: and to the best of my ability.
1:52
Speaker 3: So yes, sir, I think people are wondering what number
1:55
Speaker 3: were you wear.
1:56
Speaker 1: Or do you want to wear?
1:58
Speaker 2: You know a number I want to wear, but as
2:02
Speaker 2: of right now, I'm being number eighty.
2:07
Speaker 4: Hey, Brian Jamal Saints here with news for jackson What
2:11
Speaker 4: was the first interaction you had with the Jaguars and
2:13
Speaker 4: when did you maybe get a feel that Doug Peterson
2:15
Speaker 4: and Trent were interested in bringing you here to Jacksonville.
2:19
Speaker 2: My first interaction was was this a combine? I had
2:23
Speaker 2: a formal meeting that went well to me. Then I
2:27
Speaker 2: came on a top thirty visit and I left her
2:30
Speaker 2: pretty confident knowing that I had I had did the
2:33
Speaker 2: best that I can do. So I would say that yep.
2:36
Speaker 5: Hey, Brian Chris Porter from First Coast News, welcome to Duvall.
2:40
Speaker 5: Last night I heard you talking about you being a
2:42
Speaker 5: man of faith. You had an opportunity today to walk
2:46
Speaker 5: through the facility see them a little bit. Can you
2:48
Speaker 5: just walk me through what it was like today actually
2:52
Speaker 5: being here in Jacksonville and understanding this is my new home.
2:56
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a great feeling just being able to experience
2:59
Speaker 2: this with my pain, my family. It's a great feeling
3:02
Speaker 2: just to know that I'll be here in Jacksonville, not
3:05
Speaker 2: too long, just this is where I'll be staying. Just
3:08
Speaker 2: amazing feelings.
3:10
Speaker 5: Also, I know that you're a two sports star. You
3:12
Speaker 5: could ball, You were one of one of Louisiana's top
3:16
Speaker 5: basketball players and really didn't take football seriously until midway
3:19
Speaker 5: through your high school career. When did you know football
3:22
Speaker 5: is your sport?
3:24
Speaker 2: Football has been my sport since I was six years old.
3:27
Speaker 2: I just I took a year off my ninth grade
3:30
Speaker 2: year just to get stronger. I came in high school,
3:32
Speaker 2: I wasn't I was a little leaner. So I was
3:36
Speaker 2: just took a year off to get a little stronger.
3:38
Speaker 2: But football has always been my main sport.
3:40
Speaker 6: Yes, sir, Hey, Brian Demitris Harvey with the Florida Times Union,
3:46
Speaker 6: could you just talk about your royal ship with your
3:50
Speaker 6: dad and sort of growing up? You know, I know
3:52
Speaker 6: he was focused a lot on basketball, but just in
3:55
Speaker 6: terms of his athletics and how it sort of, you know,
3:58
Speaker 6: dropped down to you and then now your you're sort
4:00
Speaker 6: of moving up into the NFL.
4:02
Speaker 2: Uh, Well, my dad, I got a great relationship. I
4:05
Speaker 2: wouldn't wouldn't say he focused more on basketball than anything.
4:09
Speaker 2: He Uh, he really left it up to me whatever
4:11
Speaker 2: I wanted to do. Uh he was support me. Uh
4:14
Speaker 2: support me one hundred percent. So I would I mean
4:16
Speaker 2: he was he was whatever whatever I wanted to do.
4:18
Speaker 2: He will be there for me. Uh He's gonna continue
4:20
Speaker 2: to do that for me.
4:24
Speaker 7: Hi Brani Mark along with ap Uh. Can you just
4:26
Speaker 7: take it through last night after we spoke to you,
4:29
Speaker 7: what was the night like for you? A little bit
4:31
Speaker 7: of wharl winner did it calm down at some point?
4:33
Speaker 7: And then what was it like flying in today on
4:36
Speaker 7: the on the private jet? And you know how cool
4:38
Speaker 7: is that of an experience?
4:41
Speaker 2: Uh? Night when night was pretty long, had a lot
4:43
Speaker 2: of interviews and stuff. But once I got back to
4:45
Speaker 2: the hotel and got back to the room and chilled
4:47
Speaker 2: out a little bit, I was able to go go
4:49
Speaker 2: to go to sleep, get a couple of hours of sleep.
4:51
Speaker 2: Came in this morning on the private jet. That was
4:53
Speaker 2: my first time experiencing being on a private jet. Uh,
4:56
Speaker 2: it was amazing.
4:57
Speaker 7: Uh So yeah, is that the closest thing to tell
5:01
Speaker 7: you had with you?
5:02
Speaker 2: Yeah? Is there?
5:06
Speaker 8: Jp Shadick with Jaguars Radio for Brian and coach. So
5:10
Speaker 8: there's a lot of talk around here about football IQ
5:12
Speaker 8: and the importance of being a smart player. How in
5:15
Speaker 8: the discussions of the Jaguars, Brian, how much did that
5:18
Speaker 8: come up? And what did you have to show to them?
5:20
Speaker 8: And then coach what did he what stood out about
5:23
Speaker 8: that process? Brian?
5:24
Speaker 2: Go ahead, Uh, it came up just like well, taking
5:27
Speaker 2: the little tests or whatever how they test you try
5:30
Speaker 2: to see how you remember things how you learn things.
5:32
Speaker 2: So I would say it came up and doing us.
5:35
Speaker 2: I would say my football IQ is one of the
5:36
Speaker 2: biggest things that helped me out when I'm out there
5:39
Speaker 2: playing coach.
5:42
Speaker 9: Yeah, it's the things we saw, you know, on tape
5:44
Speaker 9: and when you talk to coaches and people close to Brian,
5:48
Speaker 9: you know, the the level of comfort there and understanding
5:50
Speaker 9: his offense, understanding you know, his role in that offense,
5:55
Speaker 9: being able to run just about every route you know
5:57
Speaker 9: in the rout tree. And you know, I said last night,
6:00
Speaker 9: there's gonna be some different routes that we're gonna ask
6:02
Speaker 9: him to do and utilize his skill set that way,
6:04
Speaker 9: and and it's gonna take some time. It's gonna take
6:06
Speaker 9: some new learning obviously with a new system, but very confident.
6:11
Speaker 9: You know, we've got, uh, you know, a rookie rookie
6:14
Speaker 9: mini camp coming up and then the rest of the
6:15
Speaker 9: off season program, so you know, we're gonna do everything
6:18
Speaker 9: we can to get him caught up to speed as
6:20
Speaker 9: as fast as we can and get him plugged in.
6:24
Speaker 10: Uh.
6:25
Speaker 6: Yeah, Doug, can you talk about what Brian's skills will
6:28
Speaker 6: do in terms of creating room ideally underneath and things
6:31
Speaker 6: like that and the pressure that his skills are gonna
6:33
Speaker 6: put on the opponent.
6:34
Speaker 9: Yeah, I think the number one thing you see is
6:36
Speaker 9: that the speed right on film, and you see the
6:39
Speaker 9: ability to get behind secondary and and the and the
6:42
Speaker 9: second and third level defenders. And that's that's big obviously
6:45
Speaker 9: in our league. And then you know, again I mentioned
6:47
Speaker 9: last night too, there's gonna be some different coverages that
6:50
Speaker 9: that that he's gonna see, you know here at the
6:51
Speaker 9: NFL level, and and a lot of teams try to
6:54
Speaker 9: keep that, you know, at Bay they try not to
6:58
Speaker 9: get receivers behind you and and you know, but it's
7:01
Speaker 9: our job as coaches to make sure that we create
7:03
Speaker 9: opportunities to do that and utilize that that speed and
7:06
Speaker 9: so what what that does then opens up the second
7:08
Speaker 9: level area. That's where you know, those you know, twelve
7:13
Speaker 9: fifteen to twenty twenty five yard ranges are really important.
7:18
Speaker 9: And that's that's where you can spend a lot of
7:20
Speaker 9: time and make a lot of uh, make a lot
7:22
Speaker 9: of catches in those areas. And with what we saw
7:24
Speaker 9: on tape, you know, with Brian and being able to
7:28
Speaker 9: you know, separate at the top of the route and
7:30
Speaker 9: and you know, use that athleticism and and use his
7:33
Speaker 9: strength and his size, you know, to to create some
7:37
Speaker 9: some openness there in that second second level.
7:42
Speaker 3: Brian, congratulations, I'm all cunder pomp brand with News for Jackson.
7:46
Speaker 9: Has it sink in yet that you were a first
7:49
Speaker 9: round draft pick now an NFL athlete?
7:51
Speaker 4: Uh?
7:52
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was getting there as as a time go by,
7:56
Speaker 2: sinking in more and more.
8:00
Speaker 3: Breton Martineau with Action Sports Shacks Trent, how much of
8:03
Speaker 3: this was putting together kind of a piece of the
8:06
Speaker 3: puzzle and with Gabe Davis's acquisition and now Brian, the
8:10
Speaker 3: big play capability of this offense, you know, coming off
8:15
Speaker 3: last year, was that something you guys targeted that you
8:17
Speaker 3: needed to do better?
8:18
Speaker 10: Yeah, I think yes to all that. I mean, it
8:21
Speaker 10: was certainly something that we targeted within the system. You know, again,
8:26
Speaker 10: as you talk to the coach, we're looking for ideal fits,
8:29
Speaker 10: and he's an ideal fit, you know, for what the
8:31
Speaker 10: coaching staff is looking for, for what we feel we
8:34
Speaker 10: need to expand offensively. So all of it, I mean
8:39
Speaker 10: in a culture fit like we talk about, you know,
8:41
Speaker 10: bringing in the type of guys that fit into this
8:43
Speaker 10: locker room, fit into this community, and you know he
8:47
Speaker 10: checked all the boxes that.
8:48
Speaker 3: Way, One more follow if you don't mind just looking
8:50
Speaker 3: at tonight. What's the next few hours like for you guys?
8:53
Speaker 3: You have capital? Are you going to be sliding around?
8:57
Speaker 3: Do you want to slide around? Or anticipates sty.
9:00
Speaker 10: But well, again, I mean we've already reached out. There's
9:03
Speaker 10: there's a chance we do some things to try to
9:06
Speaker 10: move up. Uh, there's no guarantees that that's going to happen.
9:10
Speaker 10: We feel good at the pick we're at that we're
9:12
Speaker 10: going to get a good football player. So if the
9:14
Speaker 10: opportunity arises and we can move up, we'll do so.
9:18
Speaker 10: If the if the we stand pat we'll do that,
9:21
Speaker 10: and there's a chance we move back. You know, everything's
9:24
Speaker 10: on the table right now. We feel the board is
9:26
Speaker 10: in good shape. We like a lot of the options
9:29
Speaker 10: that we have in front of us, and we'll just
9:31
Speaker 10: see how the early round goes.
9:34
Speaker 7: Trent, you've experienced a lot of drafts. Last night was
9:38
Speaker 7: unique and the first fourteen offensive guys, what did you
9:41
Speaker 7: make of that? And do you and Doug feel like
9:43
Speaker 7: that's maybe where we're headed as a league with you know,
9:48
Speaker 7: everything being so offensive?
9:52
Speaker 10: That question, No, I think it's you know, every every
9:58
Speaker 10: draft takes on its own identity, you know, and this
10:00
Speaker 10: one obviously was slanted toward the offensive side. I think
10:04
Speaker 10: as you move further along here in the second round,
10:07
Speaker 10: you're probably gonna see a lot of defensive guys start
10:09
Speaker 10: to come off the board. You know, it's a need
10:13
Speaker 10: based league right now, not that it always hasn't been.
10:17
Speaker 10: I think there's value in this second round. There's gonna
10:20
Speaker 10: be a lot of guys that come out of this
10:22
Speaker 10: second round and end up starting in the National Football League.
10:25
Speaker 10: So I wouldn't discount this day. It's an important day
10:28
Speaker 10: for us, important day for a lot of teams around
10:30
Speaker 10: the league.
10:33
Speaker 4: Hey, Trent, Doug, this is for either of you. How
10:38
Speaker 4: much does we were talking about Brian being a basketball player.
10:40
Speaker 4: How much does a guy be in a two sport
10:42
Speaker 4: athlete matter in the evaluation process. I think this is
10:44
Speaker 4: the third year in a row that your first round
10:46
Speaker 4: pick has also played basketball in high school. How much
10:49
Speaker 4: does that account as you kind of try and figure
10:51
Speaker 4: out who these guys are in the athletic profile, you know,
10:54
Speaker 4: I like.
10:54
Speaker 9: Guys that they play multiple sports, you know, growing up.
10:57
Speaker 9: I just think it makes the more of a well
10:58
Speaker 9: rounded athlete, you know, and in different skill sets, right,
11:02
Speaker 9: But at the same time, I think it benefits the
11:04
Speaker 9: player and and it just gives them, you know, that
11:08
Speaker 9: athleticism you're looking for. So I'm all for guys that
11:11
Speaker 9: that you know, play multiple sports, whether it's you know,
11:14
Speaker 9: big guys that wrestle or things of that nature. I mean,
11:17
Speaker 9: you know, he's not a wrestler, but but but a
11:21
Speaker 9: dual spot guy that you know, or a track guy
11:23
Speaker 9: you know. I mean, it's just a different skill set
11:25
Speaker 9: that it turns them into really good athletes.
11:29
Speaker 7: This is for Trent.
11:30
Speaker 1: Trent, you said last week that if the need excuse me,
11:35
Speaker 1: if the talent level was pretty close, that you would
11:39
Speaker 1: maybe favor a little bit more need over in that situation.
11:43
Speaker 1: Obviously you had great need at cornerback, great need at receiver.
11:47
Speaker 1: What was kind of the was the tipping point for
11:49
Speaker 1: taking Brian? Was it the talent separation or was it
11:54
Speaker 1: in any way need because it seems like the need
11:58
Speaker 1: was pretty much the same, So was it.
12:00
Speaker 10: Lily the combination of everything? You know, And again, when
12:03
Speaker 10: you look at Brian and you know where he's been,
12:07
Speaker 10: the type of young man he is, you know, the
12:10
Speaker 10: ability to check all the boxes as far as what
12:12
Speaker 10: we're looking for in players. You know, there were a
12:16
Speaker 10: lot of good football players on the board. He happens
12:19
Speaker 10: to be one of them. You know, not to discredit
12:23
Speaker 10: anybody else, but at seventeen, like we said last night,
12:26
Speaker 10: you know, Brian would have been the pick, and he
12:28
Speaker 10: ended up being the pick at twenty three. So we're
12:31
Speaker 10: just fortunate, fortunate to have him and looking forward to
12:34
Speaker 10: getting him on the grass.
12:36
Speaker 1: How nervous were you as the picks are going by,
12:40
Speaker 1: hoping that.
12:41
Speaker 10: Brian would getting nervous, I had to settle coach down.
12:45
Speaker 5: Now.
12:46
Speaker 10: You know, there's always some angst right when you trade
12:49
Speaker 10: back and you you know you're looking at the board.
12:51
Speaker 10: We just felt really good about the way the board looked,
12:54
Speaker 10: Like I said last night, the teams that were in
12:56
Speaker 10: between seventeen and twenty three and their needs. You know,
13:01
Speaker 10: you can't control someone else trading in between you, but
13:04
Speaker 10: you just do the best you can to analyze the
13:06
Speaker 10: situation and you hope for the best once you make
13:09
Speaker 10: the trade.
13:11
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you.
13:12
Speaker 6: All right, we're gonna have it. You guys have the
13:14
Speaker 6: front right here.
13:14
Speaker 8: You skills