Latest / NFL explained. / Kevin Mawae: Blocking for 1,000-yard rushers, How He Helped Change the Current NFL, Training Camp Pancakes

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Kevin Mawae: Blocking for 1,000-yard rushers, How He Helped Change the Current NFL, Training Camp Pancakes · NFL explained.

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: But if I had to put one over the other,
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: it would be my dad to watching work in the military.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: My dad's uniform was starch. They never looked sloppy. I mean, man,
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: it's like it was details and that those things mold you.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: I think everybody should be able to say that their
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: mom and dads are number one people.
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: What's up? Everybody on peanuts to him?
• 0:33
  Speaker 3: And this is the NFL Player's Second Act podcast with
• 0:36
  Speaker 3: me as always my trusy co host Roman Harper, Roman Harper, Yeah, let's.
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: Go, let's go.
• 0:46
  Speaker 3: That was That was That was the first thought.
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: I liked that one.
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: Hey, yeah, man, really looking forward to this gentleman. Who
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: our next guest? Another Hall of famer. But then at
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: the same time, I actually played against this one, So
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: I think we all have yes so excited about that
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: at one point or another.
• 1:02
  Speaker 3: Oh yeah, he's a Hall of Fame. Garden Center played
• 1:06
  Speaker 3: sixteen years in the league, six time first team All Pro,
• 1:09
  Speaker 3: eight time Pro bowler. Ladies, gentlemen, please welcome Kevin. But
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: why to the show. Now, Let's let's get into the conversation.
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: When I was trying to.
• 1:21
  Speaker 3: Start it is so flaps.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was. I was a flap, guy, I have
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: my flap was shown, so flaps meaning backflaps on the
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: back of shoulder pads. We're mentioning it because Kevin was saying, like, oh,
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: I just wanted I was looking over my notes like
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: and Kevin was like, you know, it's just like right
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: before you hit the field. You know, my gloves tight,
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: no wrinkles in my jersey for me as a dB,
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: I'm like, my backflap needs to be out. Like I
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: got to show off the back flap. I don't know why,
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: but we got to show off the back flap. I
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: was like, Peter, what you want one? I definitely And
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: Kevin has a very strong opinion and I kind of agree,
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: and I don't get it. But since we have you
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: in here, offensive lineman with flaps, yay or nay?
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: Absolutely not. All I say is like, I don't want
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: to get hurt when I get put on my back.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: I mean, I mean, if you're playing office line and
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: you're on your feet the whole time and you're the
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: one pancaking guys so driving them down the field, what
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: is there ever a need for you to have a
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: backflap other than you want to look.
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: Cool, you want to look cool.
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: You want your swag?
• 2:21
  Speaker 3: Were you a don joy those the knee braces? Did
• 2:24
  Speaker 3: you have those?
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: I didn't have the big A cl ones. I had
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: the old school They are lotteral braces only on the outside.
• 2:31
  Speaker 3: Gotcha.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: But I start wearing way back in the day, back
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: in high school. They don't even make my brand anymore,
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: you know, because you know everybody's now wearing the ones
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: that fitted the orthopedic ones. I was just like two
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: side braces and protect yourself from getting smoked from the sign.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: I start wearing those back.
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: So what do you feel about left tackles wearing the
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: back flap? Because sometimes the running back is chipping and
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: they get hit one time.
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: It's like, yeah, I don't even know what to say.
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: It's like, you know what, don't.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: Go Yeah, It's like, you know, it's it's part of
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: the game. You know, It's not he's hitting in the
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: back all the time. Sure, you're one of the really
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: great offensive tackles. You're not asking for help anyways, you
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: know the guys. I go ask Bruce Matthews if he
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: ever asked for running backs for chip hip out here,
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: he probably be like, yeah, maybe once or twice in
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: his whole career. But no, I mean, but you know,
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: but now there's common too. I got shots in it.
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: Back running back, run right up in the middle. Yeah,
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: it strokes you right down to spinal taps.
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: You.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I can understand you why you guys wear it, but.
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: It's just not it's it's not to.
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: Look offense line. You're just saying, hey, I follow my
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: back a lot. Yeah.
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: Okay, all right, I like that. Okay, Kevin, what was
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: your first Welcome to the NFL moment?
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: Nineteen ninety four?
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: We're in answer.
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, no, I need this right off the bat too. Really.
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: Nineteen ninety four, we're playing in Husky Stadium for you
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: young guys. The Kingdome was where I was playing. But
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: the tiles fell there. Fell fell right before preseason started
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: from the ceiling. So they had to scrape all tiles
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: and we do it. So we played in Husky Stadium.
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: We're playing against Tampa Bay and I'm I'm the second
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: team long snapper, so the second half is mine and
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: I snapped the ball on a punt. I'm running down
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: card on no nose, just keep looking up. I'm running
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: like this. So here's the thing. I got the NFL.
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: This is cool.
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: I'm not wearing knee braces. I don't have my mouthpiece
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: in you know the NFL. You cleaning iPad?
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you don't have to know.
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: And I'm stroking. I'm running down sideline like this looking
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: for the ball. And to this day, I have no
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: clue who hit me. Caught me under the chin. I
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: am went up bit my lip came of blood's coming out.
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: I'm like training, you got a mouthpiece in there, so
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: and I was. I still I go on YouTube videos
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: preseason nineteen ninety four Seahawks vers versus Tampa Bay and
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: that I can't find the video because I want to
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: figure out who not that matters, but I just like,
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: I still don't know who hit me. I have no
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: clue who hit.
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: And sometimes YouTube they don't put on the punts.
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: No, but sometimes you get the whole game though somebody
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: I was put up the whole game. So I still
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: they have no idea who hit me? I sayeah, this
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: is real.
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: Did you long snap in college?
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: I did as long start. I started long stipeing in
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: high school, so I was there's times when I was
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: a starting long snapper. Then the guy the guy in
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: and he gets hurt, and I have to do it.
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: I did it all the way through my sixteen years.
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: Had to snap a few games and my last couple
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: of you know, a couple of years with Titans. When
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: the guy gets down, blows his shoulder out or something
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: like that.
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: Hated it. Hated it.
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: Why you're protected. They made rules to protect you.
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: They were. Now when I was.
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: There, bro, I was, okay, punt snap snapped the ball.
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: I was. I was. If you're the guard, you know
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: you're going to get free because I ain't running down.
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna pick for you because I'm not. I just
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: finished ten play drive and all out of the fifty
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: yard line. Yeah, I'm gassed, you know. And then on
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: top of that, I'm two hundred and eighty five pounds
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: with knee braces. I got neck roll on. You think
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna make a tackle, No, I said, I pick.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: I'm running down the field, and look this will happen.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: One time I picked the guy for the guards folds
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: behind me. I start, the guy's got he's holding me up.
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: I'm like, dude, I'm not making the tackle. I'm not
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: even trying to make the tackle. And I see this
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: if I look down and see that I'd make a
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: ninety degree turn agideline. I don't even try to run
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: it out. All the skill guys go down there, run
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: past the guy and the jaw. I'm gonna get you
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: next time, bro.
• 6:35
  Speaker 3: I just appreciate that you play special teams like you
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: did A ten play drive. I've I played. You play
• 6:40
  Speaker 3: sposor teams all sixteen years. I play spposor a team
• 6:43
  Speaker 3: all thirteen years. I ten play drive whatever, and they punt,
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: I'm still running down. I'm still covering the gunner. This
• 6:50
  Speaker 3: guy right here never plays special teams his entire career,
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: like he just he just didn't do it. Oh my
• 6:55
  Speaker 3: just high dollar guy, high dollar guy. First of all,
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: high dollar guy.
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: Neither one of you guys are gonna count my blessings
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: on this podcast. That's number one, all right. Number two
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: is he was the backup long snapper. I was.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: It was not like I was.
• 7:09
  Speaker 4: Here's a story, so, man, I snapped in high school.
• 7:13
  Speaker 4: I snapped in college, and uh I remember the first
• 7:16
  Speaker 4: game I went to go snaping in college was L
• 7:18
  Speaker 4: s u Or playing Miami of Ohio, and I hurt
• 7:21
  Speaker 4: my shoulder applied to I just went to cut a
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: guy and landed on my shoulder kind of hurt, and
• 7:24
  Speaker 4: I'm like talking about the snap and I rolled it back.
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: Man, I got you talking about getting chewed out by coach.
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: And so if anyways, I missed two weeks, so I
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: had to rehab my shoulder. So so that happens, and
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: then we go and for so I'm a free agent
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: nineteen ninety eight, I go from Seattle to the New
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: York Jets. Bill Parcells is the head coach, and I
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: had this conversation with a coach. Just look, I said,
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: I know that, you know that I know how to
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: deep snap. I said, I don't want to do it.
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: I don't want to be on special teams. Hey, mawahy,
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: I'm not gonna pay you the kind of money I'm
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: gonna pay you to be a deep snapper. You ain't
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: gotta worry about it. Tin camp comes around. First day
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: of training camp. Mike Sweatman is a special teams coach.
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: You see depth chart and then Bill Pails parcels like,
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: you're on the depth chart for punt team. Make sure
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: you out there for special teams. I'm like, dude, now
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: I got to spend extra thirty minutes a special team,
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: and I got out there early for special teams practice
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: and I got to do the halfway through. Now I'm
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: the starting center. All my reps are starting center, and
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: you know, this way you can appreciate guys the full
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: time starters that are full time specially. But then I
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: got I'm a big guy. I'm supposed to be like
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: chilling out with the boys down in the shade or
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: doing extra past sets because usually have the special team
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: is always like one on one pass rushes right next whatever.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: I'm down there running and covering punts before one on
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: one pass rush and parcels like and why you like
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: the depth chart? I say, hell no, I don't like.
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: But I never I was never the starter. But guys,
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: you know, get hurt or whatever. And it's okay if
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: you get hurt like a like the Sunday, and then
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: you got to prepare your mind for it. But your
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: special team's got to get hurt. Had a game and
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: you had no inclination even going out there, and now
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: your whole mindset changes.
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: And so can I ask one more question about special teams? Yeah?
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: And Kevin, so if you didn't get smoked your first
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: preseason game, would your mind have been different about running
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: down on coverage, because no, it wouldn't have been different.
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: Because well, yeah, as a special teams guy, especially on
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: punk coverage, you know not to just keep looking at
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: the ball the whole Hell yeah, I mean I already
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: knew this, but I'm sitting there like this is preseason.
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: I mean it's like, you know, no big deal. Well
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: I didn't realize that. So there's some dudes out there.
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: That's the only report to make the club. I got smoked.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: So that was one. But then another one was my
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: rookie year. So I go into training game, I'm a
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: week and a half holdout back then that's when the
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: rookie showed up two weeks early, in two weeks whatever.
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: So I was a week and a half holdout and
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: we go to practice and then uh, we go to
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: one on one pass rush and they don't put me
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: against like just another rookie in the club. Cortes Kennedy
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: coming off defensive player of the Year. He taps together
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: on the guy I don't even know who was. Hey, man,
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: get the way I got this rook I looked at
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: test and I'm like, this is gonna be bad, and
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: I didn't win the REP. But I didn't get embarrassed.
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: That's all I can say. I was like, all right,
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: this is what football, this is what's been the NFL
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: is all. But I gotta play this kind of guy
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: every week. That's when I just in my mindset just
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: changed from that perspective. And so, yeah, those are the
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: two moments.
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: RP. Cortez Kennedy.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you hold twenty twelve, you hold the record for
• 10:34
  Speaker 3: having played in ninety games, and there was one hundred
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: yard rusher and then there have been you have had
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: a thousand yard rusher in thirteen of your sixteen seasons.
• 10:46
  Speaker 3: That's Curtis Smarten, Chris Warren, Lindel White, Lindell White. Excuse me,
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: Chris Johnson, what do you think about that stat right there?
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: That's the hell of a status.
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: You know, I didn't know those You don't think those
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: are stats. You don't know until you come through this
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: process of the Hall of Fame, because your presenters are
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: they got to put these one one shooters together. And
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: the thing that I didn't know then the ninety hundred,
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: ninety or ninety two hundred yard rushing games. Yeah, that's
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: a lot of hundre yard rushers and I you know,
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: and that's something I didn't I didn't know they tracked
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: those things. And so that's one of the ones I'm
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: most proud of. And then the thirteen hundred, the thirteen
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: thousand yard running ranks because because at this is the reason.
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: Why is his offensive lineman only known if you sacks,
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: you give up sacks or penalties, or you hurt the team.
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: But the great offensive line groups, not just individuals, but
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: the units are known for how well they're.
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: Running back running football.
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's why you know, even in today's game,
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: you got like Jason Kelcey and the Philadelphia Eagles, they
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: had a great passing game, they ran the ball, and
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: all these other teams and the teams are playing late
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: in the year, what do they do well? And so
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: so I was proud to be a moment of those.
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: And there's some of those guys that you just Curtis
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: Martin still wows me. He won the Russian title, is
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: the oldest guy to run the Russian title at the time,
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: I think two thousand and three, and he never had
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: to run over twenty yards in that year. So I
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: means we just all grounded out and yeah, those are
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: the two stats that I'm most proud of.
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: All right, you you just gave me a little bit
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: about Curtis Martin. I want to know about all those
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: those thousand yard guys and uh kind of each individual? Yeah,
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: all right, so what like like what the first thing
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: that kind of comes to mind when I remind you
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: when I maybe their style of running or who they were, whatever,
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: whatever comes to your mind. I don't want to leave
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: you anywhere. Curtis Martin.
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: Not flashy at all. We called him cought from behind Kurt.
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: He was never gonna run past you. You know, he
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: was never gonna want you. If he gotten second level,
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: he can get down there. But if you had to
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: go to eighty, you know he's not He's somebody's gonna
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: catch him. But consummate pro And he sat in the
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: old line room with us when we watched film. He
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: wanted to know where the combination blocks were. He wanted
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: to know where like if I was pulling in the
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: open field where I thought I was turning up. And
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: he was a very patient runner. As far as comparing
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: him to somebody, I really I really don't know who
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: I can compare him to. In today's game because he's got,
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: he's got, he's a He was a bigger like stock
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: her back, but he wasn't flashy. It wasn't big, but
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: intuitive and very smart, set his blocks up like nobody
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: ever played with Chris Warren. He was Derrick Henry before
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: Derrick Henry, big back, big back I'm talking about, and
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: we were inside outside zone smooth, but he was big
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: back and uh, the very patient runner we were. We
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: were a zone heavy team. Yeah, and uh, another patient runner.
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: But he can but he can break away. It will
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: look like he wasn't running very fast, but you weren't
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: going to catch him. Yeah, all right, Lynndale White, it's
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: hard to talk about Lyndall without talking about Lyndell.
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: That's exactly what.
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: Usc coming off like a national title game. Him and
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: Vince Young, you know, we were all teammates together. But
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: he acts like he's from the streets, grew up in
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: a neighborhood with a gated fence. Great dude, man, He's
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: a great guy to have. But it was kind of
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: funny because he looked more like a fullback totally. And
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: he played and sometimes when him, you know, we had
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: crash and dashed in two thousand and eight with with
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: with Chris Johnson, and so he would play the fullback
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: role sometimes, so we had a big fullback with a
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: mod you know, mamad hall serage. But uh, but again,
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: he was a guy that you need a yard, you're
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: gonna take Chris Henry out and you're gonna put I
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: mean Chris Johnson out, and you're gonna put Lindell in.
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: We're gonna smash it up in there, and he's gonna
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: get the other yard for you. Okay, all right. Funny dude,
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: he is funny. He's funny.
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: He looked funny in his jersey too, because he's kind
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: of Yeah, he doesn't look like a football kowski the kicker.
• 15:10
  Speaker 3: He looked like he was that is great.
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: Not so round, but you can see his belly a
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: little bit. He likes. So he played Kansas City and
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: this is one that I didn't know he had this
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: in him. We're playing Kansas City in Arrowhead and we
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: had two hundred rushers that day, Chris and and him,
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: and we're we're minus forty yard line when we're running
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: against eight man box and we're stacking the box for us,
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: and so they've got bear defense. Eight man box. Dude
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: breaks it, gets past the second level and he takes.
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: It to the house.
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: But he's gassed. You see he's looking at the scoreboard.
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: You know you's behind it.
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but he's gassed. But he pulled away from everybody.
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: He I think he shocked everybody on the team. But
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: I love that, all right. Last one Chris Johnson Magical, magical,
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: that kid can go. And so we were playing early
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: in his I think it was his first year and
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: maybe this preseason something. And he pulled away, broke the
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: second level, hit the sideline and was gone. And he
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: didn't he wasn't running. He was just kind of striding,
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: like you're doing ten yards striders, yea. And I asked him,
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: was Chris, Like, how fast were you going? He's probably
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: about forty five and he was smoking this cruisy. So
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: he was a guy like so and nine when we
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: we uh, we were chasing Eric Dickerson's record, we we
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: got eliminated, so we eliminated the playoffs. We had like
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: four or five games to go. So then the whole
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: team took on the responsibility of chasing this record. Wide
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: receivers like run my way, I'm gonna stalk this guy. Down,
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: you know, and that kind of stuff. But he was
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: the guy if you if you got the second level,
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: if you cover your linebacker up and you see Chris
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: run pass, he just stopped blocking, starting to walk to
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: the sideline because nobody's gonna catch him. And I've done
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: that one or two times. He just took off and
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: I'm you know, I'm in the numbers. So I just
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: walks the sideline. Mike Munchak, my old line coach. He
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: goes and I'm sitting out that he's had head across
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: the goal line yet. Yeah, I'm sitting on the sideline already,
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: was like, what are you doing. I said, nobody's gonna
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: catch him. I'm not running eighty yards to go celebrate,
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: so I'll drap him up when he comes back. But
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: he can go. He could go, and it was it
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: was fun to watch and chasing Eric's record in that
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: nine season that was pretty special. And we went We
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: went two thousand and six yards that year. I think
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: he's the fifth back in the history to go over
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: two thousand yards and that was a That was the
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: last game of my career, so that was pretty cool.
• 17:31
  Speaker 3: Anyway, you made the Pro Bowl that year, I did yeah,
• 17:34
  Speaker 3: So what's so I think something that most uh uh,
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: what people don't know is what was the best gift
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: that you received from all the years that you've played
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: from the running backs at Christmas time? Because Christmas, because
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: Christmas time, the quarterback he gives he takes care of
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: the d line for well, I'll let you explain that.
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: Explain quarterbacks take care of the offensive line. It used
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: to be way. I don't know how old are you,
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: forty four? Forty four and Roman about okay, So you
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: guys may or may not remember back in the day,
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: they used to have the Isotona gloves. Yeah, and Damn
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: Marinos like take care of the hands and take care
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: of you. So his gift to all the old linemen
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: were Isotona gloves, which are pretty sweet gloves.
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: By the way, I remember I remember, do you not know?
• 18:21
  Speaker 3: I remember the infomercials.
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: And they're they're warm. So but Damn Marino did commercials
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: from Isotona gloves and so I'm like, oh man, they
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: give you know. So I was like, that's my first
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: when I was like high school, thinking like they give
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: gifts to the lineman. So then you start hearing stories.
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: So as you're coming up through college and stuff. So
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: so the best running back gift I think I can
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: say that we've ever gotten. When Chris went two thousand
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: yards six yards, Chris gave the whole offensive lineman tag
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: Howard watches, Uh, diamond bezels, black tag, diamond watch. Nice
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: watch didn't fit me very well. It's just awkward deal.
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: And then Chris John and Chris, but Curtis Martin the
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: year he won the Russian title, bought the entire offensive
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: lineman three piece out of Louis uitan luggage three piece.
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah you got. You got the Duffel bag, a roller bag,
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: and then you got like a little shoulder strap bag
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: or something.
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: Like that that New York Fields. Yeah, that's Cis.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: Curtis smart. Curtis Martin wore the suits had like fifteen pockets,
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: not three pockets. But so that was it. And then
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: I think in ninety eight is the year we went
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: to the AFC Championship game. We Curtis started reeling off
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: hundred yard games. So we would have our team meeting
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: on Saturday night before the game, and if he ran
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: for hundred yards that that week before, he'd come in
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: before he broke the meeting and he'd pull off a
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: Chris hundred dollar bill to every guy in the offensive
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: line room and that was pretty cool. And then at
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: the end of that year, Benny Testford, who's now in
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: the year fourteen or somebody, mixed the Pro Bowl and
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: he that's the first time I ever got a roll
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: X watch. Benny bought me a roller X watching and
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: later on and Vince Young thirteen to three season eight,
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: he bought the entire office line of a Rolex watch
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: that year.
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: He's got some good gifts, man, I'm telling you, dude,
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: Like Drew brought some really nice gifts for the old
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: line in New Orleans through the years as well.
• 20:17
  Speaker 3: Do you think one of his best ones was, Oh no,
• 20:19
  Speaker 3: the roll.
• 20:20
  Speaker 5: Bro like you just their classics, Yeah, like they don't
• 20:25
  Speaker 5: like I like, for my tenth anniversary, my wife and
• 20:28
  Speaker 5: I bought uh matching Rolexes with diamonds and stuff like that.
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: But the sub Mariner, it's just it's a classic watching
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: for anything you work out in it, you can do it.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: And that's I still have those. I still those are
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: my two favorite watches I have.
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: But then the cool one of the just things that
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: because I've heard of guys getting like ATVs and all
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. So in third we go thirteen
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: and three that year and Carrie Collins was all it
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: was quarterback. He goes, hey, I got something for you guys.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: Come out in the back behind the equipment room. There
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: was a flatbed trailer at four wheelers, like Honda four
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: wheelers up there. Every off the lineman got a Honda
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: A TV that was pretty cool. So I'd already had one,
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: So I left out that one and I said it,
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: gave it to my brothers. I had just hold on
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: and whatever. I come back three months later, where's it?
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: Where's the four wheler? Oh? Bro, bills to pay?
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: I sold it? Oh no, my brother sold the four wheeler.
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: Oh wow, Bro, you can't like you gave it to me.
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: You even had gave me the title. I said, yeah,
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: but if I give you something, make sure we talk
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: about it, you know, So learn my lesson on that one.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: But that was the four wheeler was was one. It
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: was an unexpected kind of just or something you would
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: expect her to watch or something like that. But carry
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: went off off.
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: Those are those are cool?
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: I like that.
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: I want to go back to Curtis Martin a little bit.
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: I mean, not only was in an outstanding gift giver,
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: but he was my favorite running back to watch for
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: a couple of years when he was up there with
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: the Jets. You blocked for him for seven out of
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: his ten thousand yard seasons because you maybe just say,
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: I mean, that's already super unique. I don't know a
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: lot of running backs that stayed in meetings with the
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: offensive lineman to see like, okay, hey, when you're pulling
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: in this situation, what is offensive lineman thinking? So then
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: I know when he's out there in front of me
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: what he's thinking. So then I know already know I'm
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: setting up the block. That's such a unique detail that
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: most people don't know that running backs, well, especially if
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: his caliber, that they did. But maybe just kind of
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: go into other details that what made him so great,
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: what made him so important for that locker room, and
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: maybe who he was as a person or a team.
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: I think Parcels said it at one time, is when
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: your best player in the locker room is the best
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: person in the locker room, maybe just an genuine person,
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: then you're gonna have a special locker room. And that
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: that's what that what Curtis was. That's what Curtis was.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: Treated everybody right, respected everybody. You go in locker room
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: with with, you know, your best running back or receiver
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: or whatever, and there's a sense of ego about it.
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: And and Curtis wasn't that guy. He was humble guy.
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: Nobody knows what he did in his off time. I
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: mean he didn't just I mean he would be one
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: weekend he'd be down in Central Park playing chess with
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: homeless people, and the next weekend he's out giving food
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: out some of it, but you never knew about it.
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: He was a very humble person during that time. And
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: even today. I saw him last night and you ask
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: him what he does, and he really can. He's kind
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: of a mysterious dude.
• 23:24
  Speaker 3: It's kind of like like Tommy or Martin.
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: No one ever knew what he did.
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, you don't know. But you know, he's not
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: doing anything wrong. He's not being nefarious about anything, he's
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: not trying to hide anything. He just he just lives
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: his life. And he and he said it in his
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: Hall of Fame speeches. He told people he said he
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: didn't love football. It was just a means to an
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: end for him. And I'm like, you can't go through
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: what I've seen Curtis go through in the times he
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: spent the training room and not love football. But I
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: also know, you know, he's a he's a spiritual man,
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: a man of faith and is a lot of us are,
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: and we're like, you know, we operate on a different
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: level for different reasons. And Curtis was that guy. But
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: if you ever look at any of his notes and
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: how meticulous he writes, like, you know, I don't know
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: what your handwriting looks like, but like I'm a chicken
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: scratch guy. I only I can read it. But when
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: you look at Curtis's notes, yeah, I swear it's like
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: the figure out that girl in high school that had
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: the best curse of handwriting, that's Curtis. Yeah, his penmanship
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: is an incredible note taking was was detailed beyond major
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: and so for him to be that guy and how
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: the success he has is it wasn't just by chance. Now,
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: he was gifted with talent and stuff like that, but
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: it was meticulous about how he went about his business
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: and that's what made it really cool about it, and
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: everybody gravitated towards him. He had an end with every
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: position group and the team. Everybody wrote what was respected
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: in the building. But he made you feel like you
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: were a part of all that he's doing. And that
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: was pretty cool about it. And there was no pretension
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: about him or or whatever. So for him for us
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: to have me, so we would always and it was,
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: you know, thursdays after it's a shorter practice or whatever.
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: So then we'd always a line. We'd always get together.
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: We'd watch Blitz film, we watched the run cut up tape,
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: and Curtis were coming there with us, and it got
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: to where we had all the running backs and all
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: the tight ends in there with us, and we'd all
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: just we just go through it together because he wanted
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: to know what he wanted to know what we were
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: seeing as we ran to play. And but it wasn't
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: just in the room. And so how he lived his
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: life on a regular basis.
• 25:29
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you talk about gifted and being talented. You got
• 25:33
  Speaker 3: a special gift and you got you pretty talented your
• 25:35
  Speaker 3: damn self. Like, so your third season you go from
• 25:39
  Speaker 3: guard to center. That takes a special talent, especially at
• 25:43
  Speaker 3: this level. Yeah, to be able to switch positions like that,
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: how was how was that transition going from guard to tackle.
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: Was it easy?
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: Was it hard? It wasn't. So I played center in
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: high school exclusively, got signed to LSU to play center.
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: I ended up starting to left guard left tackle for
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: three years. I played tight end and shot yards. Early on,
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: I was starting left tackle, and then my junior year
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: I started three games of center, one game at guard,
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: four games of tackle. That's the year I made thirteen
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: All American in a like a two to nine season.
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: And then I got moved to center. My senior year, I.
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: Was coach then too. He was They didn't they did not,
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: They don't.
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: So I came under Mike Archer, came into the NFL.
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: He went to Virginia and came in the NFL. And
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: then the coach took his place was a guy by
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: the name of Curly Homan. And what put him on
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: the map was he was the head coach at Southern
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: Miss who beat Florida State in Alabama in the same season.
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: Who was their quarterback? It was Brett Farv And then
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: LSU just took a slump. So I was at l
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: s U for five of the worst season six seasons
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: in the history at school, and uh, I think Brett
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: Farv every time I see him, appreciate thanks.
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: You did.
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: I know what I love. My love for the game
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: was greater than my disc take for how our coaching
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: staff was, the losing, and my love for LSU. And
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: back then nobody transferred you just check quit. Yeah, but
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: my love for LSU was greater than all that, and
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: my glove for the game was greater than the losing.
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: And so I just played ball, you know. And uh
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: so I get drafted to play center and I go in.
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: I'm a third team center behind Ray Donaldson who was
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: a twelve year VET, Joe Tofemeier who was like a
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: six or seven year VET, and then there was me
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: and that was it. And so we go into the
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: second week training camp and the starting right guard hurts
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: his neck ends up becoming a career kN injury. So
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: this guy, Mitch Arrot, God rest his soul. He blew
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: his neck out, and so I moved over to second
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: team guard while still being third team center. And then
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: we go into week four of the season against Indianapolis Colts.
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: Bill Hitchcock, the starting right guard from I think he
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: was from pitt Canadian guy. He gets down in the
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: stance snapped the ball. Twenty one guys on the field
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: move and Bill's still stuck in the stance, ruptured a
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: disc right before right for the snap or something like that,
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: So really in his back just for career kN injury done.
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: Damn.
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: So now I'm like literally couldn't get out of the stand.
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: I mean, he's like still in his three point stance
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: and I'm sitting there thinking, now I'm next guy up.
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: So now I'm playing guard. That's my rookie year. So
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: I played guard for the next eleven games and then
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: I'm just maintaining the starting guard spot. The whole plan
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: was for me to move to center when Ray Donaldson retired,
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: but you know whatever, they just when Ray left to
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: go to Dallas Cowboys. The second season that we brought
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: Jim Sweeney in from New York Jets, who's the older guy.
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: Which is good because now I got broken into the
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: league by Ray. I got taught the game by Jim Sweeney,
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: very better than just a savvy guy, and so it
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: kind of worked out, and then I got to see
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: the game from from that perspective. Yeah, and then I
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: finally moved out to I moved into center, but I
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: was small man. I wait, my first two years I
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: played two seventy five. Yeah, I was small, and Howard
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: mud or Mole line coach. You got to get bigger
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: than this. So I went from two seventy five to
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: three ten in one off season.
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: And that was how how much eating.
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: It was horrible.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: I was eating.
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: But they didn't they didn't do nutrition.
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you didn't even have kitchen in Seattle at the time. Okay,
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: so back then everybody had racketball courts and stuff. Right,
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: So we come out of our locker room, hang it right,
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: and then there's a hallway that went to the back
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: of the building and you take stairs downstairs go to
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: Rackaball Court. The hallway was just folding tables that we
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: put trays on. And it wasn't telling my second or
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: third year that we started getting like breakfast and stuff.
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: You know, it's like you had to stop by McDonald's
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: on the way to work at lunch time. You left
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: to go to the Chariokey chicken place right down the
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: road when I was in Seattle. And then so finally
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: we started getting food and everything was chicken. So we
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: call our cook was chicken Joys because everything was baked chicken, chicken, sandwiches,
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: chicken fet of cheenie chicken, this chicken, that deal on
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: the chicken bro but I ate everything. So in the morning,
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: I would make a gallon like majoring picture of peanut
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: butter batter, I mean of pancake batter, and I would
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: get up they go to work out, come home, eat
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: stacked pancakes, big breakfast whatever. And before lunch, if I
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: got hunger again, I eating know, stack of pancakes, I mean, dude,
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: because I love breakfast, so like, I would literally eat
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: a gallon of pancakes, battered like you know, throughout the
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: whole day. I went from two seventy five to three
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: ten to three months.
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: It was awful, awful.
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: I was thirty eight waisted my pants, you know, I
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: was like a skinny guy, looked good at my only
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: back of pictures round. See. I was like, god, man,
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: I look good in that uniform. And then I go
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: from that to where I now wearing size forty two.
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: I want to get a new Wars.
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: I went from a size thirteen shoe to a size fourteen,
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: so my feet spread on me and my back.
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: Was killed me.
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: So I played there for two years. I did okay,
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: and I did all right. So then I've become a
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: free agent, go to New York and I remember this.
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: I weigh in at three o five first day of
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: offseason training and we got to run five three fifties
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: around the field. John lots o strength coach, and he's
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: set in the pace. And I prided myself on the
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: running because I knew that I was. I was always
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: a rabbit in workouts. So as a jailer, if you
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: stay on my tail, I'm going cross right at the line.
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: So if you're behind me, you're not gonna make your
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: times just but I can pace the scroup man. I
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: got to the second three fifty, I was gassed. The
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: third one, I didn't make my time. And I'm sitting
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: that thinking this is awful, and Parcels is over by
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: the locker room looking at it.
• 31:37
  Speaker 3: This is your first year, right, this is my first
• 31:39
  Speaker 3: year with New York.
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: On the high end center. I was like Parcels maybe
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: the highest pace center in the history of the league.
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: And he said, sothing is I paid this fat bet?
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: Be beat? This is much money. You can't even make
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: your b be beep. And I'm like John Lott our
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: strength coach old country dude, Hey, big Giff, you ain't
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: three or five. You can't play this out. I said,
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: I don't want to be this big here. We're gonna
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: work on this. So I got down to ninety that year. Yeah,
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: and then I go to Camp two ninety, I got
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: down to eighty. And so the next next thirteen years
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: I played it two hundred and eighty pounds. Word. I
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: moved inside in the center, and I figured out and
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: then that's why I used all my my kung fu
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: and ninja moves. But yeah, so, but so the idea
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: of how was that transition from in the middle to
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: back inside, It's something I did the whole time, all
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: the way from college, all the way through. I didn't
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: even I was at the Olie Masterminds a couple weeks
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: ago and I told the guys, how you still you
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: know you're trying to how do you steal reps in practice?
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: You know? How do you get better when it's not
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: your turn to go? And my thing is volunteer for
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: Scout team. Go play Scout team, man, because that's where
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: you can go experiment and screw up. Nobody, nobody knows. Hey,
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: as long as you do if you're a DV, as
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: long as that receiver catches the ball, you're good. But
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: just like I want to, I'm gonna try something different
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: my back pedaling, you're going or something like that. So
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: I'd go out there. Man, I'm gonna play left tackle
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: on Scout team against the Kyle Vandenbosch. Wise, I don't know,
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: just because I want to have fun doing it. So
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: in my mind, I was one. I was working working
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: tools that who knows might work on the inside or whatever.
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: But the other part of it is it made practice fun.
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: And because I enjoyed practice, I was a guy that
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: liked going to practice. But it also it also helped
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: me develop skills that if you're just the one position
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: guy all the time, you're not going to expand your
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: your toolbox. And so like I volunteered for Scout team,
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: and then early on when I was playing, when I
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: end up starting to guard, I was right up to
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: the number two center, so I had to take all
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: the one reps at guard, all the two reps at center,
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: and then I had to take all the Scout team
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: reps at center. So I never came off the practice field.
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: I never got a break during practice. And that you
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: know so. But I just always prided myself. You canna
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: put me on the field if you if your goal
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: is to have five, your five best offensive linemen, and
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: you're best offense line, and his best position is center,
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: move me to guard. I'm gonna be one of your
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: best five. I don't care. And that's kind of my mentality.
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: That's a small mentality because you're gonna get on the field.
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: A quick question, quick answer here. When you played tackle
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: in college, how much.
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: Did you weigh to forty one? I started in the
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: SEC at left tackle at two hundred and forty one pounds,
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: this blowing sec.
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: How I was an athlete?
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: Bro, heybody, it's all it's all angles. The whole game
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: of football is angles and technique. That's yes, it is
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: you get you know, like if I got to pound
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: myself against the big guy tech washing four hundred twenty
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: pounds whatever he was, and you want me to stop him,
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: ain't gonna happen. But I angle him. I can get
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: to that point before he can, and I'll just hunker
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: down and play leverage. So and I was a weight
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: room guy. I love being the weight roomy. Squatt was
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: my favorite exercise how much squat?
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: How much just squat all time? Hi? Would you say.
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: Single rep like six five six o five?
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: Okay?
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: And then and then you know, cleans, Like I tell
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: guys all this time, like I believe it that you
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: have to lift weights just as hard during the season
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: as you getting off. I love that you have to
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: me because that's why you stay healthy. So my goal
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: in my sixteenth year in the season was to be
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: cleaning hand cleaning at the end of the crew of
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: the year as much as I was during my workouts
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: in the office in the preseason.
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so my last.
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: Year in the NFL, on Thursdays was my clean day.
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: I was. I was hand cleaning three fifty and you know,
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: but I probably I had to because I had to
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: stay strong through the year. But but yeah, I started
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: my first game at LSU at left tackle.
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: I had to ask because I know the whole weight
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: thing was and I kind of creeped up by the.
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: Time I got drafted. I was like to eighty two,
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: seventy nine or whatever it was. But but the problem
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: was for me, I lost weight so much during the season.
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: So if I go into to eighty, I played down
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: to sixty five. So that's why I was had going
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: in to ninety and play down to eighty.
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: All right, Bill Parcells said, you were the best center
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: he's ever had, big compliment. Yeah, there we go. Why
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: is that such a big competent knowing because he's.
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: One of the greatest coaches ever coach the game, And
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: to you know, three Super Bowls in New England, two
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: of the with the New York Giants. And this is
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: so I go to my free agent visit and i'm
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: I went to New Orleans, I went to Philly, I
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: went to San Diego, I came to New York and
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: Parceales was talking about what he needs to win football,
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: and his philosophy is, in order to have a winning
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: football team, you gotta be strong down in the middle
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: of the field. You're running back, quarterback, center, middle, linebacker, safety,
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: that's if you If you're strong down in the middle
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: of the field, you can make everything else work. And
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: he said, until he goes, we were gonna have great
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: teams with the New York Giants with Phil Simms and
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: all his defense and all that, with Carl Banks and
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: lt and all those guys. He goes, but we were
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: not going to take it to next level until I
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: had a premier center. He goes, that's when I signed
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: bart Oates and he reaches back and he grabs a
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: binder from behind him like this, he opens up, he
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: pulls out his top priorities for this offseason, for this,
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: for this free agency class, and number one thing was
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: the center. He goes, We're not gonna win here until
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: I have a premier center, and you're that guy. And
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: I probably I told him so, I'm gonna make good
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: on this and I did, and uh, to this day,
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: I tell maybe he's the best coach I've ever played for.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: I love that.
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I love when coaches flirt with players too,
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: Like that's a good way to flirt with you, to say, hey,
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: you know.
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: It builds you up. Yeah, it builds you. And then
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: then you don't want to let him down. Yeah exactly,
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: you don't want to disappoint him.
• 37:38
  Speaker 3: And that's the good coaches know how to do that.
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: Though.
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: I call that the seat up or factor liked his
• 37:45
  Speaker 2: coaches know the dude.
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: Had Yeah yeah, but this is so I got picked
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: up from I flew from Seattle to New York, and
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: I walked through the Jets facility and they had like
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: their All Pro wall and I asked Scott Pioli at
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: the time was like, not way up. He was the
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: Gopher boy for Parcels. I'm sure his title is higher
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: than that. Mike and then uh my Tannehill or Mike Tannama.
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: So they were they were the dynamic duo I call him.
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: And so I walked by the hall. When was the
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: last time I had an All Pro player? They're like,
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: we don't know, and it was Winston Hill back in
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: like the late seventies earlier's I'll be the next one
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: and I made a promise that I was gonna be
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: the next guy the next one alignment and I was
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: for that team.
• 38:30
  Speaker 3: Is there a play that defines who you are? Like,
• 38:35
  Speaker 3: we all have our legacy, but is there one play
• 38:38
  Speaker 3: that is out there that you that you know of?
• 38:42
  Speaker 3: And then when we watched that week, say, oh, that's
• 38:45
  Speaker 3: Kevin why because he does X Y Z.
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: I think there's two that I can think of out
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: the top of my head. It's kind of funny. I
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: think most guys could answer this question. I'm sure you
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: could have about your guys' career. She hate to do it
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: because you know, on draft day when you're in college
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: and you're not the one getting drafted, like man, I
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: hope I'm not to do highlight film, you know, one of.
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: Those kinds of deals.
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: But this is no disreck because because I respect the
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: heck out of Zach Thomas. But there's a there's a
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: play that's in my highlight reels. Were playing against Zach
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: and I pulled from the center spot to a left
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: to the left and whether Zach took a wrong angle whatever,
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: and I put the right shoulder on, dropped him, never
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: lost stride, just kept running and Curtis Martin was right
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: behind me the whole time.
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: Oh like Sunshine and uh in the in the the movie. Yeah,
• 39:35
  Speaker 2: remember remember the tight running down there? It was one
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: of the d did through it.
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: Zach put Zack on his back and I just kept
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: running through it, chased the next safety down the roay
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: and we just kept rolling. That's one because that's when
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: my game I was opening. I was known for my
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: open field play against the second level guys, screens and
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: tosses and all that kind of stuff. And then in
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: the past game we're playing New York Giants, New York Jets.
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: I think it was my last year in in the NFL.
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: I can't remember, but.
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: There was a throwback game, so they had their New
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: York Titans uniform.
• 40:07
  Speaker 2: That's why I remember it.
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: And uh so it's I passed that and it's a
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: slide left, but I'm covered up, so I take my
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: nose back. I got him, and the linebacker's got a
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: blitz coming and he's not even my responsibility. But once
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: I knew, once I locked onto my guy, if I
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: can keep my head on a swivel, I can put
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: myself in my body in a position to close the
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: gap between me and.
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: The guard or me and the other guard.
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: And I saw the linebacker coming to my right side,
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: and all I did is I locked this guy out.
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: I leaned back in and I just drew a shoulder
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: to him, and I like blew a blindside shot. He did,
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: He wasn't look no, And I took two guys out
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: and the running back got to Scott release and come out.
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: He didn't get the ball, but still he didn't have
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: to hit my running back. So those are two plays
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: that just still awareness, you know, my visual awareness for
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: that special awareness.
• 40:57
  Speaker 2: All right, Kevin, You know, so the NFL is the
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: Honors this year they're gonna have an award too. It's
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: called Protector of the Year. So the best offensive lineman's
• 41:08
  Speaker 2: about time. Okay, I like that, so tell me your
• 41:13
  Speaker 2: opinion about them. Finally, give him the award to the
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: best offensive linement, and then I have a follow up.
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: I think it's a hard award to give out because
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: there's really no stats, you know now, But here's here's
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: you take guys games, say he played eight hundred snaps
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: this year and three hundred and fifty have more passing
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: games or pass plays, And my idea is they take
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: you gotta filter out the ones where he had slide
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: help or when this dude was on a island by
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: himself against the premier pass rusher, whether it be a
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: tackle or nose tackle, whatever, did he get beat and
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: I get beat? And how many times? Whats the percentage
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: of times did he won that rep or whatever. I
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: don't know how they're gonna do it, but that's how
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: I envisied it. Like if I get stuck on the
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: island by myself against whoever you know, Casey Hampton and
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: or whoever the best Nigomigan Sue or Aaron Donald or whatever,
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: did I beat him? A higher percentage of times because
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: he's a premier pass rusher, And that's kind of how
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: I've measured it going. But I think more importantly for me,
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: because everybody knows, pass protection is not a single person guy.
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: It's a unit. And I think it should be a
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: unit award. That's how I see it. If you can
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: get through the season and you give up less than
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: twelve sacks the entire year, you're you know, you're winning
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: football games. And you know if you only give up
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: like ten sacks as a unit for the entire year,
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: because what happens is a running back miss is a
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: block and the sacks go on the line, yep, you know,
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: and and what it does is and a lot of
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: people don't know this, but when the quarterback get sacked,
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: that they take that off your rushing yards and the stats,
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: and so that that damages the offensive lines credibility as well.
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: So I think it's a unit. I think it should
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: be a unit award, and I think that that's how
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: they should go about doing it. And you know, how
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: many how many sacks do you give up? What your
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: sack ratio the percentage of passes in the game, and
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: you come up some mathematical formula for that. But I
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: heard that. I was at the ol Line Mass Minds
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: a couple weeks ago they announced that they're going to
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: do this award, So I think that's pretty cool.
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: What did What would you name the award?
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: I like, I love it, Protector of the Year, you know,
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: But I would, man, what would.
• 43:19
  Speaker 3: The design look like if you could present the award?
• 43:21
  Speaker 3: Which how would you?
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: Well? Have you guys, you know what the Joe More
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: Award is, Yes, the Office Line Award for the greatest
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: the best office line college football. It's got to be
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: something like that. It's a whole group of guys. Though, Yeah,
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: it's the whole five. Man. That's why if it's a
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: unit award, it's got it should mimic something like that,
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. But it could look like,
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: I mean, you take the greatest of so hard because
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: you got like, you know, the greatest of the game.
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: In my ear, I'm thinking guys like you know, John
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: Hannah and and Gene Upshaw and Art Schell and Anthony
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: Munos and Munchak. But those guys they say the greatest
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: of the game. For them, it's guys gim Otto and
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: ring and all those guys that came before them. So
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: I don't know what that's gonna look like. I don't
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: know who you call it, what you call it, I
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: don't know.
• 44:02
  Speaker 3: Maybe you take one guy from each era, a guy
• 44:04
  Speaker 3: from like the sixties, seventies, eighties, best tackle.
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: From like the fifties and six. Yeah, your best guard
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: from the like the seventies, and the center from the eighties.
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: What Mike Webster is going to be that guy? Yeah,
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: you know, And I say that because I'm in the
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: Hall of Fame, But no disrespect to Demoni Dawson, but
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: DEMONI took over after Mike Webster. And then you get
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: Bruce Matthews the right guard, and you get Jonathan Augen
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: or whoever even though his left tackle, or Seyes, Who're
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: gonna put up there? Walter Jones? I mean, you got you,
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: Walter Jones, Orlando Pace, you got all these guys that
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: were our contemporaries. But I look back and think John
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: Hannah and Anthony Munos. I mean, I played tackle and
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: I studied Anthony Munos's game. So who are you gonna
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: put up there? I don't know, but you know, I
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: don't know.
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: Okay, good, No, no, no, And I don't know it's
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: a good answer. I think I don't know the good answer.
• 44:53
  Speaker 3: I agree, it's kind of it's kind of like the
• 44:55
  Speaker 3: basketball logo, like they they got Dre West, Like you
• 44:57
  Speaker 3: had to pick somebody to make this logo after.
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: But if you're not a fat basketball fan, you don't
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: know who that is, right, you know, everybody knows that
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: Jordan's shoes. You know that's Jordan. Yeah, you ain't got
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: to say it, you just but that's the greatest for
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: our time. He was the greatest guy that ever played
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: the game. Right Now, there's argument as Lebron and Kobe
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: and all that kind of stuff, Like I'm not a
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: basketball fan, but I know nobody wanted Lebron James shoes
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: nineteen eighty nine. They wanted Jordan's shoes. You know what
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: I'm saying.
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: Absolutely, So this is something I'm really excited to get
• 45:28
  Speaker 2: into because this is very close to my heart. What
• 45:32
  Speaker 2: made you want to start to get into the more
• 45:34
  Speaker 2: leadership roles for the NFLPA When you did, I saw
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: it was like after your like four and five. Yeah,
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: it's when you started to take on more and more
• 45:43
  Speaker 2: leadership and more roles. You were rep first, yeah, and
• 45:46
  Speaker 2: then being in it.
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: I was always bent that way as far as like
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: just I was a fourth fourth grade classroom president, you know,
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: so it' what a stat but that was so you
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: think it's like I got still trapped. So all these
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: random stupid memories. But uh, and then all we did.
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: Miss Sandela was my fourth grade teacher, and we lived
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: in Germany, and and I was American school, so we
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: had to clean the classroom and everybody did and and
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: every you know, and it's about doing the little things
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: and picked it. And so I'm looking around, you know,
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: backpacks need to be under your desk and all that
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: kind of stuff. I go up to the white board
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: and I erased the date up on the board and
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: put the correct date up there. Miss and Della's like,
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: what would you do? I said, well, the date was wrong,
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: it's like two days ago. And she goes, Kevin's Kevin's
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: our our new president of the classroom. So I like,
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: I carry it out like a bad man. Your backpacked,
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: put your pencils underneath the counters out. But uh, but
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: I've always been bent that way. I always spend the
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: outspoken guy on the team. But I think it comes
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: from my dad's background. My dad was military. He was
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: He was a sergeant Army East seven. He retired after
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: twenty three years. But he always taught us, man, if
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: you're going to do it, do it right, and don't
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: let anybody else. You don't go down to somebody else's level.
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: You make them rise up to yours. And so I
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: get in the NFL, and four years I just pay
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: attention in the PA meetings and all that kind of stuff,
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: don't really get involved. And then ninety eight I go
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: to near Jets. I'm sitting in the you know, the
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: annual meeting when they come to and the guy sitting
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: in front of me asking me questions all the time,
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: and I'm the one answering the questions. He goes, well,
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: why don't why aren't you our player rep. I said, well,
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: why don't you? If you have, I will be, But
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: you got to nominate me. I'm not going to raise
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: my hand, nominate myself. And he did, and I got
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: nominated and I got elected. And so for the first
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: time I started understanding the business of the game. I
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: was welcome to the business of the game, and it
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: was really off this field, welcome to the game. Moment
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: when I was a week and a half holdout trying
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: to get the best contract for me, and that's this
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: is a business. This is just spoutfall. This is a business.
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: And so when I became the PA rep for the team,
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: I started understanding the inner workings of the CBA, what
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: it meant, how it got there, the history of the league.
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: Understanding that that contract that I was working on my
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: rookie year was the first time they had a CBA
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: since nineteen eighty seven. Because they worked with they played
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: without a CBA. There was a Plan B free agency,
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: the Reggie White case. So I started learning about all
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: this stuff that a lot of our young players don't
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: even have a clue about. And I just kind of
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: was involved and just make myself available. And the best
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: availability is just to be able to know the answer.
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: So when your teammates ask, you have a quality answer
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: to give them, or at least tell them where the
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: resources are. And so did that for I think it
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: was six years or something as a player rep and
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: eventually got elected to they got nominated at the Bord
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: of Rep meetings, got elected as a vice president and
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: again you get a little a little bit more knowledge
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: of what's going on now is more about the inner
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: workings of the building itself and stuff like that. But
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: what I think prior to that trace Armstrong, Anias Williams,
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: Tim Brown, Robert Smith. They were all these extitive committee
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: members and they would they would do handpicked guys out
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: of the border reps meetings and identify guys that they
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: thought could be future leaders of the organization. And so
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: when they had executive committee meetings outside of the big
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: board meeting, they would invite us to go sit in
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: on these meetings. We didn't have a voice, we didn't
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: have a voter or anybody was just to listen to
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: the conversation and how they think those things were. So
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: they identified about eight to ten of us, and we
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: all kind of rose through the ranks of the PA.
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: Then became presidents. The two of us became presidents, and
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: many of us became vice presidents of the Union. And
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: so that's just kind of how it worked. And then
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: then flashed forward to like two thousand and nine or eight.
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: I was gonna walk away from the Union twelve years in.
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: I'm ready to just whatever, and then things started happening
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: and I just made the decision to run for president,
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: became the president, and literally the day of training camp started,
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: Gene passed away. So then I got thrust into the
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: whole new role of responsibilit But it's just I was
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: always been that way. I was a class class officer
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: my whole through time through high school, I went to
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: Boise State. I was just I was always that guy
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: at my school. I was a student council officer in
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: my high school, and then in college I was you know,
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: team captain and all that kind of stuff.
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: So I just okay, So so Jean, guys, no, only
• 50:23
  Speaker 2: that the owners opt out. Let's let's talk.
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: About what really popped it off. So I know.
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: Already already.
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: I know where the conversations headed.
• 50:34
  Speaker 3: No, this is he's got his own personal because yeah,
• 50:38
  Speaker 3: we've we've talked about your TID.
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: You're personally affected by a lot of this, no question.
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: That's some point, at some point in the way we
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: all works, either you're a contract guy or like on
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: any of your contract, things are changing, or you're in
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: the leadership side and it changes the whole dynamic of
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: your season because you're in the middle of all these
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: conversations and all that kind of stuff. So it affected everybody.
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: It wasn't just yeah, you know the guys, the leadership.
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: There's twenty five hundred players that were affected by this.
• 51:07
  Speaker 3: It was more or less when we have these converences,
• 51:10
  Speaker 3: we have this, We've had this conversation often over the years.
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: Well everybody has an opinion too, well everyone, Yeah, everyone
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: has an opinion.
• 51:18
  Speaker 3: And it didn't affect me as much as it affected you.
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: Okay, right, you.
• 51:21
  Speaker 2: Know what I'm saying.
• 51:22
  Speaker 3: Yes, we all got affected by it, but it affected
• 51:25
  Speaker 3: you more because that was your contract here.
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: Yes, so the opt out was actually happened in twenty ten. Yes,
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: they opted out in twenty ten. Jane passed away in
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: obviously two thousand and eight. So I was a president
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: at the time, and you can't negotiate unless you got
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: your executive director. So I'm in the year fifteen, I
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: mean year fifteen. I spent every Monday either on a
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: conference call or traveling in Washington, DC, and I was
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: there till Tuesday night, and then I would fly back.
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: And so then we started, how do we go about
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: this process to find the news direct so the exact
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: committee will talk about the process, and then we spent
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: weeks vetting search firms I'm talking about not days, weeks
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: like search frinsdays fifteen to twenty five, and we'd interview
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: every one of them, like what's your process, what do
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: you think? And you know whatever, what's your ties? Do
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: you have ties in the NFL? Do you not have
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: ties in the NFL? If you have ties, is it
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: high ties? Are you tied to the Commissioner's office? If
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: you are, we don't want you. You know that kind
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: of stuff. We had those conversations and we got down
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: to that. So then they present you a book of
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: candidates and it starts off with fifty and then they
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: get fifty and you just talk about them and say, well, okay,
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: we're going not these all. We'll give us a book
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: of twenty five candidates, the best possible twenty five candidates.
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: So then you got it. Then this this was our process.
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: Then we had to interview twenty five candidates. So you
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: wouldn't do those interviews. They weren't going to be phone interviews.
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: There was no zoom back then. We didn't have zoom.
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: So we would fly in to Washington, d C. On Mondays,
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: interviewing candidates Mondays and Tuesdays, fly back Tuesday night. So
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: you can go to practice on Wednesday morning. And that
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: was my whole two thousand and eight season a lot,
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: and it was brutal. It was brutal, but it was
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: the best season I had. And this is why. It's
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: because when I got to practice, I had three hours.
• 53:13
  Speaker 2: It was just all about me.
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: Didn't have to do a phone call, didn't have to
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: answer a question. I just went out there and played
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: ball and that's all I did. And so so that's
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: what happened. Well, that was two thousand and eight, So
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: we worked through that. Two thousand and nine things lightened
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: up because we finally get to a point where we
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: select the executive director and then in twenty ten is
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: when they opt out of the deal, and then that's when.
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: But we'd already now we have our leadership in place
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: already for a year and a half, and we're starting
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: to strategize as an executive committee. Some guys cycled out
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: of retirement and new guys are in and now we've
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: kind of built our war team of what we're gonna
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: do when we start our negotiations, and we only had
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: a year and a half, a year ready for it,
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: where it's this next upcoming ones, not they got five
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: more years to figure it out. But yeah, it was.
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: It was tumultuous, It was tough, and it was very stressful.
• 54:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I can only imagine. And I'd heard those stories
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: because Scott Fajeta was one of my who was very
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: much so with a lot of you guys, with a
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: lot of this stuff through the through the wars, and uh,
• 54:13
  Speaker 2: it only really affected me. And I have no opinion
• 54:16
  Speaker 2: on the leadership. Ye I would just would love to
• 54:19
  Speaker 2: you were in the room. So it was very cool.
• 54:21
  Speaker 2: But no, I was one of those guys that was
• 54:23
  Speaker 2: a four year guy who just went on my first
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: Pro Bowl, just won the Super Bowl.
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: And now the salary dynamics changed huge. They know this
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: is what happened, right, So we go twenty eleven, we
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: get the deal, so that's that would be the year
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: after your contract whatever.
• 54:37
  Speaker 2: So it made me I couldn't become a free agent because.
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: You had to be six years yeah yeah, yeah, more
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: because of the because of the lockout, because of the
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: opt out, the opt out, they extended it. So you
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: got stuck. And yes, tended offer deals, yes right, yes, yeah,
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: and it happens.
• 54:54
  Speaker 2: It sucks for you.
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying.
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: And I was like in that one that one to
• 54:58
  Speaker 2: two years.
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: Maybe ten guys or something like that. They're follow that
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: because this is and this is what I learned from Gene.
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: From Gene Upshaw, you worry about the minority voices, of course,
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: and listen to their problems, but you always have to
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: side with the majority.
• 55:14
  Speaker 2: I saw that in the write up that you said,
• 55:16
  Speaker 2: up have those words were to me? It landed so
• 55:19
  Speaker 2: well for me.
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: The minority will be heard, but the majority will always rule.
• 55:23
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: And what's going on in our country today, right we
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: hear the libar and on what's sad, whatever side of
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: the fence, and politically you sen on. If you're the minority,
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: you got the loudest voice. You always do. But at
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: the end of the day, majority always wins. And it's
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: like that everything we do. That's why we live in
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: a democratic society. And that's the way the NFLPA was.
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: You got guys that are squeaky wheels, and they're all
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: the time squeaky wheels. If they hear you, we're gonna
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: address this as best as we can. But at the
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: end of the day, we got thirty two teams are
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: going to vote on behalf of their fifty five and
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: eighty five players. And that's what's going to be heard
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: whether you like it or not. And that's the hard
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: part about sitting in the position I was in, and
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: with Jeans in you're hated by half the guys in
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: the NFL.
• 56:02
  Speaker 2: See, I never felt like we hated our leadership as
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: much as like it felt like guys never paid enough
• 56:11
  Speaker 2: attention until all of a sudden, until that's exactly what happens.
• 56:16
  Speaker 3: Exactly what does that.
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: Matter to you until it affects you? And that's the
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: problem with leadership in general. Yes, because nobody wants to
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: jump in until yes, and so the guys that become
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: leaders And this is this is how I felt about it.
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: I'm not doing it for me. I'm not And I
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: told my executive committee, whatever decisions we make over the
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: next four years through negotiation stuff, just know this all
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: of us, most of us are going to be retired.
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: It's not going to affect you one bit. You still
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: got your four to one. You guys still got your severance,
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: you still got your your annuity, all the stuff that
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: we fought for up to this point in time, you're
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: getting all that. You're not going to have a part
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: of the new salary cap. You're not going to have
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: a part unless that next leadership group says, well, we're
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: getting way too much money, let's make a new benefit it,
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: which they have a little bit right through through some
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: programs in half. But it doesn't You don't care until
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: it affects you. And that's when you sit in these
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: meeting rooms. And it used to be you get your
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: rebate check from the NFL, p I players ink or whatever.
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: That's all they wanted. Give me my fifteen.
• 57:16
  Speaker 3: Hundred dollars check and so I can leave, So I
• 57:18
  Speaker 3: can leave.
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: But they didn't care about the free agency and how
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: the new collector Bargaining Agreement is going to affect you
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: and down the road and all that kind of stuff
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: until you become the guy that gets stuck in the middle.
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: Right now, all of a sudden, you want answers, You
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: want them now. I'm getting screwed.
• 57:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I never thought about half back and then, but
• 57:36
  Speaker 2: then I don't think it ever really happened until it happened.
• 57:40
  Speaker 2: It doesn't happen until it happened. Happened till that happened. Yeah,
• 57:43
  Speaker 2: and it was super ity. So for me, it was
• 57:46
  Speaker 2: just like, man, this was like did you I was
• 57:49
  Speaker 2: supposed to hit it. I didn't. And look it doesn't matter.
• 57:53
  Speaker 2: It's one of the bridge you know what I mean.
• 57:54
  Speaker 2: I still got my business.
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: I'm saying the thing. If I was ten years younger,
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: I would have signed made a contract. These guys are
• 58:01
  Speaker 1: making more in the third round for a signing bonus
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: that I made in my entire career.
• 58:06
  Speaker 2: But you know what, it's crazy.
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: I don't care. I don't care. God has blessed me.
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: I do what I want to do.
• 58:11
  Speaker 2: I love this. I got this question for you because
• 58:15
  Speaker 2: I think that negotiation really, in my opinion, changed everything
• 58:19
  Speaker 2: about what we know is off season football. Yes, and
• 58:23
  Speaker 2: so how what negotiations When you guys are in there negotiating,
• 58:28
  Speaker 2: at what point do you say, Okay, well, if we're
• 58:30
  Speaker 2: going to do this, this is what we got to
• 58:32
  Speaker 2: have because now there was no more to days. You
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: guys like that was like a huge change. And now
• 58:36
  Speaker 2: there's no more too days.
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: In college everyone always goes all yeah, and so there
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: are to days. The rules of two days have changed dramatic, dramatically,
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: So like, how did you come about with that?
• 58:50
  Speaker 2: Even including the off seasons? Coach because you guys, in
• 58:52
  Speaker 2: my opinion, have changed the whole world of what we deceived.
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: So the biggest issue at the time, and then you
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: guys probably remember this was was brain injuries and CTEs
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: and stuff like that, and so that became the forefront
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: of health and health matters and issues. Well, but they've
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: always have been. So when I became a player rep
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: in ninety nine, my first meetings was the two thousand
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: player rep meetings, was the first time they had changing
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: helmets in like twenty years, and I remember sitting in
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: there and then they were presenting this new helmet which
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: I actually wore, and there was a lightweight helmet made differently,
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: kind of like a motorcycle helmet, but it had different
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: kind of path and stuff like that. And that was
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: the first time that the helmet's ever been changed ever, right,
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: And so then re buysing their league in two thousand
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: and two, they buy the entire league out. Me and
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: about fifteen guys on the execut committee and on the
• 59:38
  Speaker 1: board gets selected to go to Rebok headquarters in Massachusetts
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: for research and development. And that's the first time we've
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: ever talked about where they're asking you about the shoes
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: positional playing shoes. But those are the kind of things
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: you always talked about because everybody knew astral turf was horrible.
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: It's like playing in your grandma's back patio with the
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: green carpet, you know. So so then that's where they started
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: talking about, like how does the pattern of the cleats
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: match with the playing surface and all that kind of stuff.
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: So those are things that the normal public and many
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: of the players have no clue that the player and
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: the player, the players association, the leadership was always involved
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: in a lot of those conversations. And now which I
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: think one of the greatest things I've seen is given
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: organizations report cards on their facilities of free agency. Right,
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: I mean, how are teams like LSU and Alabama and
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: Nebraska beating everybody else in recruiting going to the facilities
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: and look what they've got, you know, and now a
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: lot of guys going in the NFL. It's a downgrade
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: from the dollars. So go back to twenty eleven, or
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: when we're doing the negotiations about the health, well, how
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: do we get to the practice. The biggest issue was
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: brain trauma, and guys are suffering from brain injury and stuff,
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: and so you had to think about what causes it. Well,
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: it's multiple becussive hits throughout the course of their career. Well,
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: how do you eliminate that? Well, if you're going two
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: day practices and sometimes like with a Jets, we did
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: three days, you had like a morning practice, special teams practice,
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: and they had afternoon practice. Well, every time you had
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: step on the football field for every play, that's the
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: opportunity to have a helmet to helmet contact hit. And
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: so well, how do you eliminate that. Well, you got
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: to eliminate either the time of practice or the amount
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: of times you're on the football field. So that's how
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: the conversation started. So we gotta get rid of two days. Well,
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: if you don't get rid of two days, and the
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: coaches still want two days, and that was part of
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: the conversation was, well, the coaches aren't gonna like this,
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: So we're not negotiating against coaches, we're negotiating against ownership.
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: The coaches don't have a say in this. They go
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: form their own union, but you guys won't let them
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: because then they're they're part of management, you know. So
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: so the coaches don't have a say in this we
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: hear their concerns, but at the end of the day,
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: this is not their decision to make. It's going to
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: be us against you guys. And so great point to
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: the culmination of it was the only way you eliminate
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: concussive episodes is eliminate the opportunities to have the custom efficcudes.
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: The only way you eliminate opportunities is to cut back
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: on aunt of practices. And so that's how you elimination
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: of practice. That's why your second practice, if you don't,
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 1: has to be a walk through with no helmets, because
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: what happens is a walkthrough becomes a speed through. We're
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: running full speed because coaches can't help themselves. And now
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: that I've been on the coaching side of it, I
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: see it because you get so frustrated we're not going
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: to get this because the angles are the timing is
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: not right right.
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 2: I gotta see it.
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: And that's and so that's kind of how that conversation
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: started and how it happened. And of course we take
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: into account we had Tom Mayer was our medical director
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: of the PA Mark or Stagan, who owned who opened
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: started exos way back in the day. He was always
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: on the board of our Health and Welfare Committee and
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 1: things like that, and then we have to this is
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: the thing that people underestimate the intelligence for football players.
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: On our executive committee during that time, every one of
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: us had an advanced degree, whether it be NBA like
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: I have a master's sports management. Every one of us had,
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: and then Dominic Foxers ended up going to Harvard, you
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, So they underestimate your intelligence. The
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: challenge is every four years you got new leadership on
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: the PA side, the NFL has got what the same
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: thirty two guys every time. That's what the challenge is.
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: But that's how the conversation works. And so the players
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: will say, I think this is a great idea. Okay,
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: let's let's research this idea and we can maybe implement this.
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: But that's how we came to no two days or
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: two days modified the hard part and then like full practices,
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: you know, full Paddy only like one a week for
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: the first fourteen weeks or something like that, and then
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: you get whatever that is, like seventeen Yeah, I don't
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: know what you like, total seventeen over fourteen weeks or whatever.
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: I don't ever know the rule is, and that's kind
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: of how it all.
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 2: I like it. I liked it.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 3: As an older guy when we had all those it was.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 2: It was very interesting because you know, from a younger
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 2: guy's perspective, it was like, I don't know if I
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 2: cared as much versus But then when you get older,
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 2: you care a lot more. But I appreciate it. I
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 2: loved it.
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: As you get older, you learn how to practice. Yeah,
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: you had learned how to be more efficient in your practice.
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: So okay, I can cut back. I don't have to
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 1: go you know, if I'm running go routes, I don't
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: have to run dead springt go route. Now, I just
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: got to make sure I get to my point. I
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: know where my point is, or if I'm on a
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: deep slant, I need to know where how far I
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: got get to the field before I make my break
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: or we.
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 2: Get all that kind of stuff pre and post practice too.
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 2: You're just more efficient with your.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: More time when not out there smart. And then it
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: goes back to the modalities now that they have that
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: they're now mandated to have in the training room all,
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: whether it be hyperbaric or red laser or things like that.
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: You know, and then enough of course, another part of
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: that was the big the whole marijuana thing. And you know,
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: there's a lot of guys who are self medic Kayden
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: with with by smoking and all that kind of stuff,
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: and and you know, it's become a big part of
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: the culture, and it's been legalized in so many any
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: in the NFL is like, just because it's legal in
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: this state, doesn't mean you guys allowed to do it.
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 1: We're still going to test you. So that's why they
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: dropped the numbers and the thresholds. And then I don't know,
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: I think the roll all together is like nobody can
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: nick for meat anymore, you know, And but you know,
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: and my whole mind is like, I don't know how
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 1: that makes you play better. But I've never done it before,
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: so I don't know. But for some guy it might
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 1: work for you. I mean, I had teammates. It was
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: the drink a fifth of jack on a Saturday night
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 1: before a game, because the calm the nurse to me,
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: I'd be like so sick the next day. But like
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: I ate two cups of the size of Eminem's the
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: night before game. I just you know, I was carbloading.
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: So everybody had a different deal but but that's how
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: the conversation started. It all started with CTE and how
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: to protect our guys from having uh, you know, chronic
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: brain image.
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 2: Well, I appreciate you for sharing because I just, you know,
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 2: I want you to know that a lot of us
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 2: appreciate what you did that And I don't know if
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 2: you even think about it, but you really, and you
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 2: and your guys and us as the league change the
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 2: way everything that happens in football going forward, because nowadays
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 2: you see guys even in college, like they think, oh
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 2: my gosh, training camp so hard. I'm like, yeah, I
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 2: do exactly what you just did. And I'm just saying
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 2: you have no idea, you have no clue and what
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 2: you can't tell them that it's not hard because that's
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 2: their life. But at the same time, yeah, and I
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 2: just don't know if we understood, like that decision that offseason,
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 2: how much it changed everything about football going forward.
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: And it goes back to you got to understand that
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 1: the changes that you're implementing may not ever affect you,
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 1: but it's going to make life better for the guys
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 1: come after you. Absolutely, and that's I think a great leader,
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 1: no matter what role you're in whether you're in corporate politics, whatever.
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: A great leader understands you not making decisions for yourself.
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: You're making decisions so that when you leave, whatever arena
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: you're in is better than what you found it. And
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: that's I feel like during my presidency those four years,
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: and I think that's what we left myself. Just Saturday,
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: Mike Rable, Tony Richardson, Drew Brees, you know guys are
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 1: on the connect with other other guys. I can't name
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: them all, Brian Dawkins, you know, all of us guys.
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: We felt like we left the game better because all
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 1: of us were in like double digit years except for
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: Dominque Foxworth, who became the president after I left. And
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: that I think that's a true sign of leader. It's
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: not about what's going to help you. It's going to
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: help what helps everybody after you, right, And that's that's
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: how and I think that's how it should be done.
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 3: I want to read something to you, and I want
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 3: you to expend upon it. Really put some time in
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 3: thought and to who you'd want to be if you
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 3: never had the game of football in your life.
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: You made that comment, Yeah, I made it about transitioning. Yeah,
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: there's a we all know there's guys that are lost
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: without football because that's all they've ever known. And I
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: was one of the early on I was one of
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: those guys. All I want to do is be a
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: football player. I went to LSU. I joke around now
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: that I was an eligibility major at LSU. They're like,
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: what's that. That's like, my goal was to stay past
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: twelve hours every semester so I can be eligible to
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: play football. I grew up and figured out I need
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: to graduate and get something sometime of degree. But it's
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: been my experience in the stories that I've heard the
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: former players that I've met that struggle when they're outside
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: of the locker room because they don't have the surrounding
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 1: of the boys in the locker room. Yep, they don't
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 1: have the game, they don't have the they don't have
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: the platform, the platform or the pedestal that they spent
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 1: their whole lives on. You were a five star athlete
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: in high school, you were a second round draft, or
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 1: you were like All American college, you were a second
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: third round pick in the NFL. You blow your knee
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: out and nobody cares, And that's got to be heart
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 1: soul crushing for men, and for me, I was on
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: that trajectory because it was all about ball for me.
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 1: But I was married, I had a wife, and then
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: I had circumstances in my life that made me change
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 1: my whole perspective. I had the death of a brother
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 1: after my second year in the NFL, and my wife
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: became pregnant at the same time. So all of a sudden,
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: now you're going to be a husband, you're gonna be
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: a dad, and your best friend just passed away tragically, unexpectedly,
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: and you think around, look around, like, man, this is nothing,
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 1: this means nothing. And so it led me on a
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: spiritual journey, of my faith driven journey where I became
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: a born again Christian and understood I believe the word
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 1: of the Bible, and the Bible telling me that God
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 1: has a purpose for every one of us, and everybody's
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 1: purpose is different. My purpose was not to play football.
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 1: My purpose was to find football that He has a
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: platform to make it better for me, to be able
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 1: to have a voice to make things better for everybody else.
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 1: And so when you have that mindset, you can walk
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: away from the game say okay, how do I And
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: this is what the trust is really good about how
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: do I transition from a player to the corporate world,
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: or a player to the community, or the player in
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: the teacher or coach or whatever. But understanding that the
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: reason why I have a louder voice is because football
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 1: gave that to me and then using that to make
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 1: whatever difference you want to make in the world. And
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: the guys that don't understand that are the ones who
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: struggle when they leave the game. The other ones that
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: I missed the locker room, I don't know what I'm
• 1:10:24
  Speaker 1: gonna do with in my life, and they go on
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: too tailspin and things like that, And of course there's
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 1: injuries and head to trauma that might play along with it.
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: But I think the earlier in the game that you
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: start thinking about the exit of the game, then the
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 1: better off going to be. And for me, we didn't
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 1: have continuing education in my first ten years in the league.
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 1: We didn't have all that, and most of the guys
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 1: weren't a lot of guys weren't graduating before they come
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: in the NFL. Now colleges are accelerating their graduation rates.
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: Guys are graduating with masters before they even get in
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 1: an NFL. True statistically, I don't know if it's changed
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: statistic when I was playing, statistic players they graduated from
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 1: college before they joined the NFL statistically have longer careers
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 1: than those who didn't graduate from college. And the reason,
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 1: and I don't know what the reason why, but my
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 1: high surmise that the reason was because they figured out
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 1: a way how to be committed to something, to get
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: through something. So now you have that mentality that I
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 1: got through that. I mean, I had to go through
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 1: twenty hour rules in college, I carried eighteen hour workload,
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 1: I had a study, I still wanted my social life
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: and then all this, but I figured out a way
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: to get done. So then you come to the NFL.
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: You've had that success. Now you just apply all those
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 1: same things to an NFL player and then you move on.
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 1: So then statistically, on top of that is a guy
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: that makes it to this fifth year in the NFL
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 1: statistically has a better chance of making it to year
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: ten than the guy that only makes it that doesn't
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 1: get to year five, you know what I'm saying. So
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 1: if you get to year two, your statistics to get
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 1: to year ten are a lot lower than the guys
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: that's already in the year five obviously, because you are
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 1: god three years on deal. But you learn how to
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 1: you figure it out. You figure it out, and here's
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 1: the best thing you do. Don't come to the locker
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 1: room thing, you know. And I used to tell young
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 1: guys all this time, and I learned it. I knew
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 1: it when I went in. I picked a guy in
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 1: the locker room that I watched how he lived his
• 1:12:14
  Speaker 1: life a lot. This guy's twelve and it's got to
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 1: be a ten or twelve year vet or something like that.
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: And just watch how he goes about his business. He's
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 1: not the loudest guy in the locker room. He's always
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 1: on time. He's always got a notebook. You know. When
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 1: he gets done, he's going home to his family. Those
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: are guys that are playing forever. You know what I'm saying,
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 1: And that's why I locked onto So then as I
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 1: became an older guy, I would tell young guys this.
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 1: You keep your mouth shut, eyes and ears open, see everything,
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 1: hear everything. Nobody wants your opinion until you've earned the
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: respect of the guys in the locker room. And then if
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: you see something, then you become the guy that, hey,
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: young man, that's not ye, you're not gonna be around
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: very long. That's how you're going to keep going, you
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 1: know that kind of thing. But but going back to
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: the part about knowing who you are in the outside
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: of the game. When I realized that my priorties was
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 1: be a great husband, to be a great father, a
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: great brother, and a great friend, football didn't matter because
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 1: if I can be all those things, then I just
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: apply all those principles being a great footbo boarder, right,
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: And that's kind of was my mentality.
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 3: So this is a this is a question we like
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 3: to ask a lot of the guests that come on
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 3: the pod. You have had a tremendous life, successful high school, college,
• 1:13:26
  Speaker 3: professional career, NFLPA president, the leadership from your dad and
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 3: and everything else. If you had four people to pick
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 3: and put on your mount Rushmore, who would those four
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 3: people be that have helped you shaped you, mold you
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 3: into the man we are talking to right now.
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: My mom and dad too. Okay, we'll puts down.
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you want to be one of one together. You
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 2: want to do them this, one and two.
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: I would have to put them one together because you
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 1: know what I mean, you learned something from each one
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 1: of them. But they ran the household together, you know
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: what I'm saying. So it wasn't like mom's rules and
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 1: dad's rules. It was the house rules, you know. And
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: however they developed that mentality or whatever. But but I
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: would say, but if I had to put one over
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: the other, it would be my dad. And my dad's
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 1: very quiet.
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 2: Man.
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 1: But you I just if you got in trouble, mamas
• 1:14:26
  Speaker 1: weren't whipping you. Yeah, if Dad said something, boy, you were.
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 2: In trouble, you knew you were in trouble.
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: Man. Uh, But to watch them work. He was in
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 1: the military, and I just remember, Oh, now the guys
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 1: in the army don't even know they wear these boots
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: that you don't even have to polish. I mean you
• 1:14:47
  Speaker 1: can see yourself. You can part your hair by looking
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: at my dad's boots, you know what I'm saying.
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 2: I remember that.
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 1: And uh, my dad's uniform was starch. They never looked sloppy.
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 1: I mean, man, it's like it was details. And the
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 1: mom make the bed. We had the forty five degree
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: angle on the back end with the sheets tucked and
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 1: you had to bounce quarter off it and that those
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 1: things mold you, you know, and then you watch your
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: dad get ready for work and he passes rucksack and
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: everything's meticulous. I mean the fox socks are folded just right,
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 1: and his his his sleeping bags folded up. But uh,
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: that's where I think if everybody should be able to
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: say that their mom and dads are number one people
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 1: and a lot of guys, a lot of people don't
• 1:15:29
  Speaker 1: have that, And I understand that, and that's I think
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: that's a lot of what a lot of the issues
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 1: we have in our world today is because there's a
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: lot of people that don't have that. And so so
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: dad and mom would be definitely number one. I'll call
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: him one and too because because they're so influential. The
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 1: next one, not just because it comes to my mind.
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 1: As a great friend of mine. His named Stina Rizzo.
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 1: He was the founding pastor of Healing Place Church in Bountdruse, Louisiana.
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 1: He now works at Church of Highlands and bring him
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 1: out Alabama. When I became a believer a Christian, he
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: was a guy that led me to the Lord. And
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: I remember he married my wife and I when I
• 1:16:13
  Speaker 1: was in college and at the time he just started
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: a church and he says, hey, I want to talk
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: to you about this Jesus, I want to talk to
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 1: you about the Bible. He does that you interested? I said, Nope,
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 1: not interested, don't want any of it. I said, if you,
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 1: if that's what it's going to take for you to
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 1: marry my wife and I, we'll go find somebody else.
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 1: And uh, two years later, after my brother passed away,
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 1: I was having some serious questions and doubts and and
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: uh we ended up back at his church and UH
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 1: had to meeting him June twenty fourth, nineteen ninety seven.
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 1: My life changed forever. And uh, and he's been a
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 1: part of every major decision.
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 2: I've ever made in my life since then.
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 1: Uh, my free agency in New York, my second contract
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 1: in New York, whether I take it or let it ride,
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: going to Tennessee, becoming the president of the PA, my
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: retire vironment decision. He has been a part of every
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: major decision in my life. You know, we've now he's
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 1: moved away, and we see each other maybe once or
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 1: twice a year, but we talked, you know, a little
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 1: bit more than that. But I've never made a major
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 1: decision without him like counseling me through it. So that
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 1: would be three and uh, man, the fourth one influential
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 1: in my life man, my wife.
• 1:17:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a good one.
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 1: We celebrated thirty two years this last May. We've been
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: together for thirty five years. And man, she's been through
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 1: every and I talked about it in my speech in
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 1: twenty nineteen. But man, I don't do nothing without her.
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 1: I don't do nothing. I would rather go hang out
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 1: with my wife than to go I mean, I like
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 1: being around my dudes, but I'd rather go hang out
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 1: with my wife and go do something with her then
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 1: go have a beer at a bar or something like that.
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 1: That's not my vibe anyways. But uh, Tracy and I
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 1: we we've been through some stuff, so uh yeah, i'd
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: be Tracy.
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 3: That's a good list.
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 2: Man. That's that's a good amount. Rushmore, by the way,
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 2: that's it's beautiful. It's beautiful, healthy.
• 1:18:22
  Speaker 1: It is extremely that cry all the time. So anyways,
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 1: but that that would be it, man, because it's the
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 1: people closest to you, because you know what, they're the
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 1: ones who affect you the most and the ones that
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: are affected by your decisions the most. And outside of Dino,
• 1:18:36
  Speaker 1: you know, he's the only outside guy. But I've been
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 1: with this dude since he married us in ninety three,
• 1:18:44
  Speaker 1: led me to the Lord in ninety seven vacation together. He
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 1: went to my first Pro Bowl with me. Uh A
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 1: couple years later we just want a guy's Pro Bowl trip.
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 1: He was one of the guys that came. He was
• 1:18:57
  Speaker 1: at my Hall of Fame induction. He we I mean,
• 1:19:01
  Speaker 1: I said, I remember sitting. I was at the end
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 1: of my career two thousand and nine season, two thousand
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 1: and six yards y two K. It's c J two K.
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 1: I was val in voluntary at Vandonbilt University, had the
• 1:19:12
  Speaker 1: opportunity to go a one year minimum wage deal on
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 1: the West coast or just call it, call it quits
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 1: and shut it down. And I remember sitting at the
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 1: Vandonbilt practice field at eleven o'clock at night, all by myself,
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: leaning up against the fans, talking to Dino and just
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 1: going through this whole process. Say, this is what God
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 1: has done in your life, your family, your kids, your
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 1: leadership of the NFL, all this stuff, and you've done
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 1: everything right. He goes, you know, and whatever, so and then,
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 1: but he's always been that guy just kind of bringing
• 1:19:44
  Speaker 1: me back to center, you know, and understand, like perspective wise,
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 1: if you claim to be a man of faith, then
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 1: you don't act on an emotion, you act on truth.
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 1: So what does the word of God say? What does
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 1: the word of God say about being a husband, a man,
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 1: your future, a business leader? Whatever? And if he'd always
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 1: had a way to bring me back to center and
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 1: then I made my decisions from that and uh, and
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 1: that was it. But you know, outside my family and
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 1: then everything else is my kids. You know, It's like
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 1: my decisions are based on how it affects my kids,
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 1: who are now twenty eight and twenty five and about
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 1: to be their own adults. My daughter actually sent money
• 1:20:17
  Speaker 1: back to me today.
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 2: She goes, how does that feel to have your kids
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 2: pay you back?
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 1: Because she asked for some money I sent her. She goes,
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 1: and the zel. So she goes, Zel, it was a
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 1: double payment. She goes, I'm send sending part of it
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 1: back to you. What was more I got? I got
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 1: two hundred bucks in my bank account.
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I did something right.
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 3: I haven't gotten that yet.
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 2: No, No, I'm not on that level. I'm not on
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 2: that level. Kevin Man, appreciate it. Man, Thanks for man
• 1:20:45
  Speaker 2: so candid, so open with us. You talked about being
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 2: a crowd baby. I just think it's okay to share
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 2: emotions and when you know this is probably I told
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 2: Bill Cowerd this the other day, was like, this is
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 2: probably what I missed the most about the locker room.
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 2: Is this when I'm around my guys, just knowing that
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 2: it's okay.
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no doubt about it. That everybody wants you to
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 1: be real.
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, real, you know what I mean. And uh, you
• 1:21:07
  Speaker 2: don't always get that outside of the locker room, but
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 2: when we when we all get back together, this is
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 2: just what we do. It's naturally and Uh, any day
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 2: that you have a day full of emotions, whether I'm crying, happy, smiling, laughing.
• 1:21:20
  Speaker 2: If you can cry, laugh and have all these emotions
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 2: in the same day, that's a full day. That's a day.
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 2: Put a full day. And so congratulations on putting in
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 2: a full.
• 1:21:31
  Speaker 1: Day, big dog. I appreciate it.
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 2: Man.
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 1: Thank you guys. Thank you what you're doing with trust
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 1: everything else. Appreciate your guys' careers that you guys had
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 1: and continue to be a voice of the players. Man.
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 2: Thanks man. It's all about you, your guys voices man,
• 1:21:42
  Speaker 2: and we got a great team that helps us out man,
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 2: So thank you for all of our viewers and listeners
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 2: out there, wherever you pick up your podcast, where this
• 1:21:49
  Speaker 2: Apple podcast, iHeartRadio app or anywhere.
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 1: Else you listen to them.
• 1:21:53
  Speaker 2: So trust me, man, leave a comment like, subscribe, share.
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 2: You can also check us out on the NFL pages
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 2: not new but YouTube channel. Just check them out anyways,
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 2: Peanut Man, get us out of here. Hey I'm Peanut.
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 3: That's wrong, Bro, That's Kevin And this is the NFL
• 1:22:09
  Speaker 3: Player's second act podcast, We Out