Latest / Whatcom Preps Podcast / Whatcom Preps Podcast Episode 254 - Special Interview with Casey Bauman

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Whatcom Preps Podcast Episode 254 - Special Interview with Casey Bauman · Whatcom Preps Podcast

• 0:18
  Greetings and welcome into the Walk and Preps podcast. This is episode two hundred
• 0:22
  and fifty four, a special installment, if you will, as we have
• 0:26
  a special guest. He has Nukxack Valley's all time leader in virtually every passing
• 0:31
  category and the newest member of the Los Angeles Chargers. It's Casey Bauman.
• 0:35
  Casey. How you doing, man, I'm doing well. Thanks for having
• 0:38
  me, Tyler, Yeah, you bet so. It's a it's crazy.
• 0:42
  We go back a little ways. You've had an interesting last five six weeks
• 0:47
  or so, so let's talk about how did you find out that everything was
• 0:55
  happening with the Los Angeles Chargers. Yeah, well, I mean the last
• 0:59
  couple months have been pretty pretty nuts. You know, go back a couple
• 1:03
  of months ago. My season was done in December, and I didn't know,
• 1:06
  Uh, I don't know if I was gonna keep playing ball, you
• 1:08
  know, Like I mentioned earlier, I'm finishing up my master's degree. So
• 1:12
  so that's uh, that's been interesting too. And then you know, I
• 1:17
  had an agent. I was fortunate enough to have an agent reach out to
• 1:19
  me and he you know, he he he had recruited me through the he
• 1:23
  had a connection through you know, the NFL guys. So so my family
• 1:27
  and I decided we were going to, uh keep the training going. So
• 1:33
  I uh, I went down to Denver and did my my combine prep training
• 1:37
  for the last couple of months in January, and uh, you know,
• 1:40
  and then you have pro days and stuff like that. So I was fortunate
• 1:42
  enough to go to University of Minnesota Pro Day, and I was able to
• 1:47
  play well there and get a little bit of interest and then and then you
• 1:49
  know, after that, you just kind of build the relationships with the with
• 1:53
  the NFL guys and you know, continue talking and seeing where they're at with
• 1:57
  you. So yeah, I was able to you know, I was fortunate
• 2:01
  enough to talk to, you know, some teams and get some interest there
• 2:05
  and build some relationships and and then you know, a draft day comes along
• 2:09
  and and obviously I had no I had no expectations of getting drafted, but
• 2:13
  uh, you know, it's fun to see everything unfold, right I.
• 2:16
  I. You know, it's the NFL. You never know. You just
• 2:21
  never know anything because you know, they're always they like to tell you what
• 2:24
  what you like to hear a little bit, and you just never know.
• 2:28
  So I had I had talked to some teams along the way, and I
• 2:31
  thought I had an idea what was going to go on, and it might
• 2:35
  not have gone that way. So on Saturday, you know, my I
• 2:38
  was back and forth with my agent, you know, talking, we were
• 2:42
  talking to a bunch of teams and you know, we we were were just
• 2:45
  blessed enough that the Chargers you know, believed in me and they they gave
• 2:49
  me that opportunity. And it was a pretty pretty special moment for me and
• 2:53
  my family, you know, just because the last six years of college have
• 2:58
  been interesting for me and and not not have gone they haven't gone exactly as
• 3:01
  I would have hoped, and uh, you know, it just to just
• 3:06
  to you know, get that call and you know, have that opportunity and
• 3:10
  and kind of share that moment with my family, it was pretty special.
• 3:14
  So, you know, I'm really fortunate and really blessed to be in this
• 3:16
  position. And uh, it was it was a pretty fun day. Yeah,
• 3:21
  I know a lot of people up in Wakam County were super excited.
• 3:24
  Uh all of a sudden, social media is blowing up. I'm getting text
• 3:27
  messages. Uh, It's just it was crazy. I wanted to reach out,
• 3:31
  but I didn't want to. I just like everyone's reaching out to them.
• 3:34
  I'll bug them later. Uh, it's really cool. I got my
• 3:37
  Chargers jersey on. Man. I'm super funped for you. I love it.
• 3:42
  Yeah, It's it's We're really excited. And I'm gonna We're gonna go
• 3:45
  back a little bit in this chronological order here and talk about when did you
• 3:50
  start playing football? Do you remember what grade you were in? Well?
• 3:53
  Uh, first year a tackle football is third grade. Okay, so we
• 3:58
  started that in third grade, and you know, I guess I just kind
• 4:01
  of never looked back, did you. Were you a quarterback right away?
• 4:05
  No? So, well, I think in third grade a little bit,
• 4:09
  maybe I played a lot of receiver. You know, even up until high
• 4:13
  school. I played a lot of receiver when I was younger. Even even
• 4:16
  my sophomore year of high school, first three games, I played play receiver
• 4:19
  because there's another guy playing quarterback. So I didn't really fully, you know,
• 4:25
  play quarterback full time up until you know, my sophomore year high school.
• 4:29
  So yeah, it was interesting, just just an interesting path to get
• 4:32
  to this place. You know. Yeah, playing receiver does that help you
• 4:38
  as a quarterback? So because you kind of understand what they are having to
• 4:41
  go through and stuff like that. Did that help you a little bit?
• 4:43
  You know? I think so, it's it kind of makes it playing receiver,
• 4:47
  definitely, it as a quarterback. It gives you that perspective that you
• 4:51
  know, that's it, that's just not that easy, you know. So
• 4:55
  yeah, tend to uh, you know, I'm a little more you know,
• 4:59
  under I understand those guys. And I understand because because I dropped a
• 5:02
  few passes in my career and you know, getting open and catching the ball
• 5:06
  on the run it's a hard thing to do, so and you know,
• 5:10
  it helps just to understand those guys' mindset and stuff like that a little bit.
• 5:14
  So I'm thankful to have I played multiple positions just because it gives you.
• 5:18
  It gives you multiple perspectives, you know. You know, I covered
• 5:23
  you in high school. Saw you play three different sports? Did you did
• 5:27
  you play basketball and baseball growing up as well? Yeah? Yeah, I
• 5:30
  played three three all three sports my entire life. So yeah, I mean
• 5:34
  I think that helps a lot too. I really encourage people to do that
• 5:39
  just because you know, staying active is obviously great, and then you know,
• 5:42
  just being an athlete helps you become more athletic, right, And I
• 5:46
  really think that doing all three of those things helped me become more athletic and
• 5:50
  helped my overall athleticism. So yeah, so as a freshman, you get
• 5:58
  your at Knuksack Valley and and the quarterback at that time is Tanner Meyer.
• 6:02
  He's putting up huge numbers. Coaches son, awesome kid. What do you
• 6:06
  remember about watching him play quarterback? Yeah, Tanner's great. You know,
• 6:11
  he's awesome. Tanner was one of my good buddies. We had actually a
• 6:15
  weightlifting class my freshman year. He's a senior, so we know he's a
• 6:19
  hangout on that and Coach Meyer as a coach, so you know, they're
• 6:23
  great. But I mean, that kid, he'd just run around and make
• 6:26
  plays. You know, he's just a ballplayer, you know. He he
• 6:30
  was not not the biggest guy in the world, but you wouldn't know watching
• 6:32
  him play. I mean, gets tough as nails, and uh, he's
• 6:36
  just you know, he'd run around and make stuff shake. So I mean
• 6:40
  it was great to watch those guys and and kind of learn from him a
• 6:44
  little bit. And he just had the quarterback mindset. You know, he
• 6:47
  was never rattled and he and he didn't let anything affect him, and he
• 6:51
  just went out there and you know, he's a he's what you call a
• 6:55
  ballplayer, So it was fun to watch him play. Yeah, he broke
• 6:59
  all the school records that you went on to then break most attempts, completions,
• 7:03
  yards, touchdowns, as well as the lowest interception percentage, which is
• 7:08
  really impressive being able to throw that many times and not throw that many interceptions.
• 7:15
  You were talking about your sophomore year. You started it receiver, you
• 7:17
  end up becoming the starting quarterback. There was a game that year at Mount
• 7:21
  Baker that you might not want to talk about. Jed Schlimmer breaks the Walking
• 7:27
  County all time record rushes for five hundred and twenty one yards. But you
• 7:30
  broke a record in that game. Do you remember that? Yeah? Was
• 7:33
  it past attempts? It was completions, well, I think and attempts.
• 7:39
  I think it was both of them. Okay, you completed thirty seven passes
• 7:43
  in that game, and that's the most still to this day in the Walking
• 7:46
  County game. For I mean, it was a shootout, right, it
• 7:48
  was back and forth. They were running, you were passing. What do
• 7:50
  you remember about that game? Yeah, well I remember that we had trouble
• 7:55
  stopping that kid brought on the ball and he was pretty dark, good running,
• 8:00
  and you know, we kind of had to throw the ball. We
• 8:03
  didn't really have a choice then because I mean, they get the ball and
• 8:05
  just scores. We're running out of time, so we had to throw the
• 8:09
  crap out of the ball. But it was always fun playing those guys.
• 8:13
  You know, you know, their coach is great guy, and they're well
• 8:16
  coached team, and and yeah, Jed Jed is running the ball and he's
• 8:20
  hard to tackle. Man. That's a big guy, big guy playing running
• 8:22
  back and he's moving yea. And it was a fun game. Those games
• 8:26
  are always great, you know when you can go back and forth. And
• 8:30
  I'm an offensive guy, so I like a lot of offense, so right,
• 8:33
  it was a good time. Then you go to your junior year and
• 8:39
  your class. A lot of you guys started varsity pretty young. I know
• 8:45
  Kirk Veldman was starting on the offensive line as a freshman. A lot of
• 8:48
  you guys were playing as sophomore's full time. What do you remember about your
• 8:52
  junior year kind of going into that and kind of going, okay, now
• 8:56
  we have some experience under our belt. Yeah, well, I mean our
• 9:01
  sophomore year wasn't great. You know, I remember a lot of that,
• 9:03
  and we were young, and you know a lot of us are young for
• 9:07
  even our great so it was it was we had a lot of mature to
• 9:11
  do and and you know, just kind of it's different. You know,
• 9:13
  you play you played jv your whole life, but and you know, when
• 9:18
  you're younger, varsity football is different, right you you get there and you're
• 9:22
  under the lights, and you got some fans for the first time, and
• 9:26
  and you know, it's different when you're out there, and so I think
• 9:28
  I think that experience, you know, just just getting that experience our sophomore
• 9:33
  year was really good for us. And then you know, playing together,
• 9:35
  right, you got to play play with the guys that that you're playing with.
• 9:39
  So it gaining that, you know, that trust, that camaraderie and
• 9:43
  being able to have that experience I think was good. Was good for our
• 9:46
  junior year, and we made some good strides for junior year. Yeah,
• 9:50
  it didn't go as we would liked, of course, but uh, you
• 9:54
  know it was good. It was great to play our sophomore year and and
• 9:56
  gain that you know, a level of trust and then keep it going to
• 10:00
  our junior year. So it was exciting over here at Walker Preps. One
• 10:03
  of our favorite guys is TJ Ackerman, one of your assistant coaches. So
• 10:09
  set the record straight, who's taller you were, TJ. Yeah, that's
• 10:13
  a good question. I don't know. I think I think I have to.
• 10:18
  I think I got him. Really, he might say otherwise, but
• 10:20
  I think I got him. I might have grown maybe an instance high school.
• 10:24
  But but TJ's great. I love those guys and I am, you
• 10:28
  know, even friends forever, family friends, and so I'm super excited for
• 10:33
  Brady in the success he's having right now. I mean, it's just so
• 10:35
  awesome to see. Yeah, that's that's true. That's true. Big expectations
• 10:41
  going into your senior year. There's a lot of but the you know,
• 10:46
  the league was so great even I mean Meridian goes on to the state championship
• 10:50
  game. It's a really, really tough league. You guys had that playing
• 10:54
  game. I think the final score was something like fifty six to forty eight.
• 10:58
  Another offensive explosion. I know you went off in that game. Uh,
• 11:03
  like you said earlier, it probably didn't go as expected, but there
• 11:05
  were some really great moments your senior year. Yeah, there was, there
• 11:11
  was. It was you know, yeah, like you mentioned, didn't go
• 11:13
  as planned, and I wish, I wish some things would look different because
• 11:18
  you know, we had a really good team and we had a lot of
• 11:20
  a lot of good players and and that's just the way it went. And
• 11:24
  and that's nobody's fault. Yeah, that playing game. That was fun.
• 11:26
  It was fun to you know, kick LC out there and let us let
• 11:30
  us go on. I like doing that. I'm a huge fan of that.
• 11:35
  But there's a lot of fun moments. And you know, high school
• 11:37
  football you just never get that back, right, you never get back varsity
• 11:41
  football, and uh, you know, playing with those guys and and you
• 11:43
  know, win or lose, we we had a great time doing it.
• 11:46
  So yeah, it was a lot of fun and uh, it was great
• 11:52
  to play with those guys and and uh, you know, it didn't go
• 11:56
  as planned and we wish we could have got further, but you know that
• 11:58
  that's life, that's how it goes. And it was a good time.
• 12:03
  I enjoyed it. So yeah, everyone loves reminiscing on their high school footall
• 12:07
  days. I mean, obviously you've played at the higher levels and stuff.
• 12:09
  But there's something about the high school football where you're you're throwing to a guy
• 12:13
  that you've known forever or or you know that you go to science class with.
• 12:18
  It's something really cool about it, right, I definitely, Yeah.
• 12:20
  I grew up with all those guys. You know, we playing on the
• 12:24
  same youth sports team for years and years and years, and and we're family
• 12:28
  friends doing everything together. So I mean just just yeah, doing that stuff
• 12:33
  and in front of our you know, our community. Our community is great,
• 12:35
  and you know, having that success and it's a good time. It's
• 12:39
  it's a lot of fun. You graduated with sixty five touchdown passes thrown in
• 12:45
  your high school career to twelve different receivers. So we're gonna play a little
• 12:48
  game here. You got to think about this. Can you name all twelve
• 12:52
  guys that you completed a touchdown pass too in high school? Oh? Man,
• 12:58
  we'll say Michael O'Brien, Ye, Golden Couts, Austin O'Brien, ye,
• 13:07
  Baylor Galley, Jordans Veiening, Kyle Veldman, Evan Knightling. Yeah,
• 13:16
  boy o, boy boy. Let me I gotta think here. How many
• 13:20
  is that? How many. That's seven. So you got seven of the
• 13:22
  twelve. You got five more, and and there might be a few that
• 13:26
  you only you know, got one or two to those guys, right,
• 13:28
  So oh man, I played a lot of football. Yeah, it's I
• 13:37
  met a lot of people along the road. Boy boy, I gotta think
• 13:46
  here, so I got five more? Really? Yeah? Wait my sophomore
• 13:54
  year. Oh who didn't? Oh Trey Silva, you forget about him.
• 14:05
  That's definitely threw a couple of him. Who else? Who else? Boy?
• 14:16
  Boys, I can give him to if you want. It's and then
• 14:20
  you're gonna you're gonna go, oh man, but you ready? Do you
• 14:24
  want to keep thinking? Yeah, let's hear. Let's okay. Michael Jackson,
• 14:31
  Oh yeah, Mike, I forgot a big mic. Yeah. Joe
• 14:35
  McNeely real, yeah, you guys. When you guys switched position, he
• 14:39
  ended up playing some running back, and I think he just dumped one to
• 14:41
  him. Yeah, okay, okay. Jeremy Dikes, Oh yeah, I
• 14:48
  totally knew that. Yeah. And Ryan Waning as well. Man, Yeah,
• 14:54
  I guess he might have been a sophomore when you were a senior.
• 14:56
  Okay, I guess I didn't know if he kind of touchdown, right,
• 15:01
  Yeah, okay, but that's you know, but that tells you how many
• 15:05
  good teammates you had and and and how fun it was. I mean,
• 15:07
  that's it's always fun playing these games. I played a game with Jake Locker
• 15:11
  where it was named that Locker you know, which one returned four kickoffs for
• 15:15
  a touchdown in one year. He thought it was his you know, his
• 15:18
  dad or one of his uncles, and ended up being him, you know.
• 15:22
  So yeah, so you just never know. I love playing these little
• 15:24
  games. Here's something kind of fun. Tell me about long snapping in high
• 15:30
  school, you know, yeah, I actually loved long snamp and it was
• 15:33
  so great. I mean the rule in high school touch long snapper right right.
• 15:37
  So I would just outstap the ball like I played quarterback. I didn't
• 15:41
  I didn't do a two hands. I just threw it back there with one
• 15:43
  hand and then it's free release. Yeah, And so I just ran down
• 15:46
  the field and try to make a play. And you know, I just
• 15:50
  love I just love football, and I love you know, I love contact,
• 15:52
  and I love making play. So I really enjoyed it actually, and
• 15:56
  it was a good time. And I still still like throughout my college.
• 16:00
  I would tell those guys that I played long trapper in high school. I
• 16:03
  could do it. I could do it, and everyone would laugh. Everyon
• 16:06
  would laugh. Nobody believed me, but I enjoyed it a lot. It
• 16:10
  was a good time. I saw a few times. You're absolutely right,
• 16:12
  because the center gets to go, they don't have to wait for the kick.
• 16:15
  And there were times when you could see the I could see the fear
• 16:19
  in the punt returner's eyes when a guy twice in side is coming at him.
• 16:22
  That's just as athletic as he is. And those were fun plays to
• 16:26
  watch. I I you know, I'm sure you hated to have to punt,
• 16:30
  but you were like, you know what, I get to make a
• 16:33
  play here. Yeah, exactly, I do hate to punt. You're right
• 16:34
  about time, but I'll play football, so I'd like to stay on the
• 16:37
  field as well as I was. I enjoyed that a lot. It was
• 16:41
  fun. You played a handful of defense as well, but it seemed like
• 16:45
  your senior year they were trying to keep you off the field defensively to save
• 16:48
  you for offense. But when it really called for it, you were like,
• 16:53
  get me in there. I'm gonna play some outside linebacker. I'm gonna
• 16:56
  I'm gonna do so, I'm gonna make some plays, get some interceptions,
• 16:59
  cause some fun. It looked like you had a good time playing some defense.
• 17:03
  Yeah I did. I love playing defense. Yeah, they they You
• 17:07
  know, it wasn't really my decision and not be out there my senior year.
• 17:11
  I wish I could have been, but yeah, I really enjoyed playing
• 17:17
  defense. And you know, like I mentioned, I just love football.
• 17:22
  You know, I like to play ball, and you know, I I
• 17:26
  in playing quarterback. It helps a lot to play defense, right, It
• 17:29
  helps a lot to play linebacker. And I kind of kind of have that
• 17:32
  mindset and I'm able to think with their thinking. So I think that helped
• 17:36
  a little bit when I was able to get on the field. Yeah,
• 17:38
  I wish I could have played a little bit more my senior year, but
• 17:41
  yeah, it was it was fun. I enjoyed that talk about how the
• 17:47
  kind of the recruiting went at that time. You're going through all that stuff,
• 17:49
  there's a lot of eyeballs on you. I remember that I met Brandon
• 17:53
  Huffman at the game at Meridian when you guys were there playing your senior year.
• 18:00
  He was there to see both you and Simon play and that was the
• 18:03
  night I met Ryland Spencer in person, and just how that all went.
• 18:08
  What did you enjoy about the recruiting process and how did you come to your
• 18:11
  final decision. Yeah, the recruiting process is funny, you know, and
• 18:17
  especially it's really funny if you go to Nuxilee Valley, just because not a
• 18:21
  whole lot of people go up there, go up north. And now I
• 18:23
  think, I think more and more college coaches are realizing that there's actually some
• 18:27
  talent Walking County here. People are coming up here, which is great,
• 18:30
  It's fantastic. But you know, when I was in high school, and
• 18:33
  especially for quarterback, you know, people aren't you know, really looking for
• 18:37
  quarterbacks in Walkome County. I don't think, but you know, it was
• 18:41
  it was good. You know, we had to we kind of had to
• 18:45
  go and get in front of some eyes to start the recruiting process. So,
• 18:49
  you know, my my dad and I hopped in the car and drove
• 18:52
  across the country, went to University of Idaho, went to Eastern easterns Camp
• 18:56
  first University of Idaho, then Miszoo, the University of Montana, the Montana
• 19:00
  State and uh I was fortunate enough to get offers from Idaho and Montana State
• 19:06
  on the spot at those camps, and that was kind of that was kind
• 19:08
  of what jump started my recruiting, just because nobody came up. Nobody came
• 19:12
  up to Knooksack, and it's kind of hard to get recruited. So going
• 19:15
  to those camps was you know, that helped me get That kind of started
• 19:19
  my recruitment. And then at the time, you know, you know,
• 19:23
  I don't I don't know if you know too much about Moscow, but it
• 19:26
  was a pretty easy decision for me. Montana State is a great program and
• 19:30
  they they had a great culture going, so it was a pretty easy decision
• 19:33
  for me to pick Montana State. And then you know, all those guys
• 19:37
  helped a ton, Brandon and Ryland, those guys are great that they're fantastic
• 19:41
  guys and they know what they're talking about. So those guys and they're they're
• 19:45
  helping with their exposure at all. That's it all helps a lot. So
• 19:49
  and then you know, you just meet a ton of people along the way,
• 19:52
  like I would have never met Brandon and Ryland and and uh, and
• 19:55
  I'm so thankful that I did because they're awesome, So you know, it
• 19:57
  was a it was a great experience. I Uh, I like to think.
• 20:03
  I like to tell myself, you know, if I live maybe in
• 20:04
  a in California or something like that, it would have looked different for me.
• 20:07
  But but uh, you know, I'm thankful and I wouldn't trade it
• 20:11
  for the world. So it was you know, the recruiting process was interesting.
• 20:17
  But you know, I'm sitting here today, so I can't can't really
• 20:18
  complain. Uh. There was a video that went viral when you were in
• 20:22
  high school playing basketball that I want to talk about a little bit that maybe
• 20:26
  some people watching this don't remember or they might jog their memory. But your
• 20:30
  guys are playing at lind and Christian if I remember correctly, and you took
• 20:36
  a pass and went baseline and tell us what happened. Yeah, well,
• 20:41
  you know, I wasn't the best basketball player, but I was big,
• 20:45
  so that kind of helped a little bit. But you know, I just
• 20:48
  went up for you know, the routine two hand dunk and backboard fell off.
• 20:53
  You know, it just kind of kind of fell away, and it
• 20:56
  wasn't as cool because I think we were losing the game by maybe thirty points,
• 21:02
  so it wasn't that's cool at the time, and I think Cole badgermum,
• 21:06
  I probably had thirty points and you know he he was just doing us,
• 21:10
  and so it was it was a cool experience, you know, you
• 21:12
  know, to do that, it was it was a fun thing. Would
• 21:15
  have liked to would have liked to do a little bit better in the game,
• 21:18
  but that was fun. It was fun. And then you know,
• 21:21
  that was on Sports Center and stuff. So it was a cool moment.
• 21:26
  Cool moment that that everyone. I mean, and still people don't believe me
• 21:29
  right to this day. They'll they'll see it or something. They don't believe
• 21:33
  it's me. So it's pretty funny. Oh it was, I guarantee it
• 21:37
  was you. I I was. I. Yeah, it was crazy.
• 21:40
  And they had to did you guys have to post not postpone, but you
• 21:42
  had to go to another gym to finish the game or something like that.
• 21:45
  Yeah, So we walked over across the street to the middle school and then
• 21:48
  the game up and uh, yeah, that was interesting to all the fans.
• 21:52
  Had to pack it up and pack the gym out and watch the watch
• 21:56
  in the middle school. And like I said, and that was I think
• 21:59
  in the third maybe and we were losing pretty badly. So yeah, so
• 22:03
  we were, uh, we're just trying to trying to get that thing over
• 22:07
  with. But it was fun. It was a it was a good moment.
• 22:08
  It was cool. Lynn Christian always really strong in basketball. And nothing's
• 22:12
  nothing's changed since you graduated high school. I'll tell you that. So I'm
• 22:17
  gonna I'm gonna do another little game here. No, you don't have to
• 22:19
  think too much this time, but I'm just gonna throw out five different names
• 22:23
  and then you just kind of tell me about recollection or kind of whatever comes
• 22:27
  to mind. Uh. The first one is actually a group the Veldman Brothers.
• 22:33
  Yeah. Yeah, I actually saw Kirk on Saturday. He's coaching baseball,
• 22:38
  Yeah, baseball for Len Christians. I saw him, which was great.
• 22:41
  But I mean those guys, you know, those are those are just
• 22:45
  you know, two great kids that you'll you'll do anything, and they have
• 22:48
  the best attitudes you can ever ask for, right, Like I mean,
• 22:51
  you met those guys, they'll just they're just team guys and and uh,
• 22:53
  you know Kyle Kyle, great receiver, great linebacker. I mean they're great
• 22:59
  to play with it and like I mentioned, we grew up playing baseball our
• 23:02
  entire life together and all the sports, and I mean we got pictures playing
• 23:06
  basketball when we were we were ten years old. So so playing with those
• 23:10
  guys throughout the career is awesome. And you know, we're there. Their
• 23:12
  dad's great and we were all family friends. So I'm pretty disappointed to see
• 23:17
  him move over to the LC side. But they're great, and they're great
• 23:22
  guys, and I love playing with those guys. So it was a lot
• 23:23
  of fun. Luke Winter, Yeah, Luke is uh. Luke is actually
• 23:29
  one of my best friends in high school and he's great also, he was
• 23:33
  you know, we we did a lot together and he's a lot of fun.
• 23:37
  That's a guy. That's a guy that you are thankful that he's on
• 23:41
  your team and you don't want to play against. And uh, you know,
• 23:45
  he's uh, his dad had him lifting weight since he was ten years
• 23:48
  old and he's, uh, he's a beast. He was a beast,
• 23:52
  and he he was great. You know, it's super fun. You know,
• 23:56
  we just we just had the best times playing together. It was every
• 23:59
  time we went on there on the field, it was it didn't really feel
• 24:02
  like you know, a high pressure football game. It was just like we
• 24:04
  were. You know, we were hanging out and just playing ball. And
• 24:07
  he's great. So it was awesome playing with him. Yeah, Jordan,
• 24:15
  just having a six six receiver, I mean, you can't hope for nothing
• 24:18
  better than that. I would, you know, we would get within the
• 24:21
  twenty yard line. I just huck it up to Jordan. You pretty much
• 24:23
  catch it every time. You know, you got a guy that a guy
• 24:26
  that's going to play basketball at Division one school playing receiver, So I mean,
• 24:32
  what more can you ask for? And he's he's hilarious. He's great,
• 24:34
  right, the same thing. Grew up with those guys. Our moms
• 24:37
  actually rode together at Washington State. So I mean I've known him since we
• 24:44
  were a year old, right, and and great and he's awesome, and
• 24:48
  you know, having that guy at receiver just go up and catch anything.
• 24:52
  I mean we I don't know how many times I would just you know,
• 24:55
  huck it up to Jordan and he comes down with it. It was a
• 24:56
  lot of fun. I got a really quick story with you and Jordan.
• 25:00
  I you know, you might remember this going into your senior year. I
• 25:04
  did. I wrote up the preview for the season for the Knucksack Valley preview
• 25:07
  and I think it was like the day before they get Week one game at
• 25:12
  Blaine, and I said something that you led the team with four interceptions on
• 25:18
  defense the year before, and I get a message from Jordan's saying, actually
• 25:22
  I had four, he had three, and I said, I just laughed,
• 25:26
  and I said, okay, I'm sorry, I'll make the edit.
• 25:29
  I go to the game in the second half and he intercepts the ball on
• 25:33
  the sideline, runs straight over to me and gives me the ball and he
• 25:37
  goes, that's one. And I just started laughing because you're absolutely right,
• 25:42
  Like he's a funny guy, and it was. It was so perfect the
• 25:47
  moment, right, and it was that was really cool. And I know
• 25:51
  you guys had a special connection with the you know, you can just throw
• 25:53
  it up to him, right, that's Jordan for you. Hilarious. We
• 25:59
  grew up together. I mean we're still good friends. I still talked to
• 26:00
  a long time. He's awesome. He's pretty funny, so I'm not I'm
• 26:04
  not too surprised about that. That's hilarious. It was pretty good. Uh.
• 26:07
  Simon Burquette, Yeah, Simon, I mean him and I those games
• 26:14
  that we put against each other. Man, those are those are fun games,
• 26:17
  you know, and that dude is a good player, and we,
• 26:21
  you know, hit our families got close because we would go down to Seattle
• 26:25
  and train to do our quarterback stuff together. So you know, I think
• 26:30
  there's a we got a picture of me and him both asleep in the back
• 26:33
  of the car that his mom took. But he's awesome, you know,
• 26:37
  he's going down and training. Building that relationship with their family and stuff.
• 26:41
  It was so much fun. And they're they're great. Their family is awesome.
• 26:44
  And then and then our games together. I mean, you know,
• 26:47
  I remember our senior year when they when we sold out that game against Meridian.
• 26:49
  I think they were ranked maybe second in the state and we were four
• 26:53
  something like that. I don't know, but uh, I mean those were
• 26:56
  so much fun, right just just seeing another guy, especially at our level,
• 27:00
  at the one A level, that can can compete and play at the
• 27:03
  level that he played. I mean, it's just so impressive. And it
• 27:07
  was a lot of fun, you know, going back and forth with him,
• 27:10
  especially with our relationship off the field, so it was great, you
• 27:14
  know, it was awesome. And the fifth name is Rob Meyer. Yeah,
• 27:18
  coach Myer's awesome. You know, he's he's great and I'm thankful,
• 27:21
  thankful to have him throughout my time. You know, I'm glad that he's
• 27:26
  sticking around, sticking around the game. That's awesome. But yeah, coach
• 27:30
  Meyer is a great guy and it was fun to play for him. Yeah.
• 27:34
  So you go to Montana State and I tell you what, you know
• 27:41
  it's like. And for what I do, I'm focusing on what's going on
• 27:44
  in high school. It's like, Okay, another class is graduated, and
• 27:47
  all of a sudden, I turn on the TV and you're starting at quarterback
• 27:51
  against Texas Tech on the road, big twelve team, sixty thousand people in
• 27:55
  the stands, and I'm jacked up. I can't imagine what you were feeling.
• 27:59
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know that being my first start ever
• 28:03
  in college football, that's an experience, I'll tell you that much. They
• 28:07
  do the thing at Texas Tech where you know, when you run out the
• 28:11
  opposing team, they hurl tortillas at you. So so we got, you
• 28:15
  know, bombarded with tortillas and stuff. But man, and that was that's
• 28:21
  an eye opening experience. I tell you what. Tyler. And they had
• 28:26
  a linebacker named Jordan Brooks, who went the first round. Yeah, and
• 28:30
  he actually I don't know if he still puts on the Seahawks, but he
• 28:33
  did for a long time. And man, that speed those guys. It's
• 28:37
  just different game. You know, it's different. And you know, me
• 28:41
  being nineteen years old, my first start ever, it was I was I
• 28:45
  was pretty nervous, you know, and it was and also, I mean,
• 28:49
  those guys are just flying around. I've never been hit so hard in
• 28:53
  my life. Jordan. There was a play. I got a picture,
• 28:56
  but there was a play where Jordan Brooks came up the middle and we we
• 29:03
  kind of missed a blocking assignment and he hit me so hard. I let
• 29:07
  the ball go and he hit me in the ribs so hard. And you
• 29:10
  know, it's kind of my kind of my welcome to college football moment.
• 29:12
  I got up and I was like, Okay, well here we go,
• 29:15
  here we go. This is gonna be fun. Yeah, you know,
• 29:18
  it's all like I said, that's it's the journey. You know, I've
• 29:22
  been played a lot of football, and that was that being my first game
• 29:26
  was that was pretty interesting. But it was a cool experience and you know,
• 29:30
  thankful to say I did it. Yeah. Uh so tell me about
• 29:33
  your journey from there and how the how you transferred and just kind of how
• 29:37
  everything went from there. Yeah, so that was my retrofreshman year that I
• 29:41
  was needed to start. And you know, I just wasn't coming from you
• 29:48
  know, Nook Sac and stuff like that. It's it's a lot different,
• 29:51
  you know. And I was a young kid and I wasn't I didn't really
• 29:53
  know how to handle that quite yet. And so I got benched three games
• 29:57
  into that year. I played, I started three games, and they got
• 30:00
  benched and they replaced me with another kid named Tucker Rovig, who still one
• 30:06
  of my best friends to this day. He's awesome. So, you know,
• 30:10
  being nineteen years old, you know, not playing great, getting benched
• 30:14
  in front of front of twenty five thousand fans and people, people aren't too
• 30:18
  happy with you that that's a that's an interesting feeling, you know, as
• 30:22
  a nineteen year old. So I had to fight through that a little bit,
• 30:26
  you know, kind of kind of gather myself and figure out, you
• 30:30
  know, who I really was, and so you know, I just tried
• 30:32
  to be the best teammate I possibly could. And then the next year was
• 30:36
  COVID and we didn't play any games, so, you know, just practicing
• 30:41
  the entire year, and then they had brought in another d one guy who
• 30:45
  won the job, so I was the backup. And then the year the
• 30:48
  year after, we ended up going to the national championship, and I had
• 30:53
  season ending surgery, like a couple of games into the season, I was
• 30:57
  playing garbage time and I they got tackled, broke my thumb and had a
• 31:02
  really bad concussion. So I'd have surgery on my thumb. And then our
• 31:04
  started ended up transferring in the middle of the season, so you know,
• 31:10
  I might have played a little bit, but I had surgery. So they
• 31:12
  ended up starting a freshman named Tommy, who really really good player. He
• 31:18
  lights it up and great kid. You know, he's one of my good
• 31:22
  friends still, and so you know, it was it was about time for
• 31:25
  me to get a fresh start at that point. And I so I played
• 31:29
  my four years. You know, I graduated, I got my degree,
• 31:32
  and with the COVID stuff, you still had two I still had two years
• 31:34
  of eligibility and and it was kind of you know, I didn't really know
• 31:38
  what I wanted to do. You know, four years in college football is
• 31:41
  a long time, and and college football is not easy, you know,
• 31:45
  it's a big, big demand, and especially going to school and stuff like
• 31:49
  that. I was I didn't really know if I wanted to keep going,
• 31:52
  but you know, talking with my parents and stuff like that, they wanted
• 31:56
  me to get that master's degree because I had two years, so you know,
• 31:59
  I might as well well. And so I ended up transferring, and
• 32:01
  uh, you know, at that point, I just wanted to go somewhere
• 32:06
  that I knew I could you know, play, and and uh I would
• 32:09
  trust the people around me and they had a good culture and stuff like that.
• 32:13
  So you know, I had I had a couple of other FCS offers
• 32:15
  in the transfer portal, but I ended up going to the D two route
• 32:20
  with Augustana just because you know, the people there were great. Their head
• 32:24
  coach is awesome, the culture they got is great. You know they're there,
• 32:29
  they're a high faith team there and and that's a big big deal for
• 32:34
  me, So you know, it was it was awesome. It was kind
• 32:37
  of great for me. I kind of found found my love a little bit
• 32:40
  for the game again. Unfortunately my first year, there about four games in
• 32:45
  I separated my left shoulder, so I I was dealing with that, and
• 32:51
  then it kind of couldn't get any worse. So I was dealing with I
• 32:54
  was taking courtizon shots and going out there and playing and yeah, that's not
• 32:59
  very fun, you know, I was. I was in a lot of
• 33:00
  pain, a lot of pain. So finished out that year and it didn't
• 33:04
  didn't go great for us. I wasn't playing awesome. And then I had
• 33:07
  surgery that that offseason in January on my shoulder. And then this last year,
• 33:12
  I was able to play a full year in college football for the first
• 33:15
  time in my life, and I think I did what I believe I can
• 33:19
  do, and uh, I think, h you know, I played pretty
• 33:22
  well and we we won our conference out right for the first time in like
• 33:28
  seventy years, which was awesome for US. And and then we ended up
• 33:30
  going to U Colorado and losing to the number one team in the country,
• 33:35
  which you know, that's they're pretty good team. So I can't be too
• 33:37
  upset about that. But you know, my college crew was pretty interesting.
• 33:42
  It didn't go exactly as I would have hoped, right, but you know,
• 33:46
  that's all part of the journey. And you know, I can't complain
• 33:50
  because I'm sitting here right now. So I'm I'm very blessed and very fortunate
• 33:53
  to me in this position. Yeah, it's uh, you know, and
• 33:58
  being able to go to Los Angeles with the Chargers, I think it's an
• 34:02
  interesting thing with kind of a whole new coaching staff. You just never know,
• 34:06
  right Have you talked to coach Harbaugh yet? Uh, you know a
• 34:09
  little bit. I met him on the phone, not extensively, you know,
• 34:14
  because they're doing their own OTAs right now with the team still, so
• 34:19
  you know, I've had an opportunity to talk to with their quarterback coach a
• 34:22
  lot. He's great, He's fantastic. So you know, I'm really excited.
• 34:27
  And you know, I've heard nothing but great things from everybody with about
• 34:30
  that staff and the people there. So I'm super excited to get down there
• 34:34
  and you know, just learn from anybody and anything I can because I got
• 34:38
  a lot to learn and I think my best football is in front of me.
• 34:40
  So I'm excited to get down there and get it going. What do
• 34:45
  you do better as a quarterback than the average NFL quarterback? What's your biggest
• 34:51
  strength? You know, I think my biggest strength is I like to think
• 34:55
  my arm, you know, I think I have the ability to make any
• 35:00
  throw on the field at any time, from from any position, you know,
• 35:05
  and that's something that that's really important because at the next level, you
• 35:08
  you got to make those throws. You have to. And uh so I
• 35:13
  think I have that ability and that benefits me a lot. You know.
• 35:17
  Also, just you know, being being a little bigger than than the average
• 35:21
  quarterback, I think I have a little bit. You know, that vision
• 35:23
  helps me because you know, I'm able to see the field. You know,
• 35:27
  those those linemen are pretty big at the next level, I think,
• 35:30
  you know, me being a taller guy, I think that helps a little
• 35:32
  bit. Was there ever any discussion when you went to college that a coach
• 35:38
  looked you up and down and said, you know what I'm thinking tight end?
• 35:43
  Was there any of your thing like that or was it what you know,
• 35:45
  tell me about that? Oh yeah, yeah, you know, you
• 35:50
  know, everybody, everybody's been telling me that my entire life. You know,
• 35:52
  even through high school. I got, you know, some assistant coaches
• 35:55
  that think, I think I needed, you know, make that move to
• 36:00
  tight end, and uh, you know it's uh and then in college,
• 36:04
  everybody, you know, they see a tall guy that tall I thought a
• 36:07
  guy that that can put some weight on and they want to they want to
• 36:10
  make him into a tight end. Everybody thinks that, right, right,
• 36:14
  So uh you know, I'm not gonna lie. It feels pretty good to
• 36:16
  to uh you know, make a make make that as a quarterback and and
• 36:22
  uh and signed that ideal as a quarterback just because I've been told that my
• 36:27
  entire life that uh, you know, oh you'd be really good tight end
• 36:30
  you and stuff like that. Well I think I'd be a pretty good quarterback
• 36:34
  too, So uh yeah, I mean everybody, everybody thinks they they know,
• 36:39
  and everybody likes to likes to tell you things. So you know,
• 36:44
  I'm happy I stuck with it. And I just think that's a testament to
• 36:49
  hard work and stuff like that and you know, being persistent. So yeah,
• 36:53
  I've heard that, heard that through throughout college. And they actually when
• 36:57
  I when I was not not starting at Montana, we had a there was
• 37:00
  a little package for me where I caught the ball a little bit. Never
• 37:04
  got called in the game, surprisingly, really surprisingly, but they tried.
• 37:08
  They tried, Yeah, do you know what jersey number you're gonna have yet?
• 37:15
  I don't know. I'll find out. I go I report for mini
• 37:17
  camp on Thursday here in a couple of days, so I'll find out then.
• 37:21
  But uh, yeah, I'm not sure. I'm I'm that's that's not
• 37:24
  you know, the most of my worries right now, not too worried about
• 37:28
  the number. I think whatever they give me I'll be okay with. But
• 37:30
  yeah, i'll find out here soon. As long as it's a quarterback number,
• 37:34
  right, they're gonna put like an eighty seven on. You're gonna say,
• 37:37
  well how about this young man, you're gonna play tight ends. Well,
• 37:39
  you know, Tyler, I think at this point, whatever that asks
• 37:44
  me, I uh, at this point, I played my quarterback and you
• 37:47
  know that's the plan to keep playing quarterback. But if they have things in
• 37:52
  mind, whatever they want, I'll be okay doing it. It's awesome.
• 37:57
  Well, thank you so much, Casey for joining us. I know you
• 38:00
  got to do some workouts and stuff like that. Oh, before we go,
• 38:04
  tell me about the possibility of CFL. There's a lot of this talk
• 38:10
  about you know that you would be a great fit up there. Uh tell
• 38:15
  me about why that is. Well, yeah, so recently, actually just
• 38:20
  recently, we found out that you know, my mom was born in Canada,
• 38:23
  so we I was able to get my citizenship up there, so I'm
• 38:27
  dual citizen, and then I was able to go to the CFL Combine and
• 38:30
  that was kind of a late development, so I wasn't too familiar with the
• 38:35
  game and stuff like that. And then the ball is a little bit different
• 38:37
  out there, you know. So my first day at the CFL Combine was
• 38:42
  the first time I had ever thrown a ball, thrown one of their balls.
• 38:45
  Yeah, so it was, you know, kind of a learning experience
• 38:46
  for me a little bit, just because it's a different game. There's another
• 38:50
  player on the field that is huge. It's huge, it's it's I don't
• 38:54
  know, I think it's like twelve yards wide are on both sides. Maybe
• 38:58
  yeah, don't call me on that, but it's a lot bigger. So
• 39:00
  those field outs, you know, you better throw the ball because they're running
• 39:05
  away from you. But you know, I think just talking to those guys
• 39:10
  like I mentioned, you know, I think I have an arm to play
• 39:14
  at that level because you know, the field's bigger and got to throw the
• 39:16
  crap out of the ball, and and you know I can kind of throw
• 39:20
  the ball a little bit, so you know, they like doing that.
• 39:23
  And then you know, just just being athletic and being a quarterback that's a
• 39:28
  Canadian as well as a big deal up there because because of the rule,
• 39:32
  you have to have seven Canadians on the field at once, so if and
• 39:37
  a lot of the times the quarterbacks are American up there, so you know
• 39:40
  that that that helps me a lot being a Canadian quarterback. So you know,
• 39:46
  that's just obviously the plan is to to make it down here, and
• 39:52
  you know, yeah, yeah, I'm staying down there and that's my plan.
• 39:55
  But you know, I'll be I'll be really thankful if I'm if nothing
• 39:59
  works out out and I have to go up there. And it's a great
• 40:01
  league, you know, the it's people people. People are too familiar with
• 40:06
  the CFL, I don't think just because it's not as popular down here and
• 40:09
  stuff like that, but but I mean, it's the it's the step down
• 40:14
  from the NFL, and and those guys, it's a lot of good players
• 40:17
  that have played in the NFL and can play in the NFL. And it's
• 40:21
  really competitive ball and and the fans up there are great. So it's a
• 40:25
  really fun league. And I had the opportunity to meet a bunch of people
• 40:30
  up there and reports and stuff like that. So you know, if that
• 40:34
  were to be the case, I would love to and I'd be extremely excited.
• 40:37
  So it's an exciting game with a lot of passing, only three downs
• 40:40
  instead of four. So it is it is get the ball and hucket and
• 40:45
  go and I and I mean we all are just hoping for a success for
• 40:49
  you in Walkin County obviously, whether it's in the NFL or the CFL.
• 40:52
  And pretty cool and tj Ackerman CFL legend. He played with the Toronto Argonauts,
• 40:58
  as we like to say, all five games and he late, so
• 41:00
  uh but uh but again, thank you so much for joining us. I
• 41:04
  know you're super busy, so we look forward to watching your journey and reporting
• 41:08
  on it and uh hopefully to hear back soon and and uh you kind of
• 41:12
  tell us how things are going and being a guest picker again at some point,
• 41:15
  and and uh, we love watching you play. It's it's a lot
• 41:19
  of fun. Thanks a lot, Casey. Yeah, absolutely, I really
• 41:21
  appreciate your time, Tyler. And and it's been fun. You know,
• 41:23
  see the last couple of years, we've known each other forever, so this
• 41:27
  is this is fun. I'm excited. I'm thankful that we can do this,
• 41:29
  so I appreciate you absolutely. Thanks Beddy, Yeah, for sure.