Latest / The Richard Sherman Podcast / Leonard Williams on Seahawks’ “Dark Side” defense, Super Bowl win & Sam Darnold | Richard Sherman

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Leonard Williams on Seahawks’ “Dark Side” defense, Super Bowl win & Sam Darnold | Richard Sherman · The Richard Sherman Podcast

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Speaker 2: And a whole lot of football. We're back. Let's get it.
1:11
Speaker 2: Welcome back to the Richard Sherman Podcast. Today we have
1:14
Speaker 2: the big camp, one of the best defensive linemen in
1:16
Speaker 2: the National Football League. You had seven sacks. You're entering
1:20
Speaker 2: your twelfth season in the National Football League, three time
1:23
Speaker 2: Pro Bowler, one time All Product.
1:25
Speaker 4: Finally gave it to you there, finally, bro I got
1:28
Speaker 4: jipped the year before last. But you know, it is
1:30
Speaker 4: what it is. It is what it is.
1:31
Speaker 2: You know, you get a super Bowl ring in your
1:34
Speaker 2: All Pro in the same season.
1:36
Speaker 4: How good did that feel? It feels amazing. I mean
1:38
Speaker 4: it feels like I've you know, I played for a
1:40
Speaker 4: long time. I've been in New York for most of
1:43
Speaker 4: my career, had a lot of losing seasons, kind of
1:47
Speaker 4: was overshadowed a lot of my career by a lot
1:49
Speaker 4: of the losing seasons and stuff like that. It feels
1:52
Speaker 4: great to like, finally, you know, come here all the
1:54
Speaker 4: way to the West Coast later in my career and
1:56
Speaker 4: find the success individually and also as a team. You know,
2:00
Speaker 4: I'm getting more individual recognition. And you know, this is
2:04
Speaker 4: something I've always told the young guys. You know, if
2:07
Speaker 4: we all eat, we eat individually too. So I mean
2:10
Speaker 4: what I mean by that is if your team is
2:12
Speaker 4: doing well, you're in the playoffs, your team is going
2:14
Speaker 4: to the super Bowl, You're gonna get recognized more individually
2:18
Speaker 4: as well, and it's it's cool to you know, finally
2:20
Speaker 4: come here, get my super Bowl and then you know,
2:22
Speaker 4: all the recognition as well.
2:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're getting your flowers. They always say a rising
2:27
Speaker 2: tide lifts all shit.
2:28
Speaker 1: Yes, sir, that's the one, Yes sir.
2:31
Speaker 2: But it's got to be so fantastically fun for you
2:35
Speaker 2: your family to come back to the West Coast. You know,
2:39
Speaker 2: you played college at USC as a winning program. You
2:42
Speaker 2: had your years, but you also, during your time in
2:45
Speaker 2: New York with the Jets, played with Sam and how
2:50
Speaker 2: has it been to just watch him flourish and finally
2:52
Speaker 2: get his flower. You're getting your flowers, He's getting his flowers.
2:55
Speaker 2: You know, I'm sure other people on that New York
2:56
Speaker 2: team are calling y'all like, man, finally yet like you deserve.
3:00
Speaker 4: I mean, like I was just saying, it's nice to,
3:01
Speaker 4: you know, receive the flowers and all the individual recognition.
3:04
Speaker 4: But also with being a Vet, with being one of
3:07
Speaker 4: those guys in the locker room that I've been here,
3:09
Speaker 4: I've played for a long time. A part of being
3:12
Speaker 4: that guy in the locker room was also seeing other people,
3:15
Speaker 4: so you know, I do a big job of you know,
3:17
Speaker 4: paying attention to what's going on in the locker room.
3:19
Speaker 4: And you know, Samwich is one of those guys that
3:21
Speaker 4: you know, we drafted him when I was in like
3:24
Speaker 4: year three or four on the Jets, and just to
3:26
Speaker 4: see his journey being you know, counted out by so
3:31
Speaker 4: many people, and just to see him come here and
3:34
Speaker 4: see the same confidence that he had that he was
3:36
Speaker 4: at USC is the biggest thing I've ever seen out
3:41
Speaker 4: of him. Like It's like he could have easily through
3:43
Speaker 4: all of that, you know, bounce around team, the team,
3:46
Speaker 4: all the bad press out there. You could lose your
3:49
Speaker 4: confidence pretty easily in this uh, in this field of work.
3:52
Speaker 4: And he had the same as that confidence that he
3:54
Speaker 4: had while he was at USC, and it never waiver
3:57
Speaker 4: And you know that's I think what helped him get
3:59
Speaker 4: over over the hump and just continue to grind and
4:02
Speaker 4: continue to be in this league for a long time
4:04
Speaker 4: and you.
4:05
Speaker 2: Know, be who he is. So this is year twelve
4:08
Speaker 2: for you was winning the Super Bowl? Did that change
4:11
Speaker 2: anything about your off season and how you prepared and
4:14
Speaker 2: what you did and how you celebrated.
4:18
Speaker 1: Not at all.
4:18
Speaker 4: The only thing that did change is our time. You know,
4:21
Speaker 4: we obviously went further than I've ever gone before, so
4:24
Speaker 4: it cut into a lot of our off time, but
4:26
Speaker 4: you know, I treated it the same. I took a
4:28
Speaker 4: few weeks off to let my body recover, and I
4:31
Speaker 4: got back to training. The one thing that did change
4:32
Speaker 4: my off season was me having a baby this offseason though,
4:34
Speaker 4: so thank you, thank you. That was obviously a big
4:38
Speaker 4: change in my life, and you know it's a blessing.
4:41
Speaker 4: But you know, I treated the off season the same.
4:42
Speaker 2: Man.
4:43
Speaker 4: I'm ready to go. I want to keep going. My
4:46
Speaker 4: body feels healthy, I'm still competitive. I still got the
4:49
Speaker 4: spirit for the game, love for the game. I love
4:51
Speaker 4: showing up to work, I love competing with my teammates.
4:54
Speaker 4: I love grinding. I love the grind, and so as
4:57
Speaker 4: long as that fire is still in me, man, I
4:59
Speaker 4: still want it.
5:00
Speaker 2: That's what I've heard, nothing but positive things about you.
5:03
Speaker 2: I mean, since you got here, your high energy guy,
5:06
Speaker 2: you bring it every single day. Why do you feel
5:08
Speaker 2: it's so important that you set the tone at practice
5:11
Speaker 2: every day?
5:12
Speaker 1: It's a good question.
5:13
Speaker 4: I mean, I think I just hold myself to a
5:14
Speaker 4: certain standard, you know, regardless of my circumstances that's going
5:18
Speaker 4: on around me. I feel like if I'm on that grass,
5:21
Speaker 4: I'm gonna play at a certain level that I always
5:24
Speaker 4: want to. If you throw that tape on, whether it's
5:26
Speaker 4: a game week one, preseason, super Bowl, game practice tape,
5:32
Speaker 4: regardless of what it is, I want you to see
5:33
Speaker 4: the same exact player all the time. And to me,
5:36
Speaker 4: I'm one of those people that I also think is
5:38
Speaker 4: inefectious energy. I feel like I get along with all
5:41
Speaker 4: of my teammates. And because I get along with everybody,
5:44
Speaker 4: you know, I'm one of those guys that's hugging, dapping up, celebrating,
5:48
Speaker 4: high fiving, getting guys going. I feel like I'm a
5:52
Speaker 4: force multiplier and I get guys around me going as well.
5:56
Speaker 2: I love that, and I think so too. I think
5:58
Speaker 2: these young guys and even better like d Law, you know,
6:01
Speaker 2: feed off of what you do. Ernest was speaking so
6:03
Speaker 2: highly of you, and you know everything you've meant to
6:05
Speaker 2: him and his time here. But when you're a veteran
6:10
Speaker 2: and you've been through the peaks and valleys of your
6:14
Speaker 2: career like you have, does it mean more to win
6:16
Speaker 2: a Super Bowl?
6:17
Speaker 1: Like did that? You know?
6:19
Speaker 2: Reaching that mountaintop like it had to touch something? Because
6:22
Speaker 2: sometimes losing puts you in such a negative headspace, you
6:26
Speaker 2: know what I mean, You think about so many things
6:28
Speaker 2: you start to question whether you know you even want
6:31
Speaker 2: to play the game anymore, you know, And it has
6:33
Speaker 2: less to do with how talented you are and how
6:35
Speaker 2: good of a player you are, and more to do
6:37
Speaker 2: with like purpose. So do you feel like winning that
6:41
Speaker 2: Super Bowl really prove something to yourself and and really
6:44
Speaker 2: reignited something inside you?
6:47
Speaker 4: I would say yeah, it did as much as This
6:50
Speaker 4: league and this business is all about, you know, process
6:53
Speaker 4: over results. What I mean by that is, you know,
6:56
Speaker 4: if we come off of a loss, we're not going
6:58
Speaker 4: to try to reinvent the will have a whole different
7:01
Speaker 4: week of practice and preparation just because we lost, and
7:05
Speaker 4: we're gonna do the same thing if we win. You know,
7:07
Speaker 4: if we just won a game, we're not gonna all
7:08
Speaker 4: of a sudden, you know, start taking back you know,
7:11
Speaker 4: feeling ourselves, smelling the flowers and all that type of stuff.
7:15
Speaker 4: So in this league, in this business is you got
7:18
Speaker 4: to treat every day the same regardless of if you're
7:20
Speaker 4: winning and losing. It's about the process over the results.
7:23
Speaker 4: And that's kind of what I had to learn in
7:25
Speaker 4: a lot of my losing seasons. You know, regardless of
7:28
Speaker 4: the outcome of the game and the seasons, I had
7:29
Speaker 4: to continue to be myself, continue the same process. But
7:32
Speaker 4: at the same time, you know, to go through so
7:36
Speaker 4: many losing seasons and go through the peaks and valleys.
7:40
Speaker 4: Like you said, I've had good moments and low moments
7:42
Speaker 4: and kicked while we're down, all those type of things.
7:45
Speaker 4: Then to finally be year twelve now and you know,
7:49
Speaker 4: getting that Super Bowl with a team of men who
7:53
Speaker 4: just love each other. I think that was another part
7:55
Speaker 4: that made it so special, Like this is a group
7:57
Speaker 4: of guys that I've never been around before. Man, It's
7:59
Speaker 4: like this these team really fight for each other, love
8:01
Speaker 4: each other, and I think because of that, like we
8:05
Speaker 4: deserved to have a Super Bowl ring to show for it,
8:09
Speaker 4: and to have an opportunity and chance to like, you know,
8:12
Speaker 4: come back for reunions together and like keep seeing each
8:14
Speaker 4: other and keep you know, staying in each other's lives.
8:17
Speaker 4: Because this is a special group of men that you know,
8:20
Speaker 4: I fought with last year and it's cool to see that,
8:23
Speaker 4: you know, we we have a reason to celebrate each other.
8:26
Speaker 2: And speaking about reason to celebrate Ernest when he was
8:28
Speaker 2: in here, earlier said he's gonna you know, him and
8:30
Speaker 2: the other linebackers are going to make it a point
8:32
Speaker 2: to buy y'all stakes and stuff.
8:35
Speaker 4: Yeah, let's go. I want to see that sooner than later.
8:38
Speaker 4: We're about to go to Tennessee next week, so you know,
8:40
Speaker 4: remind him, you know, wag goop? Yes, good right right?
8:45
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8:46
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Speaker 2: slash Richard. You were adamant when you got here, especially
11:14
Speaker 2: when you guys started to play well, that you guys
11:16
Speaker 2: needed your own identity because obviously, being in Seattle, you
11:19
Speaker 2: know there's a lot of you know, ghosts of Christmas
11:22
Speaker 2: past going on with a lot of things. But you
11:25
Speaker 2: guys did you guys created the dark Side identity. You
11:29
Speaker 2: guys freaking dominated all last season, all the way on
11:31
Speaker 2: your way to a super Bowl and dominated in that game.
11:34
Speaker 2: How important was that to you?
11:36
Speaker 1: And why I.
11:37
Speaker 4: Think it's so important because something I learned at a
11:40
Speaker 4: young age is no team is ever the same. So
11:43
Speaker 4: even though we have a majority of our guys back
11:45
Speaker 4: this year, we have majority of our coaching staff, a
11:47
Speaker 4: majority of our locker room stayed the same this year
11:51
Speaker 4: is going to be a different year than last year,
11:52
Speaker 4: So we get we should never try to chase what
11:55
Speaker 4: we did last year. No team should ever try to
11:57
Speaker 4: chase what has happened in the past. And you know,
12:00
Speaker 4: everybody in Seattle, including in this building, has so much
12:04
Speaker 4: respect for the legion of boom Era and what you
12:08
Speaker 4: guys did here, Like you guys were amazing, and it's
12:10
Speaker 4: like you guys set the standard and the tone and
12:13
Speaker 4: you know, the code for what it looks like. But
12:16
Speaker 4: at the same time, every team should every year should
12:18
Speaker 4: try to create their own And you know, like you said,
12:21
Speaker 4: I think in the you know, when I first got here,
12:23
Speaker 4: I kind of realized that was just the energy around
12:27
Speaker 4: this place. Even outside of the building. You could tell
12:30
Speaker 4: people just really held on to that old championship team.
12:34
Speaker 4: And I just felt like we weren't going to get
12:36
Speaker 4: anywhere by doing that, because you're never gonna make it
12:39
Speaker 4: somewhere about trying to copy something else. And then I remember,
12:43
Speaker 4: like halfway through the season, our defense was balling, We're
12:45
Speaker 4: getting takeaways, you know, shutting, you know, shutouts against offenses
12:50
Speaker 4: and stuff like that, and I started seeing stuff on Twitter,
12:53
Speaker 4: all the guys on the bus were like everybody's comparing
12:56
Speaker 4: us to the Legion of Boom and then you know,
12:57
Speaker 4: we were like we got to make our own thing. So,
13:00
Speaker 4: you know, me d Law and Jay Reed, we were
13:03
Speaker 4: like kind of sitting in the back of the bus,
13:04
Speaker 4: like some of the vets in the D line room.
13:06
Speaker 4: We're like coming up with all these different names, and
13:08
Speaker 4: we talk about how it's like dark in Seattle, and
13:11
Speaker 4: we always talk about like cutting the team's water off,
13:13
Speaker 4: like don't let them score and all the type of stuff,
13:15
Speaker 4: and we're you know, we kept talking about this like
13:17
Speaker 4: dark thing, how it's like hard to come to the
13:19
Speaker 4: PNW playing this like cloudy weather defenses, you know, shutting
13:24
Speaker 4: teams out, and we're like this is dark.
13:25
Speaker 1: Side, man. It just and it stuck everyone.
13:27
Speaker 4: I love.
13:28
Speaker 2: I loved every bit of it because you know, as
13:30
Speaker 2: a part of that, you want great I want you
13:33
Speaker 2: guys to have your own identity. Yeah, I mean I
13:35
Speaker 2: think everybody I can speak for that entire group when
13:38
Speaker 2: you you appreciate being appreciated, but you also never want
13:41
Speaker 2: to take the greatness and shine away from somebody else
13:44
Speaker 2: who deserves it. And you guys deserve your own shine.
13:47
Speaker 2: You guys deserve all the credit in the world. You
13:49
Speaker 2: guys won your own super Bowl. You dominated all the way.
13:51
Speaker 2: You guys deserve to narrate and write your own story
13:54
Speaker 2: without any input from us or any any cloud or
13:57
Speaker 2: any diminishing from anything we have to say. So I
14:01
Speaker 2: think that's the perfect thing to do. I love the
14:03
Speaker 2: dark Side nickname I you know, I was. I loved
14:05
Speaker 2: watching y'all every week. I loved it. I love great defense.
14:08
Speaker 2: You know, it's it's just because people don't appreciate it.
14:10
Speaker 2: No more, people don't appreciate great defense.
14:13
Speaker 4: But also from my perspective, what made our defense is a
14:16
Speaker 4: little bit different from each other is like we have
14:18
Speaker 4: great secondary. Don't get me wrong, but if you ask built,
14:21
Speaker 4: I felt like we built up from man, It's like
14:23
Speaker 4: we're built in the trenches. We got great linebackers, great
14:26
Speaker 4: d line outside linebackers, and you guys were kind of
14:28
Speaker 4: built in the secondary.
14:29
Speaker 1: So we're a little bit different in that way too.
14:32
Speaker 1: So it's really cool.
14:33
Speaker 2: But Mike Bennett in the Big Three, we've never won
14:36
Speaker 2: anything without you exactly. You know.
14:38
Speaker 4: They same with my secondary. We got spoon, We had
14:40
Speaker 4: all them boys out there, you know, Jove Kobeaus say
14:44
Speaker 4: we don't give them credit. Yeah, I give y'all credit,
14:48
Speaker 4: but y'all, but I would love.
14:49
Speaker 2: I mean, I love playing with those guys because they
14:51
Speaker 2: put so much pressure on them. Even if you look
14:53
Speaker 2: in the NFC Championship game against San Francisco where I
14:56
Speaker 2: tipped the ball away, Cliff at bulld the right tackle
15:00
Speaker 2: right into to Kaepernick's lap, and he had put pressure
15:03
Speaker 2: on them forced the bad throw. I mean, you know,
15:06
Speaker 2: it got kind of got there, but he what, he
15:08
Speaker 2: didn't complete it in the way he wanted to. Cliff
15:11
Speaker 2: had a big impact on that play and every other
15:13
Speaker 2: play in the game, and so did Mike Bennett. I mean,
15:16
Speaker 2: you look at the Sports Illustrated on the day after
15:19
Speaker 2: the game, and it's the D line. It ain't the secondary.
15:22
Speaker 2: It's the D line over there giving Peyton all he
15:25
Speaker 2: could handle. And I think the same was true for y'all,
15:27
Speaker 2: y'all Sports Illustrated cover it was the D line.
15:29
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the way it's supposed to be. Big dogs
15:32
Speaker 1: e first, Yes, sir, I agree.
15:33
Speaker 4: I mean that's the best way to win, in my opinion,
15:35
Speaker 4: is you know, getting to the quarterback. However, you're going
15:38
Speaker 4: to fight the quarterback the most is the way you're
15:41
Speaker 4: going to find a successful defense.
15:42
Speaker 2: You know, what did Mike McDonald say to you or
15:47
Speaker 2: what did he do on a day in and day
15:49
Speaker 2: out basis to earn your respect and get you to
15:51
Speaker 2: buy in so quickly.
15:53
Speaker 1: That's a great question to me.
15:57
Speaker 4: It was his humility and vulnerability. But the way he
16:04
Speaker 4: came in year two, I already respect him year one
16:08
Speaker 4: just because he's a defensive mastermind, genius. You could just
16:11
Speaker 4: tell the way he talked about defense, the way how
16:14
Speaker 4: he was passionate about calling defense, the way he allowed
16:18
Speaker 4: all the players to be uniquely themselves. I think that
16:21
Speaker 4: was already a stand out to me. Like even though
16:23
Speaker 4: me and Jay Reed may play the three technique, we're
16:27
Speaker 4: different body types, we're gonna get off differently, We're going
16:29
Speaker 4: to do different arm lengths, so he's gonna let us
16:32
Speaker 4: play to our ability. I think that was unique in
16:34
Speaker 4: a certain way, but really made me start, you know,
16:37
Speaker 4: loving him and respecting him as a man, not.
16:40
Speaker 1: Just as a coach.
16:41
Speaker 4: We started year two, he went up in the front
16:43
Speaker 4: of the team meeting and he pretty much in front
16:46
Speaker 4: of the whole team just was like, hey, man, I
16:48
Speaker 4: feel like I got to work on.
16:49
Speaker 1: This, this, and this.
16:50
Speaker 4: I wasn't good enough at this last year, and you know,
16:54
Speaker 4: I got to get better at talking to the team.
16:55
Speaker 4: I got to get better at you know, being comfortable
16:57
Speaker 4: in front of the team meeting room and being a
16:59
Speaker 4: better and all this other stuff. And I think, you know,
17:03
Speaker 4: in a way, it kind of made everyone in the
17:05
Speaker 4: room kind of relaxed their shoulders not be so uptight
17:08
Speaker 4: because you're kind of like, Okay, the head man is
17:10
Speaker 4: willing to critique himself, try to get better, find ways
17:14
Speaker 4: to get better, and you could tell he's chasing edges
17:16
Speaker 4: every day. So when you hear them coach us, you
17:20
Speaker 4: know it's not personal. You know, like if you hear
17:23
Speaker 4: something from the coaches, you know that they're equally trying
17:25
Speaker 4: to get better. We're trying to find a solution to
17:28
Speaker 4: the problem, not the person, you know what I mean.
17:30
Speaker 4: It's never like a personal attack. And I think in
17:33
Speaker 4: a way it made everyone in the building like more vulnerable,
17:37
Speaker 4: and it made it it like brought everyone's guard down.
17:40
Speaker 4: So like you know, you see a player to player
17:42
Speaker 4: as well, like if somebody on the offensive side was
17:45
Speaker 4: doing something wrong that the defense thought they could do better,
17:48
Speaker 4: you know, I'll go up to greys Abel and give
17:49
Speaker 4: them some advice, and he would do the same vice versa.
17:53
Speaker 4: And I think you just started seeing it, like stack
17:55
Speaker 4: over time, just this vulnerability that everyone had on the
17:59
Speaker 4: team of being and connected and you know, no egos
18:02
Speaker 4: and kind of just like pride to side, let's put
18:05
Speaker 4: the mission over everything.
18:08
Speaker 2: Such a perfect answer, such a perfect answer, because I
18:11
Speaker 2: just had Mike in here and I told them the
18:13
Speaker 2: exact same thing. I said, that's the thing. You're so human,
18:17
Speaker 2: you know. And I think sometimes coaches get to a
18:20
Speaker 2: point where they're almost like afraid to like show a
18:23
Speaker 2: crack in the armor. They're like, I have to show
18:25
Speaker 2: this this image of myself to my players every single
18:28
Speaker 2: day so they know. It's like when people see Bell
18:30
Speaker 2: Belichick out in public, like it, dressed up and you know,
18:34
Speaker 2: with a costume, they're like, the guy, this is the
18:38
Speaker 2: coach Belichick we've learned to know. And I think when
18:40
Speaker 2: you have a coach who shows, hey, I'm human. You
18:42
Speaker 2: know what I mean, I'm not perfect, I'm doing the
18:44
Speaker 2: best I can. That's all I can expect from you.
18:47
Speaker 2: It can't beat that. And I think the perfect example
18:50
Speaker 2: of what you just said was the divisional game against
18:53
Speaker 2: San Francisco when Gray came up to you, and I
18:57
Speaker 2: think he told you just attacked straight when they I
19:00
Speaker 2: forget what.
19:01
Speaker 1: Scheme they were running.
19:02
Speaker 4: Yeah, I kept getting like the slide protection pretty much
19:04
Speaker 4: like the center and guard were both sliding to me,
19:07
Speaker 4: double timming me, and the guard would like over jump me.
19:10
Speaker 4: So he was like jumping all the way to the
19:11
Speaker 4: BE gap pretty much invited me to the A gap,
19:13
Speaker 4: so I would like take off the A gap would
19:15
Speaker 4: look open. By the time I would take it, the
19:17
Speaker 4: center would come and close that gap. Gray was like
19:21
Speaker 4: kind of seeing this from the sideline. He came up
19:24
Speaker 4: to me. I brought I need a sack out of you.
19:26
Speaker 4: It's like, you know, it's a big game. It's about
19:28
Speaker 4: that time. I think it was like third down or
19:30
Speaker 4: fourth down or something like that. The defense got off
19:32
Speaker 4: the field. But I remember telling d hall A, if
19:36
Speaker 4: you see my jersey number, just wrap around me, you know.
19:38
Speaker 4: So I'm communicating the guy outside of me. Then I'm
19:40
Speaker 4: about to just take off the ball. So I just
19:43
Speaker 4: took off, beat the guard to the B gap, just
19:45
Speaker 4: pushed off the hip of the tackle and got a sack.
19:47
Speaker 4: And you know, I went up to Gray right away
19:49
Speaker 4: and was just like, Yo, good job, man. Yeah.
19:52
Speaker 2: People don't understand how much you got to be paying
19:54
Speaker 2: attention to, like to like see that within the game
19:57
Speaker 2: in real time, Like there's a lot of other stuff
19:59
Speaker 2: going around wanting to play that now, offensive line defensive
20:02
Speaker 2: line play is the most exciting thing in the world.
20:04
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna do this, but there is like a
20:06
Speaker 2: lot of small but there's so that's so nuanced, you know,
20:10
Speaker 2: for him to see that as a rookie, as a
20:12
Speaker 2: playoff game and say.
20:13
Speaker 4: Hey and have the confidence to you know, tell a vet.
20:16
Speaker 4: I feel like that's like as an example, that's a
20:19
Speaker 4: great example of like what our team was like last year.
20:22
Speaker 4: It's like even what you just said, it's like you
20:24
Speaker 4: have to be paying attention to the other side of
20:27
Speaker 4: the ball that's on the field. It's like I'm not
20:30
Speaker 4: when I'm on the sideline, I'm not just like sitting there.
20:32
Speaker 4: I'm paying attention to what's going on with the offense.
20:34
Speaker 4: I'm paying I'm getting coaching tips and notes from my
20:37
Speaker 4: from my coaches. On the sideline, I'm talking to the
20:40
Speaker 4: edge guys like hey, how can we attack? So everyone
20:42
Speaker 4: was just like locked in just trying to win all
20:44
Speaker 4: the time. Man, I think that was it was a
20:46
Speaker 4: huge deal. Last year it was off the field. You've
20:49
Speaker 4: mentioned Pokemon and Magic as a way to reset mentally.
20:52
Speaker 4: Why is it so much so important for you to
20:56
Speaker 4: take a break and get away from football.
20:59
Speaker 1: I'm yea, I think it's really important for me.
21:01
Speaker 4: It's actually something I try to, you know, teach other
21:03
Speaker 4: guys in the building as well. When rookies come in.
21:05
Speaker 4: I'm like, man, you guys got to find hobbies. Find
21:07
Speaker 4: things to do with yourself on the off season. Besides
21:09
Speaker 4: you know, going and hanging out and clubbing or whatever.
21:12
Speaker 1: It is.
21:13
Speaker 4: Finally, like actual hobbies and things like art, all that
21:17
Speaker 4: type of stuff. I think it's important. This is a
21:20
Speaker 4: very stressful career. You know, we're away from my families
21:23
Speaker 4: a lot of times. We pretty much become family away
21:26
Speaker 4: from family, you know what I mean. You know how
21:28
Speaker 4: it is. It's like we're around each other more than
21:30
Speaker 4: I'm at home with my wife and kids. So when
21:33
Speaker 4: I finally am at home, uh, you know, I want
21:35
Speaker 4: to do things that get my mind away from the building.
21:39
Speaker 1: You know, we're already here so much.
21:41
Speaker 4: It'll be bad of me to go home and now
21:45
Speaker 4: I'm home for two three hours and I'm still thinking
21:47
Speaker 4: about work. You know, I'm only home for two hours.
21:49
Speaker 4: I want to get away from it. So yeah, I
21:52
Speaker 4: collect to poke my cards from a young age. My
21:55
Speaker 4: cousin was really into it. He would give me like
21:56
Speaker 4: all his hand me down stuff because he was like
21:58
Speaker 4: playing tournaments. So I would like get hamm and downs,
22:01
Speaker 4: kind of put them in like a binder and all
22:02
Speaker 4: that type of stuff. And then around COVID time, I've
22:05
Speaker 4: seen that the prices started like going up, so it
22:07
Speaker 4: kind of got me excited to go home, find my
22:09
Speaker 4: old stuff start collecting again. And then my little brother
22:12
Speaker 4: he noticed that I was collecting. He introduced me to
22:14
Speaker 4: Magic the Gathering. So this is probably like three or
22:16
Speaker 4: four years ago now, and it was a way for
22:19
Speaker 4: me and him to connect. So I really got into
22:21
Speaker 4: it because it was a way for me to hang
22:22
Speaker 4: out with my brother and like I said, just get
22:24
Speaker 4: away from football, get away from the stress of our jobs.
22:27
Speaker 4: And you know, since then, I've been an ambassador for
22:31
Speaker 4: a Wizards of the Coast. I'm going to like magic
22:34
Speaker 4: on events in like Vegas, and they have them all
22:37
Speaker 4: over the world. Like I'm gonna try to go to
22:38
Speaker 4: one in Japan next year, and it's become like a
22:41
Speaker 4: big thing for me outside of football, which was really cool.
22:44
Speaker 1: And you know, I do plants.
22:46
Speaker 4: I'm like really into fishing and a bunch of stuff
22:48
Speaker 4: outside of football. So I definitely recommend it to everyone
22:51
Speaker 4: in the locker room to go find some stuff.
22:53
Speaker 1: Well rounded.
22:54
Speaker 2: Man. Well, I appreciate you joining me. I hope to
22:56
Speaker 2: get you back on the show during the season and
22:58
Speaker 2: keep talking about the growth of his team and everything
23:00
Speaker 2: you've been able to accomplish.
23:01
Speaker 1: Yes, Yes, appreciate your brother. Thank you.
23:04
Speaker 3: M m
23:08
Speaker 4: Hm hm