Jeff Ireland Interview - NFL Scouting Combine
Jeff Ireland speaks with some members of the Saints media at the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis.
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00:00 Jeff, just how's the process changed for you when you bring in a whole new
00:03 offensive staff and you got different ideas, different people having
00:06 different input? Like how does that change the scouting process? It changes
00:09 a little bit. You know, we all look at players
00:12 very similar and yet there's emphasis on certain things that we have to bring
00:18 our attention to. Um, so that emphasis is important to our new staff. It's
00:24 certainly important to us in terms of the details that we're looking for in
00:28 certain athletic skill sets and things like that. So that's changed a little
00:32 bit from, you know, the last couple years here, obviously the last nine years
00:35 here. Um, but it's exciting. It's, it's, it's, uh, it's energizing. Um, the new
00:43 staff has given me great detail of what they're looking for in terms of the
00:47 athletic skill sets, some of the tangible qualities, um, and just
00:51 different emphasis in different positions. And so that's exciting for me
00:54 because it, uh, that's what we do. You give me details and we'll try to go out
00:58 and find it. So that's really the only change. Um, you know, their offensive
01:02 staff has a ton of things on their plate. You know, they're all, they're
01:05 all basically new. Um, they've got a game plan, not game plan, but playbook
01:09 to put together. Um, they got freedom. See, coming up down the pike, we got the
01:13 draft, you know, so they got a lot of their plate. But, um, they've been
01:16 fantastic.
01:17 Um, anything kind of stand out about this particular class when you're
01:23 looking at it, I think might be the last of the cove classes. So
01:26 nothing really stands out. I mean, it's a good group of offensive skill, really
01:32 good group of offensive line. Um, you know, the highs, the depth that most
01:38 positions are the kind of the same and the lack of depth are kind of the same,
01:42 you know, defensive linemen there. There's only so many big men that run
01:46 sub five flat, you know, on the planet and we're looking for him and, um,
01:50 that's that hadn't really changed. But, uh, it's a it's a good group. You know,
01:54 we're trying to weave through all the information that we get at this time of
01:59 the year. Um, looking forward to the on field workouts, but thoroughly enjoyed
02:04 the interviews. Thus far, we had a big group this morning. A big group tonight.
02:08 Um, it's a great group of guys, so I'm really excited to get no better. I look
02:13 at offensive line,
02:14 it's got, you know, the media analysts or whatever. You do my drafts and big
02:18 boards and things like that. It feels like there's 8 to almost 10 guys that
02:22 that someone's first round grade. I mean, does it feel like? Does it also
02:27 feel like 32 different NFL teams might have a different three that they like
02:31 from this group? That's always the case, but there are. This is a good group.
02:35 This is a good group of offensive linemen, um, tackles in particular. Um,
02:40 and there's some guards and centers in that group as well that air,
02:43 you know, they can come in and play right away. Uh, type vision. Um, that's
02:48 a good group. Yeah. What do you look for when a guy like protect specifically
02:52 like that indicates they're ready to play right away? Like, it's something
02:55 with that position. You know, I think it's more, you know, it's intangible
02:59 qualities. You know, it's intelligence. It's, um, sometimes it may be the scheme
03:03 that they've played in and in college. Um, that's how many games they've played
03:08 in college. It's, um,
03:10 you know, it's there's an athletic skill set in there, you know, being able
03:15 to stay on your feet, balancing body control and how well they use their
03:18 hands to strike and move defenders and, um, and then pass protection. We're
03:23 past protecting 65 to 70% of the time you got that has to be a skill set that
03:28 is pretty polished in our league. Um, and so, you know, those are those air
03:33 just a few details that we're looking for. Can you tell us a little bit about
03:37 Dave's dealers? Uh, you know, kind of addition to and how he would end up
03:41 impacting with the draft. You know, that's probably a question for Mickey.
03:44 I've known Dave for years. He's a great guy. He's very talented evaluator. Right
03:50 now, you know, he's getting involved in both, you know, the pro in college. Um,
03:55 you know, I don't even know what the title that we've given him, but, you
03:58 know, his personnel, an analyst or consultant or whatever that may be. And
04:03 that's what he's doing. He's analyzing some things that we've asked him to
04:06 analyze, and he's evaluating some players that we've asked him to
04:10 evaluate. You know, he's been in a couple of different systems. He's been
04:14 in the Patriot system. It kind of grew up with the Broncos and, you know,
04:17 he's been a GM. And so, you know, he didn't want to be doing nothing. And
04:26 so it was a chance for us to, I like to call it, get another brain in the game.
04:32 And he's got a lot of experience, a lot of knowledge and why not pick it? Learn
04:37 from it. It's a quick pro quo. You know, he's gonna learn from us and how we
04:40 do things and spent some good time with him yesterday, going over some things,
04:44 and we're glad to have him on board.
04:46 When you look at the 49ers offense and the stuff Shanahan's done, one of the
04:52 things that always stands out is the yards after catch. When you're looking
04:56 for that in a player, is that you almost exclusively have to look for film for
04:59 that stuff? Or can you figure that stuff out and use these drills and see these
05:03 guys move up close?
05:05 I tell you, if you can figure it out without watching tape, tell me how to
05:08 do it. No, it's certainly a skill set that we're looking for on tape. And I
05:14 think it goes from, you can even go back to high school, not that I'm going back
05:18 to high school, watch a lot of high school football tape. I'll get a clip
05:21 from, you know, from time to time I will. But it's just a skill set that they
05:25 have. It stays with them. There's a mindset to it. You know, they're not
05:31 catching and falling down. They're catching with an intent to get yards
05:35 after catch and run after the catch and go score touchdowns and be aggressive.
05:38 And that's something that it's a little bit of the makeup that we're looking
05:42 for. But it's also it's a skill set that you see on tape.
05:45 You guys, you guys met with Jaden Daniels. And even if you don't want to
05:49 talk about that specific thing, what's the value of like interviewing a guy
05:54 that, sorry if this seems really dumb, but what's the value of interviewing a
05:57 guy that probably would be long gone before you guys pick and just still
06:01 doing that research anyway? And what are your impressions of him?
06:03 Um, look, the drafts, an exact science and
06:08 you can't say he'll be gone. You know, you never know. We have to be prepared
06:14 for everything. I've been in drafts where players have slipped. I don't
06:18 think he's going to, but I've been in drafts where maybe we've taken the
06:24 things for granted that he's gonna be gone and you get to it and he's still
06:28 sitting there for us. And maybe our scouting staff didn't do our homework
06:33 at that time on that player. And that's a dangerous game to play. So we're
06:37 gonna do our homework on every single player. Um, and that was the case with
06:42 J and we had a great interview with him as a great kid. Very impressed with
06:47 it. Sarah, world in which to maybe not Jaden Daniels specifically, but you
06:51 know, some of these guys that you meet with four or five years down the road
06:53 when they come off their rookie contract, if they become available,
06:56 that information is helpful. I imagine. Exactly. We call it a historical
06:59 document. You know, it's it's there until until the guy retires. And we
07:04 look back on that document from from today or tomorrow, whenever we've
07:09 accumulated all that data and we're using free agency, whether it's a free
07:14 agent, whether he's on the street as a street free agent,
07:17 you know, whatever case we look back in these documents and we don't really
07:22 call around the teams during free agency because you don't know if they
07:24 want to keep them, you know, so we have to look back at this and and, uh,
07:28 players mature over time. And so you have to take that with a grain of salt
07:32 that sometimes. But yes, historical document. We look back on it quite
07:36 frequently. There have been some high profile like cases of guys not
07:42 participating in the drills this year. I know it's maybe even like that the
07:44 last couple years. But is that a trend you see kind of going? Is that something
07:48 that's harder to evaluate? How do you kind of see that? It's tough. You know,
07:52 it's tough. You know, look, I feel like the players job is to answer all our
07:58 questions. My job is to try to build conviction to draft the player. And so
08:03 when a player doesn't interview or doesn't do a medical or doesn't do a
08:07 workout, those are questions that we have. And when I got questions on a
08:12 player that doesn't do this, that or the other, then I'm probably gonna pass
08:16 on that player and go with the player that has answered all those questions
08:20 because I got conviction. You know, it's no different than any of you guys
08:23 making decision. You're gonna make decision based on is educated and is
08:27 convicted as you can on the information that you have. And so when a player
08:31 doesn't work out, I mean, I feel like it hurts our ability to build that
08:36 strong conviction to make a really sound decision. And so, um, I'm usually
08:43 chasing that information until last weekend we can get out. Um, and
08:47 hopefully, you know, hopefully that's not a trend. But it seems to be quite
08:54 frequent that we do it. And at the end of the day, most of the time again, we
08:58 get him to do the we get him to do the drill. It's just sometimes not on
09:01 there. It's on their time frame, not on ours. People often talk about like
09:04 smoke screens and that this time here. How do you guys sort through like
09:07 misinformation and what's good information and what might be changing?
09:10 Like, how do you guys decide what to pay attention to and what to ignore?
09:14 Well, I mean, look, it's our job to get the information ourselves. It's not
09:18 it's not our job to listen to rumors and innuendos and, you know, social
09:24 media stuff. It's our job to make sure that we have the answers that we have
09:28 to all the questions that we that we get, um, and make her own decisions on
09:32 that information. So, um, is there smoke screen out there? Sure. But it's
09:36 our job to understand exactly what we need to do to make a educated decision.
09:42 So, uh, you know, look, we put our share of smoke screen out there, too.
09:46 So we all we all know it's out there. We have to filter through it. But it's
09:50 our job to make that make our answer our questions and make sound decisions
09:54 based off of it. What's the value of putting the smoke screen out there?
09:56 Because I don't know. Sometimes people listen to the smoke.
10:00 We talked at the senior bowl of, like, adapting kind of the vision of now
10:08 Clinton. But what does that kind of look like on a week like this where
10:10 you're maybe keeping him in mind of types of players? Like, how does that
10:13 kind of unfold?
10:14 That's your answer.
10:16 So what question
10:18 Clinton's vision for players? How do you kind of apply that when meeting with
10:22 players this week? I think it's it's it's what we did for an hour after our
10:28 last interview, Clinton. I just sat in a room and talked about, you know,
10:31 philosophy and those emphasis, uh, things that he's looking for. Um,
10:37 talked about players, talked about makeup. Just just been in time with him
10:40 and understanding what he's looking for and how I go about making decision
10:45 and my thought processes and trying to get him as much information that he
10:49 can, that I can for him to help me make these decisions. And we're very
10:54 collaborative and I listen to the coaches. I listen to my scouts. Um, we
10:59 filter through all the information that we can. And, um, you know, it doesn't
11:04 really matter if it's if it's, uh, if it's Pete Carmichael or Clinton, I'm
11:08 gonna listen to him and we're gonna try to get them what they're looking for
11:11 on DHS. The details that we're looking for in players. Um, but I think it's
11:17 gonna take a little time to get exactly what we're all looking for. But, uh,
11:20 the more time we spend together, the more time we spent some, you know, in
11:24 meetings and and they can articulate the things that they're looking for. The
11:27 better scouts were gonna be and making those decisions. You anticipate that
11:32 changing your sort of what you're looking for offensive lineman much. I
11:36 mean, it seems like you guys were running a lot of that kind of outside
11:39 zone anyway. Yeah, we do a lot of inside zone, some outside zone. I mean,
11:43 again, the evaluation of offensive lineman is relatively similar. We see
11:50 we were seeing the player the same way. I don't think the intangible qualities
11:54 change really at all. We're looking for smart, tough, dependable guys. Um, you
11:59 know, they emphasize, you know, a couple of different skills that, um, that
12:04 they're gonna run more often than we will. I mean, like we ran it, call it
12:08 call it 100 times. Well, they may run it 400 times. So that emphasis has to be
12:12 a little bit more on that on that because they just run it more. So this
12:15 is a draft number nine here in New Orleans for you. How at all is your
12:21 process kind of evolved over that time?
12:23 Try to get better every year. You try to learn from the draft. You know,
12:27 there's trends. There's different things that change. Um, you know, we're
12:31 constantly updating our prototype prototypes are constantly updating
12:34 thresholds. We're trying to understand where you find players, where you where
12:40 you can get an expensive players in terms of resources to the draft, you
12:44 know, in free agency. Um, but the process of cutting down the board and
12:49 the makeup that we're looking for the, you know, the demeanor and the
12:53 toughness, all those things, you know, they stay the same for the most part.
12:57 You just have to keep learning because the game is changing. We can only
13:01 really
13:02 we have to change along with college because college is giving us our our
13:07 farm network. And so if they're not giving us fullbacks, they're not giving
13:11 us wide tight ends and they're not giving us, you know, you know, three
13:14 down running backs. We have to change with that. And we have given us more
13:18 athletic quarterbacks. We have to change with that. We're getting less
13:21 pocket passers. So we have to change our mindset and how we utilize those
13:25 players. And so that's how I've evolved. At least at least I tried to
13:29 evolve. Yeah, you got some more guys went in scouting awards. It seems to
13:33 be something happens every year here for you guys. Why is your staff been so
13:36 successful? Is this a scouting group? You know, look up.
13:40 We have great guys and they work their tail off. You know, I guess one of the
13:45 great compliments you can give to scout is their grinders and, um, um, and
13:51 they just go out there. They do their job. They're visible. Um, they're
13:54 aggressive and getting the information that they need to be there on time.
13:58 They're very dependable. Um, and just really super proud of the guys that
14:02 get acknowledged. Uh, and that, you know, Casey Talley and Justin Matthews
14:07 on a pro side. I mean, that's a hard award to win because pro scouts don't
14:12 get. They don't get seen on the road like on a daily basis. They get seen
14:15 as an advanced scout. And, uh, you know, for Justin, uh, to make, um,
14:22 make his mark in the scouting community about, you know, a pro scout and how
14:27 well he does. And, you know, it tells you something. It's not a popularity
14:30 contest. That's not what it is. It's, uh, you know, they're getting scouts
14:35 or their evaluators and their critics, you know, and so you have to get to
14:39 earn their their mark, you know, to get it to get voted for. So, um, you know,
14:45 my ball. I mean, Mike Ball's been very instrumental with me. This, these, this
14:50 draft process. He's outstanding voice in our room. He's a strong and very
14:55 good pure evaluator. You know, he's got a routine that he goes through, and I
15:01 just really appreciate how he attacks it. And, um, all of my scouts, even
15:06 the ones that don't get the acknowledged, they're all really,
15:09 really good, good staff. And we haven't changed a whole lot, you know, in our
15:12 staff. I like the continuity of it. But, you know, Casey and Paul Zimmer and
15:16 John Sandusky, all those guys do a fantastic job. Just blessed to have
15:20 them all, to be honest with you.
15:21 Thank you Jeff.