Las Vegas Raiders Insider Podcast on Fascinating Take Awyas from Tom Telesco and Antonio Pierce
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00:00 Hi everybody, welcome back to the Las Vegas Raiders Insider Podcast.
00:06 It's great to be with you.
00:07 I'm a Hondo Carpenter from Sports Illustrated's Fan Nation, and you know I'm your Raiders
00:11 beat writer.
00:12 This guy right here, Johnny Guitars, is a terrific participant and really not only a
00:20 participant, he is a huge part of everything that we do on our coverage.
00:25 We love having Johnny on.
00:27 Johnny's a great journalist.
00:29 He is a very respected journalist.
00:31 He's a respected attorney.
00:33 So where I cover the Raiders microly, he looks back at the Raiders macroly in a perspective.
00:42 So today we've got a lot to talk about with Telesco, Antonio, some other things.
00:48 John, let's get right at it because AP made a comment in a sit-down session.
00:55 Anybody who didn't see the film needs to go back and watch it.
00:58 We got it.
01:00 That really hit you.
01:02 Now it hit me when he first said it, I thought, yeah, and I thought like you thought.
01:09 But I got emails from people saying, well, does that mean he's only going to pick black?
01:13 And I'm like, you idiots.
01:16 No offense, but if that's what you took when you saw it, I have to really sincerely question
01:20 your intelligence because he had nothing to do with color.
01:23 John, you address that real quick.
01:25 Yeah.
01:26 So color and black is what he's looking for, no doubt.
01:29 So what he talked about there was he basically laid out that everybody they draft, he's going
01:34 to see a little bit of himself in that player, whether it's intensity, tenacity, football,
01:40 IQ, willingness to be coached, drive and desire, I think are two things that stand out a lot.
01:45 But he kind of laid out a roadmap for what him and Tom Telesco are going to do.
01:50 So as we look at who the Raiders draft this year in the years to come, each player, it
01:56 sounds like is going to have some identity DNA matching with the head coach.
02:02 I would suggest that's probably a really good idea.
02:04 Too often we have seen misfit draft picks, oftentimes from the owner or some other wildcard
02:10 person that don't work out.
02:11 On a rare occasion they do.
02:14 Usually they don't.
02:15 But what AP--
02:16 We're just talking about the NFL in general.
02:17 Absolutely.
02:18 Yeah, absolutely.
02:19 The NFL in general.
02:20 And we'll probably see it this year.
02:22 You don't see the better franchises do it.
02:24 You don't see the franchises that really never have a super low and they often have a chance
02:29 at a really high.
02:32 This is a good thing to have your coach.
02:34 He's got nothing to hide.
02:37 He's basically telling you who he is and what they're going to do.
02:39 He's saying, listen, there's things that we want out of players.
02:42 We're going to draft them.
02:43 And when you draft them, expect to see-- expect me to think that I see some of me inside of
02:48 each of those kids.
02:50 That's something to keep in mind the entire line of the draft as this brand new era really
02:56 does shift.
02:58 And you've got two guys piloting it that sound like so far they're working on the same page.
03:04 Yeah, John, to me what stood out was he's basically saying, I want people with my grit.
03:11 I want people to play the game because they love it.
03:13 Now that takes me into our next segment.
03:16 Jud Heathcote, the great Michigan State coach, a dear friend of mine, a guy I know that you
03:19 really admired.
03:20 He won a national championship with Irvin, obviously when he beat Larry Bird.
03:27 He one day brings in Eric Snow to his office.
03:31 He's a basketball coach, but says to Eric, I'm switching you to point guard.
03:35 But coach, I ain't a point guard.
03:36 I want to play in the league.
03:37 He's like, yep, but all you need is one team to fall in love with you.
03:40 We know Eric had a tremendous career in the NBA.
03:44 NIL has changed college football, in my opinion, in yours.
03:49 And I'm not blaming the players, by the way.
03:52 NIL has changed the game of college football.
03:55 They're ruining the game.
03:57 And coaches now are jumping off the college ranks.
04:01 I had so many coaches and executives in the NFL.
04:08 One executive told me, I got over 100 college coaches that reached out to me because we
04:16 had a lot of openings.
04:18 Get me out of college.
04:19 I don't care what the cost is.
04:20 I want out.
04:21 I don't want to do this anymore.
04:22 He goes, I go, what's the usual?
04:25 He goes, five to 10.
04:28 Get over 100, John, over 100.
04:32 And so my comment to you is this, and I think it's very simple.
04:37 I had one guy tell me, you know, all of a sudden now, people used to go to the combine
04:42 who were hungry.
04:43 Hey, I want to get to the league.
04:46 I want to provide for my family.
04:49 Now they're walking in.
04:50 I got five mil in my pocket.
04:52 Tell me why I should grace you with my presence and play in the league.
04:56 And you got Caleb Williams' people talking about he wants a percentage on the team.
05:00 That is so absurd and stupid.
05:03 It is so absurd, it is such an absurd and stupid comment that you would think the agent
05:10 or somebody would go to them and say, shut up.
05:15 John, you've been with me a long time.
05:18 You know who my sources are.
05:21 They're rock solid.
05:23 And the people that I know who are from the good teams that are successful quarterback
05:27 pickers who are not consistently in the top half of the draft all said to me, Caleb hurt
05:33 himself.
05:34 He's still going to get picked one or two because people are going to look at the talent.
05:39 He goes, but one guy told me we didn't have him graded as a first rounder.
05:44 Now we don't even want him.
05:47 Just NIL and you know, he made allegedly 15 million.
05:53 That's what's no, I'm told it was probably higher than that.
05:57 How is it?
05:58 We know what NIL is doing to college football.
06:00 And again, don't blame the players.
06:02 I think they should get paid and should make every dime that they get.
06:06 So I'm not blaming them, but NIL, what it's doing to college is now hurting the pros.
06:12 And some coaches are even telling me I'm looking for guys that didn't have the big NIL.
06:18 Your thoughts, John shop.
06:21 You've talked about when I was in the financial services industry, there was, there's a famous
06:26 guy, uh, Mary belly talked about looking for people with PhD.
06:31 They're poor, hungry, and desperate.
06:33 So there's a lot of that that you're looking for from the NFL level.
06:38 You want guys that are driven.
06:40 And what we've got now is some of the, the pool, some of the college pool is kind of
06:46 been poisoned.
06:48 They've been poisoned by who knows what kind of team structure they were in, but they've
06:53 been poisoned by cold, hard cash, whether they know how to handle it, what to do with
06:57 it, that stuff's out the window, how much they got or didn't get.
07:01 They don't really know if somebody got a lot at some point in time, there's going to be
07:05 a tax crisis coming into the NFL that teams probably won't know about.
07:09 And they're going to find out about, and that's a whole other distraction to deal with.
07:13 So what you've got is the pool of players that supply the NFL.
07:17 And some of them are coming in with a little bit of poison to them.
07:20 Not that money's bad, but money does change people.
07:23 It has changed people and it will change people forever.
07:25 And in the case of anyone at the top of this draft and the top coming drafts until that
07:31 NIL and college football is either reorganized or somehow organized, disciplined, kind of
07:37 like you'd run any good business.
07:40 It's something the NFL has to watch out for, because as I have said for almost all of our
07:44 years and I will say for the rest of my years, complacency kills the cat way more than curiosity.
07:52 If you've got a franchise quarterback you're looking to stock your team with, and he's
07:57 complacent or already kind of cooled it or feels like he's already made it, that's not
08:02 somebody that's going to be optimizing their NFL career.
08:06 That's may not be somebody that you can depend on, that you can count on.
08:09 We've seen bad examples, too many of them from guys kind of flushing a good chunk of
08:15 their career away, like Michael Vick did in Atlanta to, you know, I mean, you can go back
08:20 as long as you can think of where you see guys get the big fat contract and maybe just
08:27 kind of cool it.
08:28 The Lions roster was stuffed with that, where complacency was like, okay, for a long time.
08:35 Caleb Williams is a concern.
08:36 I don't know who's talking around him, but I think they need to stop talking right now
08:40 because they sound too much like Robert Griffin III did before he was basically pushed out
08:45 of the NFL for good.
08:46 That's the last guy you want to sound like.
08:49 This is a brand.
08:50 I understand that.
08:51 Everybody's a brand now.
08:52 If you're going to be a brand, you got to be really careful.
08:56 I am concerned about Caleb Williams' approach around the combine and the stories and the
09:02 news that came out.
09:04 I'm also concerned that he didn't pop up and say, that's dad wrong.
09:09 This is not me, et cetera, for some of the stuff that came out.
09:12 It's not just picking on Caleb Williams.
09:14 It's a way bigger issue than just him, but every team that's drafting has now a new element
09:21 to consider.
09:22 They have to consider the mentality, the motivation level, the complacency level of anybody that
09:28 they're drafting, at least in the premium rounds, let alone at the very top in the most
09:34 position, obviously the most important position in sports.
09:38 What was having lunch at the Westin with a GM?
09:42 By the way, the best pork belly I've ever had in my life.
09:45 John, you and I got to go to Indianapolis again just for the pork belly.
09:48 Oh my God, it was so good.
09:50 Thank God for pigs.
09:53 Anyways, he said to me, he's told me before, but he reminded me, he goes, "Remember the
09:59 Chinese proverb, very few people can handle failure.
10:05 An even smaller measure can handle success."
10:10 That to me was very telling.
10:11 I thought he had a lot to say about Caleb and a lot to say just about the whole draft
10:17 class in general.
10:18 All right, I want to turn to Tom Telesco.
10:19 I'm sorry, go ahead.
10:20 Do you have something else you want to add?
10:21 Yeah, I got something to add.
10:23 You can see it in the individual sports, the concern.
10:26 What you can sometimes see is a golfer that all of a sudden is flush with cash or has
10:31 won a major and you kind of see natural complacency and natural falling off of keeping that edge
10:38 sharp.
10:39 If you're playing for business first, that is an inherent concern with the NFL.
10:44 They do a pretty good job of keeping it at bay, but that's always the concern is are
10:47 you playing for business first?
10:49 Are you playing for passion and legacy first?
10:51 The Raiders are looking for guys that want to be playing with passion for a legacy.
10:55 The concern at the drop of the draft is are you playing just for your business interest?
11:00 If you are, are you ever going to get 100% of whatever player X, Y, or Z that you take?
11:06 No.
11:07 Most teams, if they're smart, are going to want to avoid more of those guys than they
11:10 take a chance on.
11:12 Very good point, John.
11:13 All right, Telesco, let's get to him because a couple of things he said really stood out
11:17 with you.
11:18 Let's start first about the offensive line.
11:21 I thought the same exact thing.
11:22 As soon as he said it, I thought, "Oh, that's a big deal."
11:25 Your thoughts, John?
11:26 Well, what he said was essentially laid out the magic number of seven.
11:29 He basically said that you need at least seven on the roster, at least seven that can play,
11:34 and you kind of go from there.
11:36 That really stuck into my mind that while they've got to have a starting five, they
11:40 are really looking at seven as kind of the starting point.
11:44 When you think about roster and you think about filling the 53, absolutely, the Raiders
11:49 are going to have ... We know we're going to have seven at least.
11:52 Then how many more can you tack on from there?
11:54 Then how many more can you keep on a practice squad?
11:57 It's just interesting to hear because sometimes you hear teams talk about just going with
12:02 the five and there's some difference at the college level and the pro level, obviously,
12:05 because the rosters are way different.
12:07 But to hear an NFL GM who's starting from scratch with ... It's not that his back's
12:11 up against the wall, but it's very unlikely that you would get a third GM go as a GM of
12:18 an NFL team.
12:20 He laid out for you right there, seven.
12:22 We got to have seven.
12:23 Obviously, they know they need more and they're going to do more in the offseason and in the
12:28 draft.
12:29 It was interesting to hear somebody just lay that out there.
12:32 Sometimes thinking we only need six or maybe we need eight.
12:36 The Raiders have basically just told you seven is the starting point.
12:39 It is an interesting note to keep in the back of your mind.
12:42 I thought the same thing, John.
12:45 He really started talking about free agency and that really pricked your attention.
12:50 Would you talk about that, please?
12:51 Well, it took me by surprise a little bit because he said, "Look, we want to be signing
12:56 our guys as free agents."
12:58 He really said something that is shocking a little bit to probably most of us that watch
13:02 this sport so closely.
13:04 He really said that a lot of the free agency success rate is not that high.
13:10 Guys that you get from other teams as free agents, they don't necessarily have success
13:14 and play better or play as good as they did before.
13:17 That surprised me because when we think of free agency as a blanket statement, a big
13:23 statement you think, "Oh, we're going to get so much better when we go get that guy.
13:26 He's going to be our third baseman.
13:27 He's going to be our free safety.
13:29 He's going to be our wide receiver.
13:30 He's going to change the offense."
13:32 NFL GM Tom Telesco is telling you if you actually study it, the success rate of free agents
13:38 is not that high.
13:39 At a default setting, the Raiders are starting out with the intention of that they're going
13:44 to keep more of their guys because that's going to actually lead to more success.
13:49 That surprised me because I guess I'm a little bit of a sucker like so many people who look
13:53 at the free agent market and they're like, "Oh, man, if we can get that guy or we can
13:56 get that guy, we can get that guy, we're going to the next level."
13:59 In reality, it sounds like if you study the broad success rate of free agency in the NFL,
14:05 it doesn't work that way.
14:06 It's a little bit counterintuitive and certainly counter-marketing.
14:10 As this free agency season gets ready and going, you've got teams around the whole sport
14:15 thinking, "Oh, what if we get five or six teams thinking, 'Hey, what if we get Kirk
14:19 Cousins or what if we get this guy to play wide receiver?'"
14:23 Turns out the success rate isn't that high.
14:25 This is interesting insight that I think you only get at this time of year.
14:29 You only get at the combine.
14:31 This is not stuff that they're going to want to go into or be thinking about when they're
14:34 in the tunnel that is the actual season.
14:37 This is interesting stuff.
14:39 Added bonus for those that look, listen, and study all the content that came out of this
14:45 network from that combine.
14:48 Wesley, Tom talked a lot.
14:53 You saw him off podium.
14:55 You saw him in the original press conference.
14:57 John, you've covered this league macroly.
15:01 By the way, I saw your favorite GM that you run into a lot down there, by the way.
15:07 I want to just say that.
15:10 You know some guys in this league, a lot of guys in this league.
15:12 My question for you is, what's your early impressions of Telesco?
15:18 It looks to me like he's got a plan.
15:22 Some of the natural progression of getting into a new job, having never been a GM before,
15:31 there's got to be a couple things that hit you different when you're the guy.
15:36 Maybe he's in a tough spot.
15:38 Every spot's different with salary cap and ownership.
15:41 He strikes me as actually a guy.
15:45 Strikes me as a little more ready than somebody that was running on a treadmill, off the treadmill,
15:51 gets right back on and is running.
15:54 It seems like he's had some time to collect, process, store the knowledge and experience
16:01 he had from the Chargers, and now take it to this new situation and the new opportunity
16:07 in Las Vegas.
16:09 It strikes me that he is probably more thought out and has a plan that may be a little bit
16:18 different than what he had with the Chargers.
16:20 It's going to take some time to find out.
16:23 But I don't have any impression that he's not really sure what he wants to do or how
16:30 to get there.
16:31 Now the question is, can they get there?
16:32 And really, that ideally is a prerequisite for that job, but we've sometimes seen people
16:39 struggle or we've seen people going down the hill and their collar gets grabbed by the
16:43 owner this way or something else throws it off that way with the player doing something
16:47 wild and crazy.
16:48 So I like what I see as far as hearing Telesco, hearing Antonio Pierce separately talking
16:56 about some of the same stuff.
16:57 It sounds like so far there's a real working cohesion there and that is only going to produce
17:03 a better roster and better result.
17:07 The NFL Competition Committee is back to being the NFL Competition Committee and they are
17:11 about on the verge of making a mistake.
17:15 Talk about it.
17:16 What's what's on?
17:17 Well, the fun link through the end zone thing we saw show up last year and we talked about
17:24 the competition committee before the season.
17:27 We talked about him during the season.
17:28 We're going to talk about him now because whether it's the push rule that they're not
17:33 going to address or this fun link through the end zone thing, this stuff seems to me
17:37 like it's happening too fast.
17:38 It doesn't seem to me like it's happening with enough, maybe broader analysis.
17:42 And again, I think they need a person or two that's on the competition committee.
17:46 That's their only job.
17:48 How many of these guys and gals could see all the games every week or even see all the
17:54 plays that we're talking about that have caused these controversies?
17:57 I'm not sure.
17:58 I don't think it's a big ask for the NFL Competition Committee to suggest some improvements relative
18:06 to the fun link through the end zone rule.
18:08 I really don't.
18:09 It seems to be really stiff on the penalty side if somebody fumbles through the end zone.
18:16 And I'm right there with you folks.
18:17 Well, don't fumble through the end zone.
18:19 Of course not.
18:20 But I like the idea that the rules of the game be set up in a way to encourage the best
18:27 opportunity to identify the better team that day.
18:31 And that's one where I think they probably are making a mistake there.
18:35 The push rule, I don't necessarily mind.
18:38 I don't have a problem.
18:39 I'm glad that they're, don't mess with it.
18:41 Yeah.
18:42 To me, we don't.
18:43 Go ahead.
18:44 No.
18:45 I want to see more teams using it on first and second down just to mix it up a bit.
18:51 There's an opportunity to change it as far as limiting the amount of guys that push,
18:55 but we don't have a problem with that.
18:58 We also don't have a problem with, it looks like they're sneaking a little bit of technology
19:02 testing in there with the first down.
19:05 With the sticks.
19:06 You like that?
19:07 Absolutely.
19:08 Yeah.
19:09 Let's get some chips and line it all up so we can kind of take some of the inaccuracy
19:12 out of the game.
19:13 It's a huge business.
19:15 Obviously, it's the most popular form of entertainment in the country.
19:18 It's also a massive, giant gambling, massive gambling efforts for small dollars, anywhere
19:25 from somebody pressing one and two all the way up to big ones.
19:29 But everybody interested in it is going to, by far and large, they're going to support
19:35 the idea of give me the exact 10 yards, make it a little easier, make it a little quicker.
19:39 While you cut out some time in the games, maybe you could sell another commercial or
19:42 two in there.
19:44 So some of that stuff is good, but it seems to me a little quick.
19:48 This stuff is all just getting blown over that quick.
19:52 We don't need to address the fumbling through the end zone rule.
19:55 Well, are you sure?
19:57 Because it seems like it does need to be addressed.
20:00 See, I agree.
20:01 That's the stupidity part I don't like.
20:03 I love the technology and I love what they're doing with kickoffs, potentially.
20:09 I think that is intriguing to me.
20:12 So I think, but the fumbling through the end zone is ridiculous.
20:14 All right, John, I want to get to one last thing with you.
20:21 Technology's coming and we've been hammering it since before it was popular.
20:27 Put another official up in the booth who has access to all the technology in the world.
20:35 Let them review everything.
20:37 Anything that's got wrong, let them fix it, change it, speed it up, get a couple millennials
20:44 in there to her, show them how to use the technology and go.
20:48 I love it.
20:49 I think we're inching closer, Johnny Guitars.
20:52 We are.
20:53 And you know, when we saw the somewhat hidden rules with the officials, kind of the extra
20:59 officials in some of the playoff games, it's like, huh, interesting.
21:03 And an expansion of the sky eye or whatever you want to call it, we're looking for an
21:07 off field official that'll help administration and efficiency of the game.
21:12 It's not that difficult to set it up in a way where he's got limited abilities, limited
21:17 calls that can be made, for example, pushing a button because, you know, there's a massive
21:21 personal foul away from the play that nobody saw.
21:25 Looking at replays, looking at reviews, this is trending that way.
21:29 And I understand maybe the NFL doesn't want to do too much at once.
21:33 They don't want to take out the chains like we just talked about.
21:36 They don't want to add an off field official.
21:38 They don't want to change, modify the kickoff rules.
21:40 They don't want to do too much at once.
21:41 I get that.
21:42 But this is the one maybe of all that has stood out most.
21:47 There was more criticism of NFL officiating in this past season than I remember for a
21:53 good while.
21:54 And I think a lot of it could have been remedied if they would have had an off field official
21:58 in place for each game.
22:00 My contention all along has been that it was got to be the guys on the field that were
22:05 pushing away from this, the officials not wanting this for decades.
22:09 You shared with us earlier this year that that may not necessarily be the case.
22:13 If that is the case, it seems to me the NFL is about 15 years behind here in getting this
22:19 done.
22:20 And the sport's going to get a lot better if they get there.
22:23 But again, I circle back to a little bit of the concern that we heard out of the combine,
22:27 which seemed to be that some of the stuff was already getting shut down by the competition
22:32 committee.
22:33 Now, maybe we just heard from one or two voices, and that's not the story.
22:36 I hope it's not.
22:38 This is the time that the NFL should be looking at this stuff and making smart decisions and
22:44 moving things forward.
22:47 So some hit and miss there.
22:49 But I got to be a little bit reserved about celebrating the off field official until they
22:56 actually say this is what we're going to do.
22:59 And when they do, we're going to pull those balloons and all that other stuff that came
23:02 down on the screen for it.
23:05 All right, Johnny, listen, I greatly appreciate you.
23:09 Some great information from you.
23:11 Next time, will you promise you'll start with a riff?
23:14 Yeah, I got one.
23:16 I got one in here.
23:18 Absolutely.
23:19 All right, John, stay on the line.
23:20 I want to talk to you real quick.
23:21 You guys are listening to the Las Vegas Raiders Insider podcast.
23:25 As you know, I'm from SI, Sports Illustrated's Fandation.
23:29 Great to have you guys with us today.
23:30 Follow me on Instagram @HondoSR on X, formerly known as Twitter @HondoCarpenter.
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