I think I checked into the residence in on March 27th when we had 30 visits.

I mean, I live in Tulsa.

So I'll get home late in one or two days of the weekend if we have time.

And then I'm just ready to get back and see my family.

But no, it's so exciting.

We put all this work in starting in, really in June, you know, starting. We get the list of kind of who the prospects are. And then really, you know, once we break training camp, we're into these colleges. And it's like, okay, here we are. We're finally there where we can make our team better, right? And your direct title is director of college scouting. Yes, sir. And you've been with the team for how long now? 21 years. That's incredible.

What is the difference now for you in this process?

Because if there's any element of football that has changed the most over the last five to seven years, it's probably been the college ranks in NIL, transfer portal, and all the different moving and shaking that you've had to endure from the pro level.

How has it changed your job and how you do things? Yeah, just to gather in the character and background on these guys, it's really tough. I mean, when you have guys that have been to three different schools, sometimes you get sour grapes from the old school, trying to talk to all your sources throughout all these different places and just trying to understand what we're bringing into the building.

It's just tough. I mean, trying to just, you have a small period of time to get to know these guys. So, like, what type of football character? How do they learn? Like, all that stuff. Like, a lot of times, hey, if you're on a six-month contract at a new school, you're going to be your best behavior. But is that truly who you are, right? Has the development changed at all in any certain positions with kids kind of jumping around? Maybe you're not in one system and you have to see them kind of grow? Yeah, I think it does. Yeah, absolutely. I think it helps a lot. I mean, sometimes just like even look at like Caleb Downs. I mean, you know, he played for Sabin, played for who's the guy at at Penn State? Jim Knowles? Yeah, Jim, yeah, Knowles and then Patricia. But I mean, hey, three different systems. You're like, okay, this guy's unbelievable. He gets it. Yeah, yeah. How much specifically, like you mentioned Patricia, and that's thought to be just such an advanced scheme defensively relative to how a lot of colleges run things. How beneficial of that is that for Caleb Downs coming into the NFL just like, hey, we already know he can handle a lot of the stresses that exist. Oh, yeah, 100%. I think that's kind of what put like Alabama and Georgia players ahead in the last 10 years, like playing for Kirby or Nick. Like, I mean, they put so much on these kids and if they tell you

hey this guy's an average learner you get him at the combine and they're like advanced compared to some

other kids and you're like oh my god this guy's unbelievable he could draw up all 11 he knows what's

going on and you're like oh my god like yeah so really when you get guys from some of those programs

you know exactly like they've been they've been through it, right?

Walk us through your anxiety on Thursday night as you see the board kind of falling in different ways. And in the beginning, when Carnal Tate comes off the board, you have to think that's pretty good. Giants take Reese. And then those defenders start coming off. Just walk me through the anxiety. Yeah, we were just like, we know there's going to be offensive players drafted.

Like, please come off the board, right? But it's like, okay, we had 12, 12 guys in our first round. And like, historically we try to like just, hey, let's grade these guys year to year. Let's not push guys up because of need or whatever. But it's usually, I'm sorry, 12 to 16 guys most of the years.

And so, like, yeah, it was, it was, please, like, one of these guys fall to us.

And I know, like, we were hoping that there may be a couple of surprises, like, especially the O line, maybe.

The receivers, we could see both those guys. Like, we understood that one. But we were hoping one of the couple more O linemen got pushed up. With the way that everything has fallen so far and how everything went yesterday, you've got three fourth round picks. How do you feel like your board is set up to where you're at now and how things have fallen in front of you? Oh, it's been really good because I think we still have about eight guys that we have third round grades on. So that that's huge for us. I mean, we have some guys that we really like. And it's like, okay, we don't have after the fifth. Like I don't think we have anything until the seventh. So we don't have a fifth. Yeah, no. No. We got rid of it.

So, I mean, after that, I mean, maybe we have a chance to move down if some of those

guys are still there.

I guess we'll see how that plays out.

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