Kirk Cousins On How He Feels About Michael Penix Jr. Draft + His Recovery From His Achilles Injury

Because so it's fair to say Kirk causes the falcons. There's no there's no beef involved.

No, and I don't think there can be. I don't think it's helpful. Like we're trying to win a super Bowl and it's hard enough to the garden games.

Language, no memory, no simple, It's.

All right, ladies, jentleman, Welcome to another episode of Busting with the Boys. This is episode two seventy six, and I want to talk to you about something that's near and dear to my heart, and that's the Chevy Silverado. Bust with the Boys is presented by Chevy. This is a Chevy truck podcast, the greatest truck ever built, and our good friends at Chevrolet have been a big part of the Bust and family and even our personal lives.

Yes, say.

Let's give a round of applause. Black Friday Winter, Sammy Baby. Let me just give you a little piece of the character of Sammy. I show up before our meeting we have before, we had a podcast just before this episode, and Sammy's sitting up there. Say hello to him, say what's up? There is sitting two big bags of Chick fil A and enough vanilla lattes to give to a whole family. It was incredible. Came correct, Sammy, what's the should you be on the show? Brother?

Thanks for having me.

And you drove down from Chicago today? Is that true?

Central Illinois?

Yeah, but I'm from Chicago, Central Illinois. How long is that drive?

I left this morning at two thirty in.

The morning the morning.

Why did you just I don't know the day before Mother's Day fair, once again adding to your character, sir, unbelievable. Yeah, give us a syndicator, give me a little backstory and you real quick. Yeah, age, obviously you're from Chicago, and how old were you when you lost your virginity?

I'm thirty four, born and raised in Illinois. But unfortunately I'm not giving a ton of opportunities to be fans of good football. So I was it twenty ten, no. Two thousand and one when the Oilers moved from Houston to Tennessee to Tennessee Oilers for a year, whatever. But I need a football team, and the Titans were a perfect kind of mold there. I guess. I like uniforms. I liked their Frank whitechek Adie, George, the whole, the whole team there. Jeff Fisher was my guy. It's a

I love that.

Let's give this man another reb That was incredible, Thank.

You, absolutely, it was big time you walk upstairs and you see all the Chick fil A. You didn't come empty handed.

My mom has always taught us never walk into a house empty handed.

And it's great, that's beautiful. That's a shout out, no free shout out.

It really is truly.

When people don't come empty handed.

Yahout out for sure, great shout out. Is this everything you thought it would be coming on the bus.

It's definitely surreal. Yeah, I mean we've met times uh barcel Wards, Vegas, Uh, Scottsdale maybe, and it's just uh but seeing this whole operation is just insane to see live.

And you you're wearing the shirt that you wanted to be a part of. You were saying you wanted to gamble with us in Vegas.

Perhaps I might have brought some money too today. I might have brought some money today. We were talking about here, I know.

Do we have a deck of cards? No? You could be the house.

No that is what's your sounds like you have a proposition for me?

Correct?

Go ahead, whether it's obviously you guys are slammed full in June with obligations, but a power slap down the road. I will take care of all my you know, travel, transport, all that stuff Hotel. I would love an opportunity to be in a tunnel KOs So at some point that's a huge ask. I get that big as.

The eye.

I brought the ten k for whatever I would put on the table. If I lose that, I lose it. I do not care about the money. It's the fact that someone once told me that a victorious warrior wins first and then they go to war, whether than losers go to war seeking to win. So I came here today with maybe an opportunity to win.

So you're gonna come on. You're gonna come on this bus. You're gonna bring Chick fil a so vanilla lattes, have good vibes and tell the story ten grand and you're gonna drop a son Sue quote on me from the Art of War told me right now that's also incredible. Yeah. No, we don't have to talk about anything. At some point we can go. You can come to a power Slap event all that stuff. You mean, Jackie and whoever else wants to come, because jack is always jack is the

I don't care about that. I don't care about content or anything like that.

I just want the experience.

I want to go to war. Yeah, my god, I really want to go to I've been a gambler since I don't know, since turned twenty one.

Sport answer.

Yeah, I definitely didn't have a book either, A half two years before that. Yeah, I mean, I know you just kind of fell in love with it, but it's been been in my blood all my life, and I love it and just the thrill and the whole part about being in the trenches with the boys. There's nothing better.

I mean, that favorite. Here we go. It's a test favorite sports betting app.

Oh, DraftKings. I love DraftKings when it shouldn't have been DraftKings when it was the other guy, and I would happen to have to use like I put like a dollar on the the other app, and then I'd use all the other money on DraftKings. Nice, just make sure I was supporting. Yeah, just the the same game. Parlays all the stuff that DraftKings has. It's way better than.

Any other And just for everybody watching listening right now wherever you're getting your podcast, make sure you are subscribed. Sammy, he was our Black Friday winner, one of our big spenders last year. Who's joining us for a day basically at the shop for everybody who came for Kirk Cousins that is in due time. It was a phenomenal interview. We talked to him about the quarterback Netflix, coming out

Right, he's made a billion dollars and he's thinking about possibly buying a sports cars someday. Truly. We've had him on the podcast before and it was great, but something about this interview, he just seems so much more loose, so much more relaxed when you expected to kind of be the polar opposite after the whole Pennex pick.

At eight and now all that like which we get into it. He was awesome, was incredible talking about the Achilles, like the move from Minnesota, choosing Atlanta, not re signing with Minnesota. We got into a lot of stuff and you're right, like afterwards, it's like he's a role model cat.

He is. We said this on the drive back from Atlanta. Kirk Cousins is a guy you and your boys who are going out partying with in college make fun of. You make fun of Kirk Cousins when you're in college, like this guy, he didn't do anything. He's such a square at this, that and the other. Fast forward thirty two, thirty four years old. You think Kirk Cousins the guy you want to be, Like, yeah, that he just represents what it is to be a family man, to be

Yeah, and the leader man. It's like even when he's somebody that you say you're in college with and say, oh he does is like he's kind of a square, YadA YadA. You're ultimately saying that, but you know, deep down that's how you should be handling right exactly. He just don't have the word. You don't have the discipline and the wherewith zac at it. So it's easier to just make fun of it and laugh at it. But you know that we should all be that, we should all strive to be like like Kirk Cousins.

Now, obviously we were super excited to have Kirk Cousins on the show, but the thing that Kirk was most excited about being on the show was explaining to us that quarter socks are back. Yeah, yeah, absolutely love or some quarter socks we should have. I'm wearing ankle socks right now, like some sort of twenty twenty three bitch dude. I should I'm not with the times. Maybe we should do it with him, go back to quarters. Warner does it, and if Fred Warner doesn't, that's cool.

Yeah.

Fred Warner is a guy. When you see him, you're just like, this guy looks cool. He just is a cool looking cat. Yeah he's got he's got the build, but he's also got the dreads hanging out. He's got a little style to him. That's a guy you want to follow because he's not too over the top. You're like, I can never pull that off. Yeah, he's a dude that like I can maybe do a little bit of that and get some residuals.

And then you just so happen to see quarter socks on him and you're like, those dude gotta go hard.

Yeah, they kind of are nice. I wonder what's setting those shoes off right now? Quarter socks. That's exactly what's gotta be THK, we.

Should do it all right. I got some small white ones on right now.

Those aren't quarters though, those are ankle boys.

Yeah, and the quarter ones are probably go over the little nine. Yeah, it would happen. Uh, it would be better suited for this. This news we received every weekend of We're pregnant, the dad buy we are pregnant. There's a lot of a lot of hearsay, a lot of a lot of a lot of for interpretation on the apps on Will looks disappointed, he's bummed that it's a girl. I know. I put the guy that looked excited and he's smiling but has a gun to his head.

Right.

Uh, there's a lot up for interpretation, but I will say this, I am disappointed. And it was one of those things.

Oh you okay, you're doubling down.

Yeah for sure. I mean my wife she was she was surprised, just like me your boy. It's more of like because I was telling even before, I felt like I was separated enough from being pregnant, because I think we're at like twelve weeks right now or thirteen weeks, separated enough to be like, yo, if I get another rule like I'm playing with house money, like I'd be satisfied. I'd be solid, like do I actually want a boy?

You're playing Zone the whole time. Yeah, what you just explained is how middle child syndrome develops. Everything you just said, like, I don't know who this child, what this child's name is gonna be, what her personality gonna be. Like, I'm sure she's gonna be great if she's anything like real. Yeah, However, when that third and probably boy comes out, that's why they call the middle child that forgotten.

Child, especially if she listens to this episode of her old man.

Yeah, just being literally sat there with my wife and we were scrolling through your instagram Sunday night, and she goes, if we have another girl, you can't you can't post that. I was like, why, that's funny, Like funny is fun That's what funny is. Yeah, She's like, but our daughter, if it is a daughter, which, by the way, now that will like women when they get their periods, that they blue tooth sync up. We're always together, they do that. Yeah,

Have another girl. We're on the same sperm cycle.

Yes, we're on the same sperm cycle. And you can break the mold don't say that I'm trying to reverse psychology of the universe, like, hey, there's no shot I'm gonna have a boy, Am I right? You know?

But are you openly playing the joke in the game, Because here's the I guess the only thing caution is I felt like I was separate enough to where I was like, I'm not gonna be I wouldn't be too disappointed.

White girl's rip my wife. Oh, by the way, the reason why Tylon said that is because eventually she's gonna see that, she's gonna see that perace.

She's gonna be upset.

Anyway onward, I I've already told my wife I will genuinely be disappointed if it's a girl. Genuinely I will. And then I'll be happy because it's a girl, it's a healthy baby. We can scratch off all those boxes that all all people say when they're trying to be politically correct about having a kid. We want a healthy baby, blah blah blah, that's all that matters. True, I want a boy. I don't I feel like I need a boy. I just want to feel with that God. I didn't

Every competitive male wants a boy. They want an air to the throne.

The thing that bothers me the most is watching you and your process of you and char getting pregnant and you stopping from the sauna only doing the cold like reading the literature on how to have a boy, And I'm like, he's really gonna pull it off to the point where we're coming back after doing this podcast with Kirk Cousins, I'm thinking, there's no shot this man's gonna happen.

We're around he are way too much, but now you have to break the mold.

Man.

I don't know whatever it takes, bro, And I did I stop songing for how many months? Like oh, last year when I learned that it took forty five days, Like if you expose yourself to heat, you can kill off your sperm, and it takes forty five days for it to just get back to baseline. Because there's a part of me that's like, Okay, I won't hit the sauna like a week out from ovulation, during ovulation, but then I'll hit the sauna right after because then I'll

Which makes you also believe that maybe bio hacking isn't real.

Yeah, Bro, And then I do all those things, and I'm like months not hitting the sauna because I'm like not heating the seed up, not hitting a hot tub right, not staying in a hot shower too long, all those things, And I'm just thinking, like, we gotta have a boy. I know, I know, dude, but you know works.

I'm excited for.

We need girl Dad's to unite. You're the one. I'm gonna need it. I'm gonna need you to write me whether it's a mini book a big book. I'm gonna need something about fathering two girls, what to look for, what to watch out for. Hey, don't do this like me, like be better than me. I'm gonna need this handbook from you. And I need dads to unite because look, being a girl dad rips. I think having having rue

And you can even call them men.

Yeah yeah, yeah. They just get snipped, bro, And you'll probably get snipped, but you also get snipped. Your soul gets snipped. You'll just be that quiet dad at parties, and it's gonna be like, whatever happened to Taylor's he had all those girls, Man, he can't his voice just

Listen, don't ever do what you just did again, because right now we're talking, you're talking about how excited you are about a situation that I'm already in knowing that there's hope down the road because you've aready decided your head you're gonna have a three I'm already staring at the barrel of a gun, having two little girls and knowing that this is my last shot at happiness, and you're gonna do that.

I'm sorry, bro, I've just I've experience these dads that I come to learn. I'm like, oh, these are some good these are guys.

These are good men.

But you never know about it until it's like, oh, yeah, he's a he's an outdoorsman. He goes hunting all the time. He does this, he chops wood. And you're like, why don't I ever see that guy? And it's like, well, look at the environment. He's surrounded. He's been snipped from the soul, and you got to bring it out of them.

I hate. Here's what we need to do.

If you do have a third, I will make it my mission. Get snipped our souls, get snipped to stand strong, to stand up.

Can I ask you this question, I'm really I gotta pivot out of this. I gotta get out of here.

I know it's like, yeah, I'll make it about you and half third.

Yeah, congratulations, thank you, congratulations on you.

We are fired up. We are very fired up.

Allegedly, I do have to leave in a very like a few seconds. Actually, should I wait when Taylor gets pregnant? Should I wait until the baby comes out?

You did hit it, you did touch it. But what happened? What happens?

What is it with the cale?

Can we get a new cable?

How's that?

Sorry for raising better? I'm just better than the trenches. Right now we come back to the sidelines like, well can we Is that better? Okay?

And this is this is for the group. Sam You can chime in if you want to do I wait to find out the sex of the baby and tell birth? Or should I do it? The twelve week mark? I got one berth question? That's you man, Sammy. That's the thing about busting with the boys.

But the word a team you you know ahead of time, you gotta know.

Okay, So I won to one. I want to hear you last.

Okay.

You have you waited ever before?

Have you done?

Twelve week mark? Both for winning Willow.

Twelve week mark both? The first time I actually found out, I asked the doctor and I was like, Hey, is this sex and my child on that sheet? And they go yep, says girl here, So anyway what we're looking at? And I was like, lived about that situation. The second one, I wanted to wait. We get the card and I know that it's in the envelope, and you know me, you know I get I'm gonna stare this unopened card,

I think you wait solely because at twelve weeks mark, it's a lot easier to be disappointed when you see your child being born, rather regardless if it's a boy or girl. I think the emotion will take over regardless. You know you're not gonna be upset at birth, even if it's a girl.

I think you're wrong. I think you're wrong because having two kids like having like having.

Your first kids.

I don't like having your first kid is like everything's so new, everything's so new, you're experiencing so much. And one's like it's magical blahll blah. Everyone's so excited to hear the news. What's the kid, blah blah blah. The second time you have a kid, your second kid, it's not less special to you, but it's like more normal as to everybody else. Oh they're having their second kid. And then by the time you get to the third kid, it's like, hey, congrats, I guess here's what to be

It's gonna be taught.

I don't, I don't know.

I know.

I'm just saying. I'm just saying, like, the uh, the excitement just Dad's talking. The excitement of that feels like it goes away when you're watching from a bird's eye view of how everybody that's talking.

I don't actually think you'd be able to wait though.

I don't think I wait, Jack, but I do.

We definitely appreciate that perspective because that's a real perspective that that parents have. It's like, once it happens, it's like that is the the beauty or the positivity or the silver lining of doing something like that. My question to you before I answer, would you rather take one of the head or seven of the chest?

One of the head?

Then wait, because then you just take it right then and there. And then if you take something, you know you you do it. At twelve week mark, you're just taking You're just taking them the chest. Yeah, you have time to kind of wrap your head around and everything else. But you won't have enough time. Why didn't you bring the birth? I was excited to see the boy. I was excited to see the blue. Great point. Maybe the next time we will wait for you?

Wait? Do what for your thirty You're gonna wait? Maybe maybe you guys make a pack to.

He even got two out yet for the third you gonna wait?

Yeah, we'll make a pact. If I have a third, I will wait as well.

But I'll wait too.

Yeah, you have to you basically have to decide. Oh, I mean, here's the shoe.

Here's the issue is like there's another person involved with making the child that might have to find out.

Listen, I think women would are easily on board with that.

See talents against it. I've actually had this conversation with her and she said, I want to get like the nursery set up like that. She enjoys that the nesting periods what they call it for the women that are pregnant, like they love getting the room ready. And I told her, I was like, if I wait, I'm not going to that room. I don't want to see anything and I'll have to essentially tailor will now know the information that I will not know.

Okay, Devil's advocate. Go ahead, because I feel like you guys are both kind of this way. You guys usually do like neutralish style colors. That's true, you got you. You could easily shape up the same thing. You know what I mean? Yeah, ex because the if ibe of your house is very much like a good natural.

Natural Yes yeah browns and yeah yeah earth earthy colors.

You could do something like that.

Earth.

Just talk to the wife and maybe we'll have the pack next week. Because I'm listening. I'd be scared too. Now I'm not gonna talk sorry about it. Go ahead, I'm in. I'm in, Okay, twist the question very quick. I'll do I'll do the d but Taylor's gotta go when we want him to answer the twisted question brought twist but twisted tea. There's zero carbonation, so it's easier to go. Smooth down, great for tail getting, great for game day, full flavor, very refreshing. It's the perfect alcohol

I gotta go.

I do, I do, I do.

This is one I've had in the bank for a long time, and I feel like we've maybe have sort of done something along the lines.

Would you rather listen to your least favorite song on repeat? Or never listen to music ever again?

Never listen to it again. I have to go.

So the only song you do get to listen is the worst song on repeat, your least favorite song. Just that's the only song you get to listen to forever.

Yes, maybe, okay, maybe do your least favorite albu.

You understand how that's that's how that's a bad question.

Maybe Yeah, I do. I do. I'm getting defensive.

I know, I take it easy.

Here's what I need to do, Mitch. I need you to take a couple of these lucy breakers. I need you to lock in that question because that is insane. That's wild. Love you right, you know we love you right. Don't ever trust us? You need to you need to figure out that twisted question. I love you, boys. I gotta go, saving so great meeting you. Yes, you have the pen you.

Guys, go ahead and go, both of you, guys, go and you can come back on just whatever, don't worry about Thank you brother, love you too. Man. Enjoy, Enjoy what's enjoy what's to come. It's gonna be all right, right, guess yeah, it's gonna be dude, It's gonna be great. I truly like at this point number one, I've already accepted and embraced it. But being a girl dad, I feel like I'm built for being a girl dad.

Think about it from the view of capitalism, we are a girl dad pod and if you had a boy, we would have to change some things, maybe sell some more stuff. But right now, the brand is the brand.

You're right. However, I was excited to maybe do our announcement by holding the boy mom hats because that's one where we still got. By the way, everybody who's looking for our boy mom merch, I believe that's going to be restocked during a couple of weeks. But as far as dads and girl dads uniting on this front, we have all of our Father's Day merch. That line has dropped. We have some Carhart hoodies which would go great for your old man, especially come fall time when it's hunting

Rue?

Is she gonna come out? She's gonna have dark hair like I. We're stoked for that. It is awesome. And charle my wife she was. She was just as surprised as the boy, more in like a laughing way, like looking at my reaction and everything like that. But throughout the entire day I had to go get I had to tell my wife like, hey, can you put rude down? I need to go work out. I had to go to boost get some work in. I ran two miles

I know Kurk speaking about positivity.

Do you see this news? Nebraska night game Colorado at Nebraska is a night game six thirty pm Central Time on NBC. Look, everybody knows that I'm excited about Husker football. Everybody knows that I think we're gonna have a big year. I think we're gonna have a prizingly big year that falls in line with the expectation of Nebraska but surprises everybody else. I think the boys are cooking up something special. We just landed this four star quarterback over the weekend,

Well?

Was Mitch with us? Wait? Yes, no, he said when we went to Barry's. Now when we went last year for the flying out there, flying back, doing it right, doing it right. But I won't get into a whole lot. Oh, we have some shout out, no free shoutouts from Duke Cannon. Duke Cannon is listen, guys, their face routine stuff. We just did a little, a little content piece. I thought the commercial was awesome. I don't think it's doing a whole lot of numbers on social. I don't know why

My shout out?

No free shadow This week I went to a golf trip this weekend with a bunch of my college buddies. One thing that everybody, like all friend groups do this, and it's one of those things.

Where it's like.

You're you're going at somebody's going up to the bar, somebody's getting drinks, and you're just like, yeah, got me one, and there's that mutual understanding of yeah, he's gonna get me back. It's not that like, oh, vend on me for that drink. It hit me like pay me back for that drink. Like it's that mutual understanding. I'm gonna get the trust the bond, the the knowing of but he's gonna get me back. At some point that I thought, like I did that to one of my buddies every week,

On like that? With this weekend with I gotta shout out all the boys, Connor, Griff, Mike Colin foul.

Do they watch the pod? They okay, good, don't want to shut out.

Yeah, they all watch Will Connor. I thought you should, Connor, but it was just just a bunch of old football guys we used to play with, just telling stories and ship it was.

It was a good time.

But the mutual understanding of getting rounds, that's that's my SHOTOW love that.

If you don't have friendships that aren't the classic revolving door metaphor get the fuck out of here with friends anymore, just friendship should be a revolving door. My shadow no free shadowt goes to when you rediscover a pair of shoes. It could be really any kind of clothing item. But for me, it was a pair of shoes that have like maybe been hiding underneath your bed or in a closet.

New Oh I forgot I had this, Yeah.

And then you're like you're then you wear them for a week shirt, and you're like, all right, I'll see you again in six months.

Rediscovering that pair of.

Shoes or the sweatshirt, to me is that it's like it's a good feeling and kind of have a new little spark in your style. So shout out to rediscovering shoes.

Shout out to that holy shit, I forgot I had this moment up. Sammy, all right, is yours brother?

So Mother's Day was yesterday, my Father's Day next month. My shout out, no free shoutout goes to aunts and uncles. I am one of them. I am an uncle of five nieces and nephew in total. It's absolute best gig. Like there's zero responsibilities. I've never changed one diaper and they're all out of diapers now. We went to a cup game last Sunday and the kids wanted ice cream.

Did Dad care? He?

I mean, at that point it's too late. Once I hear the kids want something, they have it. It's absolute best gig. And going back to now that you're having number two, I'm not saying I prefer the girls, but I absolutely prefer the girls or the boys. It's crazy. I would have never guessed that I'm one of four boys. I'm way closer to the girls than I am boys.

Yeah. Bro, they just say it's something about him, you know, because they say when they're little, boys are like you heard Randall Cop. Yeah he'll drop in a few weeks or in a couple of weeks. We heard him talking about his boys, and I've been around. He's like, man, they're just they're on, like just on all the time, wrestling, like they just got that different instinct of mentality versus like girls are so sore.

Wheat, bro, they're so sweet and if someone's getting hurt, it's gonna be the boys. The girls are gonna dust it off and yeah and not really care. They're the one to play soccer with you or basketball where the boys are. I want to play Xbox. I want to play PS four. Yeah, so that's awesome, shout out man.

Yeah, yeah, dude, and to get hey because Jack, he's a proud uncle as well.

Absolutely love you.

You said you haven't changed any diapers? Jack, have you changed diapers? Hell?

No, dude, I get to be the cool guy, zero responsibility. She starts crying. I just grab her by the nape of her neck and give her back to your mother.

Did you should change a diaper?

I have changed a diaper.

Before and it wasn't even my kid, was no blood relation. My mom was like working in a nursery and she's like, you need to learn how to do this, and I was like, fuck, no, I don't know. I did And yeah, I hated it, but you know, I can see myself taking pride in it if it was my niece or my own. But for now, I'm good with all of the fun and being the cool guy with zero the responsibilities and then be like, all right, I gotta I gotta go, don't have any don't have any kids.

Look after Jack, You're for sure going to be a girl dad.

I I and I'm okay with.

An incredible girl dad. Not that you guys are gonna be great fathers, you both are. I just Jack's goot. That just that that empathy meter that I know. And he's a guy's guy. He's a guy's guy in the streets. He's a guys guy. And I just know he has the heart that is ready to be absolutely taken from my experience with my daughter, I just know he's he's got the heart that she's going to be he needs to be a girl dad, that he'd be a damn good one too.

Thank you that that's really kind of you to say. I'm very excited to be a father at some point when I'm ready, whether it's you know, in nine months from now.

Or whether you get that phone call, yeah, you never know.

But I am very excited for that. But I love that shout out because I have a niece and my sister's also eight months pregnant with her second and it's another girl. So I'm absolutely over the moon. Can't wait for her to be out here hanging with the actual fam. So yeah, shout out to the aunts and uncles of the world. They are real.

My shout out, no free shoutout. Will sec Way is into the episode the interview with Kirk Cousins. If you stuck around with this this song, we appreciate you. Please make sure you are subscribed if you're listening on an audio or watching on YouTube. I'm only mainly talking to the men because I know the women. They do a great job of following them through with stuff. Guys, you gott tell them over and over to make sure that they follow through and commit. Make sure you're a subscribed

Say that quote one more time.

You gotta feed the bad dogs. Who doesn't need the good dogs?

Right? And so we were talking about vices, like if you don't have one, you can't be trusted. What's your cousin's vice?

Oh man, I knew that was coming. I need more time to think about that. I love fast food. I love sugar. I don't like candy, but like soda.

You're you're a soda guy.

Yeah. I love like like cinnamon rolls, like like bakery, like donuts, chunk food. Yeah, yeah, like I don't I don't know, eat chips like you know, I got pizza, chocolate shake burgers, let's go.

Yeah, the funny things in life, you like, do you like to snack on some delicious meals?

And I've got the problem is on my my apps, they all, you know, the algorithms recommend stuff for you. And I got on the portnoy, you know, one bite, everyone knows the rules pizza stuff. And now like my whole feet is just his different pizza stops. And so I find myself like having these cravings for pizza.

Do you watch them through?

I usually watched like when they're edited down to like quick. Yeah, because you know the world we live in today, everything's fast. But he's pretty good. But uh but yeah, unfortunately he's making me always be thinking about pizza now, which isn't good for them.

What are your top three fast food spots?

This is a good topic.

So well, let's just you know, recently moved to Atlanta. So there's some like southeast part of the country food spots that like if you're from the Midwest like I am, or from out west, you don't even know about. So like bow Jangles, the bowberry biscuit is on believable, it's fire. Then the cookout we had it, and when we were in d see, they like started to work their way north.

Choices.

I usually go like mindship, but uh uh, those two in the Southeast. That was something where it's like, oh, I normally don't get to have a bowlberry biscuit. Yeah, two sides in my fast food. But yeah, I don't discriminate among.

Fast what you're what you're there's you left out a third.

I mean, Chick fil A is phenomenal, but I just don't like Culver's being from the Midwest. Culvers butter Burgers really good. Five guys. If you want to call that fast food really good, I just don't. I don't discriminate Taco John's. I love Taco John's. You're Nebraska, they have Taco John's.

But I never went to Yeah, as you mentioned something a minute ago, Mintship.

Yeah, you're a mintship guy. That's my go to ice cream.

I don't know about that, McCaffrey.

I know it is an interesting flavor, but I got I gotta I got a weird ice cream taste too. We talked about That's when I cut about you and McCaffrey about my choice and ice cream.

Yeah, well, I mean I get down with your birthday confetti cake ice cream BIRTHAIX. But you did say, oh, yeah, he just likes vanilla with sprinkles on it.

No, vanilla with caramel and sprinkles, And I think sprinkles is a good added texture to your ice cream. There's nothing sprinkles.

A big part of taste is texture. I learned that in high school biology, culinary class. Biology, yep, and then uh yeah, it's a little basic vanilla sprinkles. That's like what my five year olds on orders. No question he'll graduate beyond that someday. But I never did.

I never did know. And things have going okay for me. So I'm a boy. I'm doing I'm doing just fine.

Boy.

I do enjoy I do enjoy vanilla ice cream with caramel and sprinkles. But you can't beat it. Ice Cream is the one thing for me.

As for as far as food, that's the rest of my family.

If it's in the house, I can't say no.

Yeah, I'm an ice cream guy, like my my growing.

Up to do it.

If you're gonna, you're gonna, like hold my hand to the fire to go get ice cream, we'll get some then ship. But I don't need it. And that's probably one of the few things that I can watch someone else eat and I'm not tempted to jump in. But if you get a pizza and like, I'm just eight. Yeah, I'm a slice.

You figure out enough room in your b.

I'll find a way, yeah, rationalized.

Colt. And I would just be ravaging the ice cream bar before like nights before games.

That doesn't that doesn't do it for me. You have the ice cream, I will say. And I don't know if listeners know about the fact that when we eat as a team. I've played on three teams and even going back to college for some reason. You know, we have the registered dietitian, you know, eat healthy. Let's get our collegen protein. They got me all week long, right, They're diligent on you know, you need your beat Root juice to make sure you handle elevation in Denver. And

Like, what are we doing?

What are we doing?

But I brought it up one time. I was like, you know, night before a game, maybe that's not the best time to just like binge and let it all go. Like maybe that's the worst time, arguably, And I had a strength coach. You said I was in Chicago. We brought this up and we did it. We said it's gone, and he said there was a riot, Like it wasn't He said it wasn't worth the blowback, Like we try.

It would always blew me away, like the night thing is every team. Yeah, but there's always a way to be like, OK, fight this now, I'll sleep it off. All the ball be fun in the morning. It blew me away when breakfast hits and there's the waffle make he and guys got loads of whipped cream on it. Yeah, it's like a noon game. We played at seven thirty.

Played Chicago one year. Coach Callahan, Bill Callen our online coaches from Chicago. So he's big on deep dish Chicago style pizza. And we go, you know, stay downtown and Coach Callen's oxide he goes, I'm gonna go get the lineman, you know, Giordonald's, so he had an ordered the hotel playing dish. So the lineman just pigged out Saturday night

Yeah, you know, like this is so funny how we do it to ourselves, I know, but I always chalked it up like I had a good fourth preseason game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and I had ice cream with Carmel Eminem's in it candy, and I had a good game to where when I was feeling advice, which is often, I was like, well, it's kind of like my good luck charm. Yeah, to you know, have a little have a little trick.

That's the worst part about superstition, I know, because sometimes you'll accidentally do something you'll play really well, like what did I do differently?

Yea?

In the routine, it's always something that's not good that it's easy too. Yeah.

So at Michigan State, our routine night before games was a movie coach Dan Tukiy from Coast Antonio. He wanted a movie, and I realized after a while that the reason we watch a movie, it was nothing to do with football. It wasn't like we wrotching Rudy like we were watching like, you know, just something whatever whatever he wanted to watch, I guess or whatever the team voted on, the captains voted on. So we watched the movie and

And you keep guy, and you also keep the team. You keep guys like you know, doing anything else, correct, You keep everybody in the building. We know for the two hours we're together, then we'll go to the hotel after. I know you guys won't get in any trouble.

I mean I haven't gone to the ice cream bar yet. With the Falcons, but I'm very confident that night before the first preseason game, our meetings are going to end, We're going to head to the lunch to the snack room, and it is going to be look.

Exactly, it's going to be bad pizza and then there's tons of ice creams just sitting out waiting for everybody.

Do you have any superstitions I have.

I always say it's a routine, and there's as it's a fine line between routine and superstition. So it's like I want to, you know, go out for warmos at the same time, I want to make sure I go through the same warm up. I want to usually get on the same bus. There's a lot of things like I do that. It's more that I just have a routine and I like to be able to turn my brain off, so like to be able to just not

Has it ever been thrown off? And it kind of just put you in a frenzy?

Well, it's funny, is I have to remind myself kind of like you did that. I do get thrown off. I get I get really a aggie before games, like if you you know, say something wrong, to do something wrong, to be like come on man, like yeah, lock it. But after the game, if to remind myself on the bus going to the airport, like, Okay, it wasn't perfect.

Well, do you remember I felt like you had a year. I don't know if it only lasted a year, or if it's still something you do, but you had I believe every fifteen minutes.

Yeah, journaled out. Yeah, so that's fun, out of control. But here's what happened. Here's the original deal. So your second year twenty fourteen. I got thrown in win griff dislocated his ankle, and I had some good moments, like I showed flashes of like, hey, this guy's got potential, But then I threw a lot of picks and I was lost. I was still figuring it out and how to do it. But part of the problem I felt was I did not have routine. I didn't know where

Yeah, do you still have to do you still have a spreadsheet?

You have to have Probably I could probably go back and find it, you know somewhere it's probably is saved. But it was just in the spreadsheet cells every fifteen minutes I was able to fit it where the spreadsheet sells or every fifteen minutes fit on one page. So I was like, there we go.

Yeah, that's that's Kirk Cousins bro.

I know I've heard this story before.

I'm a planner like that. But once I for me, like, once I have it locked in, then I'm I'm like at peace, no decision, And that's what really helped me.

That's how most billionaires are really Yeah, they have all their clothesline billion Yeah.

I have heard that.

I have heard that, like Mark Zuckerberg, part of the reason he wore the hoodie every day is he didn't want to think about what he wore. So if he just wore the same thing every day, he can spend his time and energy thinking about Facebook.

Yeah.

Throw it.

Yeah, because the brain is only capable of making so many decisions.

There's a little bit of that, and I don't think I have capability to handle a bunch of things at one time. So I try to just say, all right, all that stuff I'm not thinking about, and I can focus on what I need to focus on.

Can you miss with Can you deal with this stuff?

Yeah? Yeah? Ken runs my life. That's why I will mention the guy Ken.

But the suit Yeah, can't, can't. Philippine shout out the boy can. He is the best. We interrupt this episode to bring you sport Clips. Your hair may grow fast, but after going to sport Clips haircuts, you wish it grew even faster. And that's because sport Clips has the best seats in hair. And that may or may not be because they happen to be right in front of TV's playing sports all day long, each and every day.

When your routine is so dialed in like that and you go and do a show like Quarterback, Yeah, did that mess with your routine?

And great question, It didn't. On the bye week. It was something where it's like, man, I'm used to just doing whatever I want in the bye week. Now I got to give a day to do that. I did put off At times I'd say, hey, let's film this at the end of the season. When the season's over, we can go back and circle back on this stuff. So I tried to when I could push it off.

Right so I feel like a burden every now and then. I think there was a scene where I think you're sitting by the fire and you're upset about a little maybe a burn market you're.

Yeah, yeah, that was the deal. Like we won the games. That helped, but they were scheduled to be at the house whether we won or lost, because they came into town to film. They were going to capture that content, and so I was like, well, really help if we won in terms of hanging out at the house afterwards. We won, and then yeah, You're like, I would prefer to just be hanging out with my family, but if I have to hang out with my family with the cameras, then so be it. Yeah, but I try to just

Were you pretty happy with with doing the quarterback I feel like you came out pretty well.

Yes, yeah, it helped. First of all, it helped to win. I mean, I knew if you have a good it's a different than if you were struggling. So I stayed healthy. We won, which was great. I think it was really important that you come across as who you are. So when I got a text from a teammate who played for the Bengals and wasn't with me that season, but he had played with me for three seasons prior. He texted me watched the show. I told my fellow quarterbacks,

Were you surprised at how well received you were, because if you look at the two quarterbacks in it, I mean you definitely as far as like leveling up as far as people been like, yo, Kirk Cousins is actually the man. This dude's awesome. Like you truly won the popularity contest of those three guys.

You know, there's a conversation there to be had of like, uh, yeah, there's probably some narratives that maybe weren't as true. They were a little lazy narratives that the show probably helped

You thought it was the whole time.

Yeah, I can't have.

I always say with the Julia about my boys. I'm like, we're raising two boys. I don't care if they're good at sports. I don't care if they're good at school. I don't care. They better be gritty. Yeah, Like if my boys are solved, like I got a problem. So I always say, like, I just got to make sure when they're walking across the high school graduation stage that I know my boys have grit and if they have that, everything else is gravy.

Dude, that's actually a great topic. I mean, you being as successful of you as you've been in the league, the amount of money that you've a master for your family, generational type wealth. When you think about being a father and raising your two boys and wanting them to be gritty and growing up in a world, growing up in an environment that's you know that on the outside it seems much softer, seems much easier than most of the country.

I think, first of all, when they're good at something, I don't want to tell them, well, you're really good at that, you're really talented at that. I want to say to them, I love how hard you worked at that, because I want the feedback to be that you didn't just show up and you know, when swung that baseball bat or played that piano, you didn't just show up and do it, even though maybe you did. You you're talented. I want them to think I did it well because

Up and have it.

So entitlement, you know, it's something I can't stand. It's I got to make sure my boys aren't entitled. But I said to my wife, I said, you know, growing up, I always knew that whatever I do, like I got to make my way in life, my boys will know. And I don't have an answer for this. They will know that at the end of the day, no matter what happens, they do have a parachute, like they do have a soft landing that's sort of cooked into the system, and that there's no way to like trick them into

Yeah.

Yeah, it's always a work in progress. Yeah, what is it the family that's like, oh, they're not going to get nothing? There is it? Is it? Bill Gates?

Oh, one of those billionaire guys just came out and said as well.

Right, Shack had a great line. Shaq said, Uh, I tell my kids, you guys aren't rich. I'm rich, you're not rich. Yeah, and I laughed. So yeah, I don't know. We'll see how it all plays. My boys are six and five. So that's to talk like I know what I'm doing. I'm still figuring it out every day. But it's a topic I'm passionate about, and I read books on it, you know, to try to do it right and and we'll see how it all turns out.

There are a couple you recommend.

It's a great question. I was actually true at Kathy, the guy who found a Chick fil A wrote a book called Wealth Is It Worth It? And that was pretty good. There's a couple of there's he's written specifically about raising boys, raising kids. There's a book called Preparing Airs. So you know, I'm a planner, so like I try to, you know, go out and learn and read and there's a lot out there about that topic.

When you're at the quarterback then and you're showing your family and your wife's dressing you and the coals and all that, and you just see, you see how like humble you are as a cat, because will's are I'm telling like, how much money you've been able to make doing something you absolutely love. Has ever been a time where you're like I should go buy this one thing I should want to do at question because it is like, dude, you've crushed it.

I'll never forget my rookie year. You know Rex Grossman, he was on a team, great guy. I was lucky to get to play with him for two years and my rookie year. He leaned over to me like it was during a walkthrough, I think, and he asked me a question like is there anything you know? You're a pro. Now you got a signing bonus check. Is there anything that you want? And I looked at him and I said, a man, I've always wanted a sports car. I was like, I would love a Corvette, but I was like, I

You should scratch that itch.

And at the time, I was like, well, I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna. I'm on the league minimum salary. I haven't played it down yet. I'll save, save, save down the road. And what's funny is I'm in year thirteen coming up. I never bought the sports car. And we sometimes think of that conversation and I'll be like, that kind of sums it up that like I never did. And there's a point where at some point you do need to just go scratch that inch. And I think

To buy one? How close are we you looked into?

So I love cars, So I've like when we were in Vegas for the Super Bowl week, I went out to a racetrack and I was going, like I took my brother and he's going for fun, and I'm like, I'm going because I'm trying to test drive these things. Here's what I want to get. Yeah, so, but I you know, I still haven't bought one. But we came here and Mercedes is a partner of the team. Stadiums, Mercedes been stadium. They've been great. So if I were to get one, I'd probably go that route, you know,

You still got that.

Well, my grandma's ended up getting told crazy stories. So I buy my grandma's conversion van in twenty fourteen. Uh, kept it going, kept it going. It was fun, We took it to games of fans.

Probably kept it going.

Yeah, probably kept it going. But it was sitting in a mechanic shop parking lot, and at four am in my hometown, a guy goes off the road and runs into it and totals it.

Like.

The damage was like ten grand and the van was worth like four grand. So it was the gun.

So I had to do You think there's no way to fix this with ten grand?

Well I could have.

I could have doubled think grand. The vans were four You think I'm gonna put crazy over.

Yeah, I could have doubled owt But I was like, you know, the shirts company check ought to take it. But then we went in. We did buy a conversion van. We bought a brand new one. My wife was saying it's not My wife was like, I don't think this is safe on the road anymore. She's like, let's just get a new one. So we got a new one. So we do have the conversion. Man, we splurs down.

That slirs on the conversion.

I have nice things. I don't want to lead the audience think that, like I drive like a nineteen eighty five Honda Cord and like live in a cardboard box. But we have nice things.

I say, Julie still picks out your your fashion.

Yeah, because I don't trust myself. I dressed myself this morning at like six am. When I looked fantastic, No, thank you, But I'm a pump that quarterlink socks came back. I've always felt that quarterlngth socks are the best sock going. Yeah, the higher ones are too tall. The low cut or too low quarter length is perfect. But for the last fifteen years, quarterlink socks were a big no no. Like my wife was like, you can't wear those, but they're back.

Were you wearing quarter links?

I wasn't. I was thinking. I was still thinking low cut was in. So the quarter length came back, and I realized that the Pro Bowl like, oh this is good for me? Like this is good. I'm I'm long on been like the Trailblazer to bring his back. But that's the thing. I'll see, if I'd been wearing them, they wouldn't have come back. So see, I wore a six like your rookie year. I was wearing a six around the building. Everybody would kill me for it. They're like, dude,

What's a what is the running shoes are they? What? What? I don't know that brand.

It's a brand of running shoes. Running shoes in general are back, like like Brooks new Balance, who like that's back?

All right? That's only running shi.

Quarterlink socks and running shoes are in. If you can fact check me on this, I know because I go to the lift every day and the swaggiest guys are rocking on. But like, running shoes and quarterlink socks are in, and I'm thinking I was ten years early, but I'm I'm in my sweet spot.

Now you're back.

Yeah, now you're in your bag.

Now you're like the savvy swaggy Vett something like that.

You got the quarterline socks?

Yeah?

Have you bought yourself like a chain like the kirk O thugins.

You haven't gotten a change. Jewelry doesn't really do it for me. Haven't gotten a chain. I'd like to get a nice watch someday, but a lot of them are like invite only to buy yo.

I love he's so much. I'd like to get a nice watch. I know Jonathan's in the Watches, Big Watch Relly. Yeah, he's like talking to him. I like that underground, like understands the entire game because.

It's like a I can't wait to talk to him about that. Yeah, I got a teammate. I got a teammate knows and authors, authorized dealer on who is maybe gonna help me a little bit.

Who's what's the brand you're looking for?

Rolex is iconic, Paddick Philippe. I'm pronouncing that right, that's also pretty iconic, So it's iconic. You don't want to get like a deep cut. I like to get something where it's kind of right down main street.

This h one of our sponsors is True Classic and he's a big watch guy. The CEO is a big watch guy, and he was telling me Rolex is where people start, Paddock is where they finish.

Well, maybe I should go to Paddic then the line.

The finishing line, so good right there.

Yeah, but I haven't done. I haven't pulled the trigger on that one yet.

Yeah.

Maybe maybe maybe someday.

You should just do it all one swoop, one day, just like pick a day three years from now. You're like, all right, may.

Yeah, I'm just get a scratching Maybe I'll bring rexcos. We will treat yourself from the shoe parks and rack. You treat yourself day or you just go to the mall, no judgment, whatever you want to. You need one of those days. Man, is your is your wife from She's from Atlanta?

Did that play a factor?

So you'd have to know my wife will does a little bit. If I had said to her we're going to Japan to play, she would have said, great, always learned Japanese, let's go. Like she that's the way she is. She's just she's built different. Yeah, So it really isn't a big deal to her. It's a huge deal to her siblings, her parents that like, I can't believe our daughter and our son in law are not only moving back to Atlanta after being further away, but they're playing

I mean, it's like, yeah, you kind of eliminate a lot of distractions that you know, single men would have spa.

I think you distractions. I think I think she helped create some structure.

Uh.

And she is a great perspective, you know, like what happened to day at work? What did you tell this person? How do you respond to that comment? Would you? Hey, I think you said this to the media. I think you should have said this, like it's like a built in coach. Yeah, and if you listen, like you can learn a lot of good things from your spouse.

Yeah. Man.

You ever get to a point though, when your season is dragging on, You're in week nine, you can't see the end of the road just yet. You go do the media and you come home and your wife's like, listen, you said it like this. I say, like that, Well, you're.

Kind of like, honey, here's what I gave me.

A couple of minutes.

I'm on a boat in Lake Michigan, July fifteenth, and I'm trying to enjoy my day and Julie will say some crazy comment like I can't wait for football season, and I'm looking at it. I'm like relax, like football will be I'm trying to enjoy this boat ride. I'm thinking about I'm not thinking about football, and she's like, I just can't wait. I just love ball, I love football, And I'm like, yeah, because you don't have to do

Yeah, ten days away from camp, that's it. When it starts to sinking, like damn, like it's really coming up. Yeah, we really got to go through this camp.

What went into you choosing Atlanta?

I would say the biggest thing was I felt, going back years in Minnesota as we were trying to get an extension to retire a Viking, and the offers were coming in each off season that it was a one year. It was a one year, and I realized, you know, if I'm going to stay here for another year, I'm probably not going to get to retire here. And so I did sign a one year and did try to make it work. But then I realized, you know, this

Were the vikings ever? Were the vikings? Obviously they're in the conversation and stuff. Oh yeah, things to make it work?

Well yeah, yeah, no, that they were. They were very involved. They were, they were, they were great through the whole process. They were great, and they always were. They were always great. It was just that the structure and the structures what is always kind of driven the conversation for me. The structure was was more on a year to year basis, and you thought, you know, I don't think that's the direction I'd like to go do.

Not so sorry?

Go ahead?

Oh you had You've got through this situation twice for your for transitioning. You set up relationships, established a home, friends, all that stuff. You've made a move two separate times. Now emotionally, how to how do you handle that?

Really difficult? Really difficult? Thanks for asking. Yeah, it's it's just a big it's a big turn. It's a big change. You don't like I don't, even as a sports fan, I don't have an appreciation for when like Kevin Durant leaves the Warriors and goes to Brooklyn nets I just struck my shoulders and like, all right, he's still Kevinduran Imna Sae him doing the same things he did in the Warriors. But you when you live it, you're like, it's a huge change. You know, it's a huge change

Structurally, like I remember sitting in our row and talking about guarantee contracts, you've kind of become like the example for guys around the league whenever a new contract pops for Kirk Cousins, you've had I don't know how many guaranteed contracts. But when you were talking about structure in the way it looks now you're in a situation where you're in a four year deal, not all guaranteed does that kind of like is that kind of the game

Yeah. I've always said, like, you deal in reality and you deal in risk. So I can tell you all the things i'd like in a contract, but if reality is I'm not going to get that in the market, then it's pointless to talk about. So there's a little bit of what's reality. Reality would be that I'm coming off in Achilles, that I'll be thirty six years old before I start the next game, and therefore my market may not be as strong as i'd like it to be. There's also risk, like what are you willing to risk?

That last part you just said about other players not dealing with reality and not understanding the risk that is the majority of college NFL players that are playing in it. Do you ever sit down and have those conversations with those guys because it is a so many guys live a delusional lifestyle and it's kind of scary to watch

Yeah. I've always said that they don't, you know, the forty yard dash. I'll you know, watch the combine on NFL Network whatever, and I'll laugh and I'll be like, until they have a forty yard dash that the number

Yeah, right, Or they think they might get like guys who could be in situations they think they're going to get something in a negotiation and then it kind of it's like they feel disrespected on something without understanding what the risk is or the market or business.

Yeah, that's part of it is. Yeah, people don't understand that all do you have.

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Quarter length socks do protect the scar.

See let's say it.

When when the uh when the scar? When it was you know, no show socks. The scar would be very visible. But now I can rock quarter length and I don't even have to show this car.

You got a solid hand line coming into even wearing those quarter lenks out, it was okay, they haven't.

Even come throw away, but uh it's healing up. We're six months and change in. I was told nine months when I did it was kind of the timeline August first, but being a competitor, I'm hoping for faster than that, and we'll see if we can get there when.

They're when they're sorry, go ahead.

I was just gonna say, I was gonna ask if you converse with Aaron Rodgers at all time.

I called him. I think I did it on Sunday. I probably talked to him on Tuesday just to say, you know what, what what do I need to know? Didn't even know what to ask, really, but he was great. He was helpful, gave me his perspective, his thoughts, what you want to focus on. And then I probably circled back with him in December on our bye week and he was very helpful.

Again.

At that point, he was trying to get back on the practice field already and uh yeah, so he was helpful. And then I started researching people have torn their achilles. It was a it was a serious list, like I made like a power rankings of the all time people have torn their achilles. I know al Gore tourst go towards Achilles, Judy Dench tore achilles. The actress uh uh. We had Brad Pitt, George Clooney and one other famous

Most achilles because you get worried about the Achilles because that ankle flection would have been the most difficult part for you in this recovery process.

Well, I think a lot of it is trying to get the brain to recognize that you're good now. And so it's the innervation of the muscles and knowing that hey, yes we went through trauma, Yes it needed to heal, but it's healed now you can go, we can go. I think the brain is still guarding like it always does after an injury, and so we're trying. It takes time, and so you can do all you want, you know, the exercise you want, but it's still a time has to do its work.

Is is pain a factor at all?

I think pain kind of becomes like your signal that you aren't healed yet, or that that's your limiting factor. So if you move and there's pain, then it's like, hey, why is there pain? Let's work through this. But it's interesting how as time goes, as you heal, as you do more rehab and exercises, you find you can do more and more and more and where you're getting that moment of pain that's telling you to stop is further

Like fuld go.

How'd you do mentally through it all? Like you get from you know, you're obviously making the push of the vikings. Now, you guys didn't start the right way, but the were ascending. Yeah, you guys are aer You guys were in those close games that you probably should have. We were really you're starting to a sand and then you go from and you're now on the couch watching the game. Everybody else did you?

No fun? No fun. I was in a dark place for a while, like anybody would be. You know, football means something to me, and it hurt. It was confusing, it was frustrating, and so I'd beliging to you if I told you, oh, I was good, I was resilient. It's like, no, I dealt with the same feelings anybody would feel. You know, you're frustrated and you feel like you're not you're getting a delta bad hand. But I had to remind myself that, Okay, this football career, I

Me.

He gets to go to the pro board in like two weeks and get back in the in the game, but we don't. So I kind of tried to have our group, you know, stick together, keep each other up. And then we did some trips together, did some dinners together, just to kind of feel like we're in this together. And I feel like that really helped me feel like I'm not alone. There's five other guys whose seasons are over also, and I think four of the five also had expiring contracts, so we were kind of all in

I got to start over for guys that anybody who gets hurt playing a sport, they go through that sad, sad boy period. What was the switch in your head, because obviously you're having a hard time. You took this amazing approach with the ir making them a team. What was like, how do you get yourself out of that funk to allow you to now, Okay, I'm gonna make this a good situation as opposed to just living in a bad situation.

Yeah, I think time helped also. Legos so I took I told the Julie. I said to Julie, the team left for an away trip to somewhere. I think they may have gone to Atlanta or Denver, probably Denver. And I said to Julie, I texted you because the team left for Denver. And I'm sad, right, I'm like, golly, I should be in Denver. I shouldn't be here. You know a scooter, And I said, you, Lego, We're taking the boys to the Mall of America. We're going to

Yeah, I love it. That's that's the clip to him listing off the Legos that they built. It's it's good. That's a clip. And the captain is going to be this episode is everything you want out of her cousins.

Well, how did I How did I get through it? Legos got me through?

Dude. You go through all those Legos and you just passed up the Titanic.

Okay, so we can I can go in on Lego. We have a separate podcast I have, So.

I have the Titanic one sitting in one of my rooms of the house.

Proud of you. Still that's yet, that's You're a built little different like my ceiling's probably seven thousand pieces. That's like ten thousand pieces, Like you're not You're deep.

I bought a year ago and I'm like halfway understandable. Yeah, and I just kind of walk away from it for months at a time, but I'll come back. I'll stare and be like, I'm gonna take the next four hours of my life and I'm just gonna do this.

No.

I love to build, like I love the build and create, and uh, I also love following instructions.

So like.

Some of them, though, are too big. I'm like the Coliseum the Titanic, Like I can't where's it gonna go when I'm finished? Yeah, so so I try. Yeah, the basement so we uh, like the home alone house, I'm gonna pull it out every year is Christmas decoration, so like yeah, like every year I put on the shelf with other like Christmas reaess and stuff, and now I'm

Legos are the best Lego sponsor sponsors.

They should sp We got a lot of brands here, the fast food brands, car brands, Lego brands.

Yeah, I pick one right now, Paddock or Rolex.

Wow, depends on the model. So like a rarer, a rare Rolex that's like unattainable. Got to know somebody to get If someone's willing to let me get one, I'm probably going rolex iconic it is, but we're mean we're splitting hairs here.

Yeah, both great brands.

And you did say Paddocks where you finished, So maybe that was the wrong answer.

Repeating a cool quote that I heard less than a week ago.

Let's dive into the articles that have been going around draft Knight. Yeah, Kirk Cousins, Michael Pinnix gets drafted. Uh, they call you when the pick is happening, right.

You know.

There's a Minnesota article that came out of reason that Kirk left was they talked about hit them drafting a success or high So that was one of the reasons he comes to Atlanta talk about draft Knight Kirk Cousins, the Atlanta Falcons picking Michael Pinnox.

Yeah, I think you're reminded again that you there are things you control, and there's a lot of things you don't control. And so let's deal in reality, you know, and recognize that fact and then be a steward not an owner. So I just believe that I got a steward what comes my way and control what I can control, which is what a steward does. But a steward doesn't worry about that which they can't control. Yeah, an owner does.

May before you fit, before your brain starts to compartmentalize and realize what's controllable and what's not. The reaction when the immediate reaction when Michael Pennis gets drafted, well, I had was a phone call right before.

Yeah, I had, like I'm trying to think it was twenty one, so I have been three years ago, uh Vikings. Three years ago. I was finishing up around the golf before the draft on Thursday, and I'm on like the eighteenth toll walking up the fairway and Clint Kubiak calls me r ROC and he said, I just want to get your heads up, like we made draft a quarterback tonight.

I was like, okay, Like and this was on Thursday.

This was on the Thursday, like college before the draft. Yeah, so I understood that, like for a while, you know, teams are always thinking about succession plans, are always thinking about that, and they didn't end up drafting one that year, but you're made aware that, like this is this is a possible direction that could go. So my point is is this isn't like a foreign concept. There's an awareness that this is the NFL. You know, anything can happen.

Yeah.

And then two weeks later, so I signed my scholarship. And back then, once you sign, you can't back out, like you have to sit out of here if you transfer. So I'm locked in at Michigan State, no way to get out. And he calls me two weeks later and he said, hey, there was a quarterback who didn't sign on signing day. He's extended his recruit and he's coming up to Michigan State for a visit. We're going to offer him. We think he's gonna commit. His name's Nick Foles.

Like?

So?

And Nick was the man. I'm so glad our past cross. We were together for a year and he's been a Super Bowl MVP.

Yeah.

So, but I remember at the time thinking like it's gonna be tough. Nick's a really good player and probably only one of us will play at Michigan State. So I say all that to say this whole competing for your job, coaches having to have a full quarterback room, have good players trying to you know, get as much depth as they can. It's more like, you know, copy and paste than it is something new for me, because this goes so far back to kind of how it always has been.

Right Because so it's fair to say Kirk causes the Falcons. There's no there's no beef involved.

No, and I don't think there can be. I don't think it's helpful, like we're trying to win a super Bowl, and it's hard enough, Like you know what I mean, Like, it's hard enough. So let's let's all be on the same page and let's try to go in a super Bowl.

I'm stuck on the Michigan state thing right now.

Oh, hang on one more for you, you go back to the Michigan state because I was going to say too, Like you brought up the example of Minnesota and QBAT calling you on Thursday, Hey we might draft somebody. We just had Raw on and Raw was kind of like in the mindset of like, you know, what did he say? There was like a line that he said, but basically communicate,

Yeah, and there's also like going back to reality. Yeah, like there's a little bit of like, hey, you may not like what you hear, but like it's reality. I don't know tell you, like I'd love to change reality, but reality is one thing. It's reality.

Yeah. So anyways, Michigan State, Yeah, let's go, they go zero for five. Why didn't you just go to ann Arbor?

So tremendous question and this would probably paying some Michigan State people, but growing up in the state of Michigan, like, if you have them offered me, I mean, come on, that's that's an iconic program and at the times Chad Henny's a starting quarterback. I mean they pro style offense, j iconic coach and Lloyd Carr like they did things in a way that people respected. So yeah, but I was you have to understand it. I was so far not on their radar, Like I was nobody, and they

I didn't have an offer.

He didn't.

You didn't have an offer, not even like I didn't even speak to somebody from mission, Like I was so far off their raidar. The no reason Michigan State came in was because their quarterback, they're Ryan Mallady, committed, so they were left kind of at the altar in December, like what do we do? Because I walked off the field of my last high school game with no scholarship offers, So all my recruiting happened in like the last month of the same.

So were you fully expecting to still continue your football career even if you didn't get an offer?

So when I was playing, I was very aware that like Division three was on the table.

But what about walking on? Nah?

I always think I want to play, so to just like hold a clipboard and do the signals and like live the dream of a Division one play that didn't interest me. I want to compete, So I visited the IVY league that I flew to Princeton. I remember on like Thanksgiving weekend, my dad and I went to Princeton and we walked around the campus just to like, hey, if we can't get a scholarship, maybe the scholarship is to get into a school of this kind of prestige. So

And now I'm dropping twenty eight on you, right? And it when growing up, where was the line for you? Were you Michigan, stayed? Were you Michigan?

It was neutral. My mom went to Iowa.

I don't think he can do that.

Her dad played at Iowa. So I was a Hawkeye fan and I was again it was another school I went through from worked out, from, toured the facility, like his offer never came and and I can't say enough how everything worked out, but uh yeah, I was kind of just neutral. Watched Michigan Michigan State, and just kind of enjoyed watching good football because my team was really Iowa was who I was watching.

What was your size as a senior, so.

I was definitely undersized. My like played my last game my junior year at like six one and a half one hundred and fifty eight pounds. I remember that being like I'm light, yeah yeah, and then and then to add insult to injury, my forty was like a five to two. So I was like skinny, short and slow, so like you're not doing a little bit. But yeah, so then my senior year I played at like one seventy and I remember going to Michigan State and stepping on the scales now post senior year at like one

Brother, You've had a hell of a run.

Thank you. Hopefully there's more to go. The best is yet to come.

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Do you want to play Long Time.

The World crystal Ball?

I'm a one year to time guy, but for the sake of the podcast, yeah, I'd like to play out this contract and maybe do one more. So, uh, you know in forty I think so. I think, you know, if my boys are doing well, if they enjoy the Boys, the boys will honestly have a big play in it because if they're saying, hey, Dad, we'd really like to have you stop, I'm done, But if they're like Dad, you can't quit. You gotta go, like, we're enjoying this, this is fun. I would go so listening to see

How is I know, I'm kind of jumping back up. I know we've got to wrap it up. But when this news comes in about the draft and everything like that, how did you approach talking with Pennix?

And Yeah, I just texted him that night. I just wanted him to have my number because, you know, just to have a resource to reach out to of like, hey, where should I live. I just want to make sure you have my number if you need anything. And then just congratulated him on an awesome college career, you know, like lived it. It's hard to do and what he did is at the top of the top in terms of you know, the college success. So just wanted to let him know that I have utmost respect for what

Yeah, man, do any of you guys have a question for Kirk?

Have you heard the Comnic camp schedule?

It's light, it is light, it's light. It's uh. When we were rookies, I had.

To do two rookie minute camps. It was a practice squad.

I was so pissed your second year.

Second year, Ko came.

Up to me because we don't really understand.

Yeah, Kome came up.

To explain two.

Okay, so I had to do two rookie minute camps because I was practice squad my first year and I only played the very last game of the season, So which isn't you need three games to have a credited season to mean like you're not a rookie anymore. And so the next year, since I only had one game in twenty thirteen, the next year, we have a few

Have a full week of work, You've already four full days and you have to keep going and then when the weekend is over a rookie mini gap, you have to start another week.

Yeah, and Rookie Minni Camp is maybe the most dangerous weekend of.

The entire playing with people two days.

Chao spun at wait ultimately is it?

It was for development as well.

And he was like, you know, they only drafted Trent Murphy. He was an outside backer. He's a pass rusher. He's like, we didn't draft any Hey, the good news, we didn't draft anybody. So he was like myself, I'll get to work with you one on one versus like you have like Keenan, Perry, Riley, all these guys that were ahead of me. Anyway, we'll get to do some one on work.

The next day, bro one, it's interesting.

And then second rookie mini camp actually was you know, a piece.

But it's a grind if you feel disrespected because you're kind of true it sent out. It's like being sent down the minor leagues for a week and and but yeah, for me, it was arrived Thursday, get a physical too a day Friday, two a day Saturday, one a day Sunday. So five practices in three days. And uh, it was like drink it through a fire hose. It was a lot. But now it's one practice.

And meet one in a developmental day.

Yeah, and like in like a meeting about how to take care of your finances.

That first time coming in a rookie rookie mini camp and just like trying to digest a playbook. And then I don't know about y'all, but the techniques for an off it's a lot, and they want you to do techniques totally different than you had before. It's like it's actually a scary situation.

Correct, It's it's interesting how good you can be at football if you're doing it the way you've always done it. And the minute someone says, okay, now do it from the pistol something you've never done for the pisso or okay, now do it with emotion going this way, or okay, now do it take this angle step instead of that angle step, and you feel like you've never played the position before.

So not only that, but also the comments like, hey, I don't know how you did it Michigan State, you know what I mean, Like we do it a little bit different.

Here, but it's just like it ten anymore about that? Yeah, yeah, I never thought about that, Like you being the pistols supposed to be under center, how that could be so different for you?

It just like the footwork on it and where you step, the angles you take. You're like, the play's the same, but I feel like it's a whole new offense. I'm learning. So there's a lot of of pieces to start and over where You're like, it's going to take time because I'm not I'm not the thirteen year vet right now in this moment, I can get there, but right now I'm having to start over part of the deal.

Yeah, man, dude, really appreciate you. Know what I feel about you.

I really appreciate it coming through this. It's great to get on and catch up. And uh, now I gotta ask Jonathan about the watches.

Yeah, no questions.

I will tell you this kurct Yeah, scratch that, itch, bro. This is the second time you get This is the second time you've come in this podcast. And the man that you are being able to work through these processes, going through trials and tribulations and being able to flip the switch being like I can't control this, You're moving forward is like, I think there's a special quality to have.

I was thinking about that with my boys, that like, my boys are not going to have everything go their way in their life. And I'm excited to say, what do you think dad did when he tore his achilles or like what do you think dad? Did you know when they tell him he's not good enough? Like welcome to life, boys, like this isn't And if I had had everything go my way, if I was the first overall pick and everyone told me how greaterwise my whole career, I don't have much to tell my boys, like my

You know, cousins, never say die.

Yeah, never say die. Man, just dig deeper and uh, you can be disappointed, but you can't be discouraged. You got to keep going, all.

Right, guys. Yeah, I appreciate you better. Thank you,