The thirty seventh pick in the twenty twenty five NFL Draft to Miami Dolphins select Jonah Savayanaya, offensive guard Arizona. Let's go all right, and they listed him as a guard. He could play outside, could play inside. Mike Aya Patti is who he reminded me of coming out of college. That inside outside versatility, big strong, powerful men who can move.
Like he tested really really.
Well, ran four, nine to five and the forty, so he can he can really scoop to me, you get him physical in the run game, but you don't lose all that movement if you want to get out to the perimeter as the Dolphins.
Like to do.
What is up, Dolphins and welcome to the Draft Time Podcast. I am your host, Travis Wingfield in oh I got Muswaga back on today's show. The Dolphins get aggressive and go up the board and get my guy, the guy you heard about for money on this podcast and your boys absolutely fired up, as you can tell. Jonah Sylvy and I I think I got that right this time. It's a tough one to pronounce, but we're gonna get
through it here together. Let's talk about the tape, the fit for the team here here from Chris Greer and Mike McDaniel, and I had an exclusive with our first round pick, Kenneth Grant. That's all ahead from the Baptist Health Studios inside the Baptist Health Training Complex. This is the Draft Time Podcast, Maie gaff I am so fired up for Arizona guard slash tackled Jonah Savoy and Aya, and I am just thrilled that he is a Miami Dolphin.
He was a guy that I had been discussing throughout that throughout the entire process here and really honed in on as a preferred target at pick forty eight when I parsed out how I thought the board might play out here with the value of the offensive line where it would be in this draft, And to me, man,
this was it. You talk about scheme fit, you talk about culture fit, all the stuff we're gonna get into here on this episode of the Draft Time Podcast, and I want to start here before before we get too far into it, because we've seen two players added. And I actually wrote this up on Friday morning, and I
contemplated the options that might parse through it. And while I thought the cornerback options were good there, I still felt the offensive line was kind of the sweet spot here for the forty eighth pick, and the Fins obviously agreed in pursuing Savoy and Aya in this year's class. That's going to be the hardest one since Ignogay for
me to get down. We'll get there eventually, and you know the details of the trade are this, Dolphins give up the forty eighth pick and the ninety eighth pick and the one hundred and thirty fifth pick for the thirty seventh pick and the one hundred and forty third pick. So the way to kind of boil that down to make it more simple to understand, we gave up the third round draft pick and then our late fourth round pick was swapped with the Raiders's early fifth round pick,
a total of one of that eight spots. And if you put it up on the draft value chart, the Dolphins actually got one more point out of it, so very equal trade, but Miami technically edges it out the Raiders in that regard. But they get their guy, they
solidify the offensive line in that way. Before we get into the fits and the film, I had the concept for a little bit of a segment that I wrote with Jonah in mind, and I contemplated maybe holding it until Monday, but since we were aggressive and went and got the guy to me, it speaks to my thought here and kind of solidifies it a little bit more strongly. And you know, just have we only have the one player breakdown for you guys here tonight because we traded
the third round pick. But I think this is as good of a time as any and a follow up from last night. And you know, this is the problem with doing a speed podcast at one o'clock in the morning after hosting a four hour draft event. Some things can slip through the cracks at times, but we'll get back to it eventually, always on the show. It's the beauty of having a daily show or three times a week right now, but after, you know, a three am bedtime.
I was thinking this morning over my coffee about something and it was this, and it stemmed from this comment from Mike McDaniel on Thursday about the tonality and not just the need at defensive tackle, but a certain type of need and a shot an injection of culture and a certain type of player in person into the whole, the entire organization, the entire building. So here's Mike McDaniel on the tonality they want to set for twenty twenty five, and I'll get back into it after he talks.
It was important to have a tonality set, you know, for the the twenty twenty five Dolphins and adding you know, a real presence up front and a you know, just a just a player that is going to attack it and try to play to the tonality that that we aspire to. You know, I think I think it's very well in step with, you know, our vision as we approach the whole process, open minded, but trying to you know, figure out by round how we can make the Dolphins better.
So this, uh, he's been on our mind for a long time and we thoroughly overly threw, really vetted and so very excited about what we're adding because we feel like we have a very clear clear picture of what that is.
So we have a pretty good chunk of the offseason now done. Still plenty to go here, and once again, you know, Chris has reminded us plenty of times, Chris Greer that there are free agents out there, plenty of things to explore in that market and trades and another seven picks to go tomorrow on the draft. But with what's happened so far, man, you can trace the bread combs back to all the various tempole events that Mike
McDaniel as well as Chris Grear have spoken at. You know, they mentioned the investment in the offensive line back at the end of season press conference with Chris Greer, Mike McDaniel talking about setting culture through the draft picks at the owners meetings, about learning lessons about the shortcomings from the previous season, the funny car wash attendant story who mentioned short yards to coach and how the Dolphins have to get better at it. We hear about that every December, right.
We hear about the Dolphins and their flash and their sizzle and their high powered offense in September and October. But once the weather gets tough and the the inclement weather comes in, the environments get tough on the road down the stretch, and you need toughness, and you need running game, and on and on and on. Right, and if you go back to free agency, we've gone from one of the oldest rosters in the NFL to the seventh youngest before the draft, before you add potentially nine
players or maybe fewer, or maybe more than that right. Now, they've peeled back on some of the cash spending. Right The free agency was short term, one year, cheap type of deals outside of one or two signings here and there. But the one big splash was an area, excuse me, that you haven't splashed around in before. As my son Cameron would say, splash agua. He loves to go out in the puddles or into pools or in the bath. Anywhere he can splash agua, he will splash Agua. But
the Dolphins didn't splash Agua this offseason. And you do it with James Daniels on the interior offensive line, a pretty big investment in that position, and quite frankly, a lot of the teams that have run this system traditionally don't splash Agua in that regard either. And this system traditionally does not take interior offensive linemen that high. They take tackles and centers that high, but typically guards. Until a few years ago, we saw the Rams make that
pivot with the Jonah Jackson trade. The Alaric Jackson Jonah Jackson and Alaric Jackson acquisitions they made were kind of a pivot towards that and Kevin Dotson as well. We've seen the Green Bay Packers pivot to more of that concept with Josh Jacobs being behind a very good offensive line. The Niners are in that process that we are also joining as well. It's bigger interior offensive line. And the Dolphins accomplished getting bigger and staying more athletic than they
were last year. Last year was a three hundred and fifteen pound and a three hundred and twenty pound guard who were not elite movers and quite frankly, weren't that greatest scheme fits. And now your projected lineup is two more of two of the most athletic guards in all of football, and they come in with rare athletic ability and big size, and that is different than what we're used to. So back to the splash and free agency, I mean, all of the offseason has been adding big, physical,
tough players. James Daniels, he spent on a guard big for the first time in four years. Nick Westbrook, A Kine and Faroh Brown both to me, you are better blockers than pass catchers at eligi positions, and I think Westbrook Akeene is a damn good pass catcher an incoming potential increased role for Jalen Wright, who I think will be a much bigger role player than eighty three carries this year. And you also signed Alexander Madison. Both those guys are
bigger running backs. You signed three off ball inside linebackers, including two including the first throwback type of player since Eland and Roberts and kJ Britt, as well as two safeties, including a big time presence in the box. And he fought to melafon Wu. It's not necessarily sexy, but I think they have the right approach for how to fix things didn't work a year ago and building it up in that way because the Dolphins started this thing from
the inside out. They didn't put up their fancy, you know, siding and roofing. They went to the foundation and built their pillars. They built out the offensive line. They they rounded out the tight end room. They went after the running back position. They attacked the interior defensive line in the first round of the draft. They go after linebacker
in safety. They've made the steps to address the concept of playing in the elements, playing tougher, more competitive football down the stretch, which will all of that work We're gonna see. That's why they play the games. But to me, the vision is crystal clear, and quite frankly, I feel like the fan base had been asking for this for a long time now. Maybe it's not the same big time names that get get all the attention and give the off season accolades that you used to get for
the Miami Dolphins, but who wants that. I mean, the last several years you can point to the off seasons and say, like, teams that didn't have flash or sexy moves are the ones that were the team standing at the end of the season. So we'll see how it goes. No guarantees, but I like the vision. I like the change it speaks of. And let's go ahead and close with this updated discussion from Mike McDaniel on that idea
of tonality, but this time from nine two. After you've added a three hundred and forty pound defensive tackle and now a three hundred and twenty five three hundred and thirty pound offensive guard, that's a lot of humanity coming at you. Let's go ahead and hear from Mike McDaniel on the idea of toughness and the feedback that he received from his teammates and the building that told him they have to get better in that area.
I think that there's a mutual.
Understanding amongst Dolphins right now for the twenty twenty five version that just started getting there, their working that you know, non negotiably, we're gonna be one team moving in one direction and we're gonna earn everything we get, and and so in terms of narratives, in terms of like those expectations that guys should have. But when I tell you, there's not really any time spent talking about what other
people are saying. The opportunity that you have is to do with action what people will ultimately have new narratives for. So if you you're you're controlled variable, if you can put forth a good day's day of work and you have teammates that you trust, you know all the things that being being said about whatever, that takes care of itself. So I think, uh, you know, the team will embrace are two of draft picks thus far, because you know, we kind of know the team that we have and
the type of guys that will flourish. And I think it fits something that you know, we're really trying to define every day, which is the type of people we are, the type of team we are and that will be defined by our work.
Let's go ahead and pause for our first break right there, come back and get to the film, the testing metrics. I have more audio. We're going to talk about the fit in the system. We're going to talk about his stats, all of that fun stuff, his background and more on the next side of the Draft Time podcast, brought to you by Autoation. Always a nice thing when the first two players you draft on Thursday and Friday are guys that you've already done deep dives on their film. It
makes the rest of the workload much more doable. Let's go ahead and kick this thing off here with his tape. The first that jumps off is the physicality and the size and the mass and just how he moves people and the way that they are impacted when he hits them. When when you see him from that standpoint, you think, Okay, this is a gap scheme power player, but then you watch him get out in space and it's like, oh, he's actually like the best mover in the entire class.
On top of all of that. In fact, let's cut into the film here real quick and get into the testing metrics. If you list him at guard which Chris Greer said, they see Jonah as a guard with four position flexibility as a plus, he played tackle and guard in college. But if you list his workout metrics as a guard, which we'll hear from Greer, that's what they're going to do. This year. He was a eighty fifth percent tile size guy at three hundred and twenty four pounds.
His twenty nine inch vertical and eight foot ten inch broad jump those were both in the eightieth percent tile of guards as well. His four to six six shuttle time was in the eighty second percent tile among all guards, and his forty yard dash his ten split and twenty split two forty yard dash was four point ninety five. That's ninety eight percent tile and a ten split of one seven to two good for ninety six percentile man. We have discussed this type of addition for a few
years on the show. Quite honestly, it was a big part of me talking about a player like Jackson Powers Johnson last draft process, a plus mover at three hundred and thirty pounds who was always intriguing because you could keep your deadly outside zone run menu available, which is the bread and butter of the offense. And the entire starting point for the offense. But when you needed tough yards inside, you could saddle up a three hundred and
thirty pound guard and run the football behind him. Two of them, And now you've dropped in a three hundred and twenty five pound people mover in the middle. And in addition to all the sizzle and the ability to move the ball in a flash, now you get into those third and twos, you have the menu of your outside zone run game. You have your quick passing game that's super efficient and effective. And the screen game they've converted on those situations, those speedouts, the slant game, the
screen game. They have so many options to move the chains in those ways. And now I fully believe you have the element that makes all those other elements even more dangerous to defend, the capability to line up and run it downhill and move the line scrimmage and move the change, because when guys know you can do that, those other things open up even more. To say that I am fired up about this one would be an understatement.
Daniel Jeremiah off the top of the show that compared him to Mike iu Potty, the former first rounder of the Niners, with rare, rare size and athletic ability himself. And yes, it's like Kenneth Grant. He doesn't come in here and just get handed the keys right away. He has to earn it. But you can hear how much the Dolphins love this guy so much so that Chris Greer cut to the Chase about how they view him.
At the end of the day, this was a player that we were convicted in that was going to be a starter for us, and he'll play guard for us, and he understands that we've talked to him about it, and so we're excited about it.
Also that one seven to two ten split time was the best at the combine of anybody who weighs three hundred and fifteen pounds or more. Back to the film here, the first thing that jumps out about his game is the pop. There's popping his get off, if there's popping his hands, there's popping his hips. Lots of pop, so to pop. You could say, let's break that down step by step. Here the way he fires off the football.
He comes out with exceptional pad level, which allows him to impact guys on combination blocks to easily disengage off that first level and climb up to this linebackers on the second level, or even peel back and find work with a green dog blitzer, a delay blitz right, or someone looping off in a rush game. And that's where the pop in the hips comes from. He can drop step, open up his gate, and explode back across his body and just be a fluid mover in his change of
direction skill set. More on that in the fit piece. Gosh, the feet they are so sweet, man. He's so light on his feet at three hundred and twenty four pounds, The way he can change directions working backwards. You're gonna hear Mike McDaniel talk about his ability to set the pocket from a pass protection standpoint, The way he can transition his weight, drop the anchor slide to find work. It's all the look of a plug and play starter from day one. I'm very, very convinced that he can
be that for you right away. He's so light on his feet, can take away the edge and redirect back inside. Massive frame, long arms, good for a guard, obviously thickly built. I bet you could tack on some more weight if you wanted to because of his frame. Exceptional balance that allows him to mirror and the patience to not get out over his skis and protection. He's a smart player. His hands are bare claws. They impact people and send guys flying to the ground. You know how we talk
about bringing your feet through contact as a tackler. He brings his feet through his blocks. Never heal clicks and can just glide around the field with smooth, effortless power. He reminds me of that guy at the driving range who has a smooth golf swing and the ball jumps one hundred and ninety yards off of his seven arm, and he is just an easy, easy mover. And I keep coming back to that McDaniel comment about tonality and the film of Jonah. He's always looking for work. He
loves football. He plays through the echo of the whistle man, just the reps outside the numbers. He is rolling guys off the football outside the numbers. Impressive, impressive stuff. Talking about the fit for the football team. I have a bunch of get to here, but first let's go ahead and hear from two sound bites, first from Chris Greer
and then Mike McDaniel. Chris Greer up first, talking about just the pick in general and how the Dolphins were aggressip to go get this player, and you know, passed on another pick on this particular day to go get this guy. We'll hear that first and then come back and hear from Mike McDaniel on what makes him a scheme fit for the Miami Dolphins.
Was a player that we had targeted, we spent a lot of time with. We had him in on a thirty visit, and spent a lot of at All Star Games, butch went out and spent a day with them and had a.
Private workout with them.
So this is the player we're very convicted on for what he can add with his size, his power, he's got versatility, He's played tackle guards, so he's an athletic kid. And as we spent time getting to know him, he was the right kind of guy for us, and he loves ball. He's very competitive, and so for us, it was important that as we were going through the board, he was the highest rated guy we had, and so the opportunity and we took.
It well, I think, first and foremost beyond the scheme fit, you know, we were elated to have We had an objective going into the draft of how the types of people we wanted to add and the types of impact we'd hope they'd have. And I think first and foremost, setting the pocket in protection is something that he is very, very skilled at, the idea of adding not only a fierce competitor, but someone that plays with the tonality of
violence and aggression. That that was something that you know, Chris and I had talked at length about how many, how how many people could fit that bill, you know, so that strong conviction, you know we've the draft picks are each every round is important to us. But you're also away that with do you have an opportunity to get someone that fits the bill in multiple ways for something that we've identified for a long time needs to be our focus if we have that opportunity, so really pumped.
I think pass protection and run scheme I think is a great fit for him.
And look, we do all kinds of window addressing, right, There's lots of eye candy in this offense. We motion at the highest rate in the NFL. We can pull guys, we can dummy pool guys. Your eyes have to be really good to defend us effectively that way. So that creates a lot of indecision for the guys up front the famous Max Crosby quote like, you guys are tough to prepare for. You use some cuss words in there when talking to Mike McDaniel after that game in twenty
twenty three. You have to brace for the run but also be able to reset the pocket as a rusher, and when you introduce the indecision through the idea of scheme flexibility, like I have to be prepared for all these different looks that can give me, But then I also have to be worried about a three hundred already pound guy catching me on my heels and squaring me up and just pure humanity rolling down hill at me in a controlled chaos that way, that can be a
lot to contend with. For sixty minutes, McDaniel talked about the ability to sit the pocket and think about Toa's quick release and the ball out nature of this offense. You get the sheer mass inside, bigger bodies who can anchor and hold up one on one man, the quick passing offense becomes even tougher to impact that way. I think the way this line has been built can help ease some of the pressure off to it as well,
maybe even get him under center more. But that's all different discussion for a different podcast we'll get into as the weeks go along here. I think Savoy and Ayah, I think the is an ideal outside zone guard with the rare ability to feature as a man gap blocker and total butt kicker on the inside, and the idea of tonality right the toughness element, the way he finishes. He's the kind of guy that you'll need a cold tub immediately after the game when you block him for
sixty minutes. He embraces the nastiness that is playing on the offensive line that combine with his spatial awareness. I mean, my goodness, Paul Daniels, Brewer, Jonah Austin, these are five players with exceptional ability to get out in space, and four of the five are really comportable to a power
element we've talked about here. I don't think that's Brewers gain necessarily, but he's so good in other areas and good enough in that area that it's going to work with the four guys around him, Like who it's got me fired up. Let's go ahead and hear from coach McDaniel right now on the entirety of the offensive line and what excites him about this group of five guys that I think is one of the better starting groups in the entire league because I believe in Patrick Paul.
I think James Daniels and Jonahvana are perfect fits. You know what I think about Brewer and Austin Jackson. Very bullish on this Dolphins offensive line? What say you, Mike McDaniel.
You know, it's about getting better. I think that was a focus, a major focus of ours. So we've been very focused to find the right people take advantage of the opportunity. We think we have.
It.
You know, the I think there's something that guys believe in that what does that mean and what is that line? They will tell us with with their work, and that's what they're excited to do. Obviously, we feel convicted, you know, the players that we've had added this year, and you know some of the pieces that we've had at that position. But more than anything, you know, I think we have the right type of guys to go to work and attack the process so they can define what the offensive
line is for the Miami Dolphins. I will say that through the collective group, all the people you've mentioned and some more players, they're all very hungry and eager to uh to work at their craft and uh and and help us grow as an organization.
And just to continue here, sorry because I keep finding more. Kyle Krabs brought on his touchdown Miami Blowpot. The Wildcats were struggling with the USC front this past season and Jonah volunteered to kick inside to block a player named Bear Alexander who was wrecking them on the interior. He moves inside and just turns the tide of the entire game. Kyle wrote that Jonah developed a reputation of positional flexibility and mental toughness, which pairs well with the powerhouse play
style and explosive athleticism. And Jonah is also quoted on his player bio on the Arizona website. Because he wanted to flip the program arounds why he chose the program. Sure Enough, the year he gets there, they were one to eleven the previous season. The next two years five and seven, and then ten and three. They did stumble to a four and eight mark last year with multiple
quarterback injuries. He's played a fifteen hundred forty four career snaps in college, didn't miss a start in three seasons thirty six consecutive there, from his first game as a freshman to his last game as a junior. He played three positions. He played just under a thousand snaps at right guard, just over one thousand snaps at right tackle, and then three hundred and forty five more at left tackle. PFF graded him with three negatively graded run plays on
the entire season. We talked about that being a big problem. Last year, Miami had the most negative run plays in the league. You're not going to get those with James Daniels and Jonah casting it, Jonah Savoy and Ayah I'm gonna get that. I am gonna get that here. Eventually. He allowed only fifteen pressures this season. That's out of four hundred and seventy eight pass blocking snaps, good for a pass block efficiency score over ninety eight, which is
elite territory for a tackle. He's even better inside as a guard. He was flagged one time this year, a holding call against Kansas State. His background his one year as a full time starter at guard was a freshman, and he was a freshman All American. This from Dane Brugler is the beast. NFL scouts say Jonah's swagger helped maintain Arizona's culture after Jed Fish left following the twenty
twenty three season. He played his high school football at Saint Louis High School in Honolulu, the same school as to a Tongua bai Loa, and their families know each other. All right, go ahead and take our last break right here. I think the Day three preview we're going to go ahead and punt on that because it's kind of the same thing I've taught about, you guys, know, looking at cornerbacks.
This board's getting picked up pretty good right now, but hopefully you can find a guy like a Jacob Parrish sometime on Day three, maybe go after the safety spot with JJ Roberts at Marshall. Some of the names I like, I'm kind of doing this podcast during the third round of the draft, so I don't want to give you guys names that get picked off the board, so we'll save that for the pod tomorrow. I think you'll get that content elsewhere too, So let's go ahead and pause
for our last break right there. Come back and finish up the podcast on the other side with my chat with the very lovable, very fun fun guy I talk to you and a very smart, knowledgeable football player and Kenneth Grant. That's next Draft Time podcast, brought to you by Auto Nation. What's Up, Dolphins, Welcome back into the Baptist Hell's to us for another edition of the Draft
Time podcast. Here my exclusive interview with Dolphins first round pick Kenneth Grant, Kenneth ken Kenny G. What should I call you here? Man?
Welcome in, Kenny g KG. I like all of it, all of it.
Keny G. You flared with the sax player as well from the nineties before your time.
I'll look them up on Safari, but I haven't listened to any of his music.
That's my first thought. You guys are a little bit different though, in terms of your professions and your career. So a good company though. So the first thing that really stands out for me and fascinates me about this whole job is players like you. Because guys that are your size should not be able to move the way that you do, right, And some of that is natural gifts, obviously, but I'm always curious to know what goes into building the perfect NFL body like that. So, what is the
process for getting yourself ready for a football season? And being so big a swathletic. What's that all look like for you? Yeah?
Really just rest and recovery. I'll say the biggest thing is because like you said, I'm just so big moving at this size, you know, I need to always be in a cold tub and a sauna, get massages or dry kneeling and things like that. So it's really just like taking care of your body and eating the right things for sure.
So that seems to be like a Michigan thing, a program that pumps out all these well conditioned athletes year after year. What it being part of that program under the last you know several coaches, you guys have had defensively head coaches, a bunch of great coaches. What did that program teach you about discipline and training your craft?
Well, yeah, I'll say it all started with the strength and conditioning staff. That's where it started. You know. They
they're the ones we spend the most time with. They trained us to be, you know, discipline and also know how to conduct our business, our business in a mannerly way, just because like off the field and on the field, they translate, So what you do off the field can translate what you do on the field, so you know they're they're always, you know, being mentally tough on us, you know, preparing us to be mentally tough and expect
the unexpected whenever. Every day, like I'll tell you a quick story, like we have like on our running days, we have like our rollers all laid out, and then right next to it is a card. Every every roller has a card next to it. And if you flip the card and he says, what's your card on, the whole group has to go jump in the cold tub and then then run your conditioning tests. So that's a quick funny thing.
You're going to bring one of those games down here to south forth, maybe you can get the other guys that on that same game.
Might as well make them there you go.
Let's talk some of the actual on field football stuff here, because man, a guy like you that can play the nose tackle, can play the three technique all the way out to the five technique. Again, that stuff fascinates me, and I'm always so curious about players and processing things. And for the defensive line perspective, you have a snap of a finger to read pass, to read, run, play pass,
whatever it might be. So I guess my question for you is is how does reading the blocks from those different positions differ for you in terms of how you process and when you line up in different positions.
Yeah, it's not really just really it's not really different. You know, it's just like a different type of technique and different leverage that you have to you know, play with. You know, in a one technique, you kind of got the advantage because the center, you know, has one hand on the ball and one hand free, so he doesn't have two hands, so you gotta be quick with your hands. But in the three technique, you know, the guard he has both his hands and you know he already knows
where you're going in the snap counts. So that's when you have to really tighten down your technique and be fast off the ball. I think what what plays into that is, you know, having quick hands, hims, hands and feet, you know, need to be quick and coming off the ball asap.
I think it was the Ohio State game Donovan Jackson. You ran like a loop off of the outside edge and beat him with speed around the coorum Like, okay, that's the guy that can play nose tackle a three forty five and do that as well. We're in good company here speaking your Michigan days. Mike McDonald the first DC there when he was there when you got recruited, correct, Yeah, okay, so he was on staff there, and I'm a coaching clinic ner like watching those guys talk about coaching and
just different ideas football philosophies. And he was talking about the installation of pass rush games and the interchangeability in terms of the alignments we just talked about. Right, Can you tell us about how translatable that is on this defense with coach Weaver, who I don't know if you knew this, but he coached under Mike McDonald and Baltimore.
Yeah. So when I took a visit here, you know, we went over to playbook and things like that, and I was kind of like, oh, this is you know, it's kind of the same thing as Michigan, but you know, different verbage in different like little tweaks and techniques. But you know, I was real comfortable with the playbook and his style of play, you know, just understanding what the coach is one and how their philosophies are.
Yeah, it's really good stuff. I think it's it's going to translate pretty quickly for your here and so just kind of talking to you about this stuff, Like you get a big smile on your face right time I bring it up. It seems like you love football. It's kind of a read I get on you, like, what is it? What is it about football that you love so much? I don't like to lose, to be honest,
like nobody. Yeah, I don't like to lose, even if it's like a rep or a practice rep or you know, even in the weight room, like competing in the weight room. I don't like to lose anything, to be honest. So back in high school, you played on the offensive line or sorry, the offensive line as well as a defensive line. What did that teach you about playing d line?
It kind of, you know, tell me that you you kind of got advantage that offensive line. You know, you know where you're going, know to snap count, so you can get off of guys real quick. But you know, for me, it was really funny, you know, just being able to physically dominate guys and kind of you know, use that advantage of me playing defensive offense against them. So it's pretty fun.
You're two athletics down on the offense side. Those guys got go defense because you're you're more athletic than the guys on the offensive side. Right, oh yeah, kind of how that goes. So also basketball in high school through a shot put, track and field. I'm just curious. Tell me about all the sports. You probably try them all at some point in your youth, right yeah.
So I'll see, My first sport is baseball, played t ball when I was little. Then kind of transition of football, pop warning and things like that, and then once I got to the high school, carried on football, you know, out of basketball track. The funny thing is are during the off season with football, our head coach made us go up with the wrestlers and wrestles, so, you know, out of a love of that to my weapon tar, but you know, all around great athlete.
How big were you in the basket? Like, what was your size in high school and basketball?
Probably a little heavier than I am now, but really yeah, for sure you got.
To play high school basketball. I have like to defend you in the post. That would not be fun for a little high school.
Man, especially getting all the rebounds and everything.
That would be hilarious. Watch a little drop step a little three hundred fifty pounds and do a one hundred and forty pounds soaking wet kid. That's hilarious to think about. Let's finish up right here. We all the viral play, the Penn State play k Tron Allen chase him down from the back. I'm curious if you can take us through that and what that play says about about you and your in your game.
Yeah, so I'll just start off with the player and what I saw. You know, they had ran a center and a guard pool play towards the outside. And then I was like, I think kind of everybody in the defense knew that that side specifically was our weak side, and they schemed it up perfectly. I'll give him that. And I was like, in the playoff, was like, oh, snap, that's a big hole. So I saw our linebacker Mike be He was the closest, so I tried to push him into the hole to force him to make the tackle,
but that didn't work out. So I was like already facing towards the runner. So I was just hawked them down. But you know what it says about me is, you know, I'm gonna do the unexpected things. You know, guys don't like to do. I mean I'm running down the field thirty yards, but you know, the next play out lined up and it was time to go. So I think I'm very well conditioned. And you know, I got that gritting me to stick in, stick into things like that.
Was that film review fun the next day taking a look at that rep. Oh yeah, just get some love.
Yeah, a lot of.
It's toff New Dolphins defensive tackle, thirteenth pick in this year's draft. Kenneth Grant, thank you so much for your time that he man, I appreciate you. Good stuff fins up, baby, And after the interview he told me, hey, great questions, man, which told me like, all right, this guy just loves football and loves talking about football. So great stuff there. So it always feels good to I'm not gonna lie about that. Let's go ahead and call it a podcast.
We'll come back tomorrow and break down a lot of the picks we're gonna make here. I'll probably do half the draft picks we make tomorrow and then save the rest of that for Monday. We're gonna have the fast fact stories up on Miami Dolphins dot com, be tweeting some some clips out hopefully here Soon's all kinds of
content covering the Miami Dolphins twenty twenty five draft. But until next time, you all please be sure subscribe, rate, review the podcast, go ahead and follow me on social at WINFLD NFL for allow the team at Miami Dolphins. Check out the Fish Tank Podcast with Seth and Juice, the YouTube channel for my Kenneth Grant interview for Dolphins HQ for Draft time exclusive, and so much more. Last, but not least, Miami Dolphins dot Com. Until next time,
fins up Caroline and Cameron. Daddy, He's coming home.