Welcomeing to JAG xam.
I'm kind Annie Stephens, Brian Sexton, and John Osier are with me today.
Is we get ready for okas next week.
Rookie Mini camp is behind us, and we didn't learn this whole lot, but it is always nice to have people back in the building and get ready for things to get going this season. Our first big thing today is pro football one oh one, A little bit of a teaching thing here today as the rookies came to the building for the first time last week and got to try to figure out exactly how this whole pro thing goes.
Now they're with an NFL club, you know. Right now they're we're just rookies. And so come Monday, when everybody starts walking in here, you know, and they start seeing all the guys, you know, it makes an impact on them.
And you know, there are a lot of these guys, you know, I see they were they were starters in college and now they're gonna they're gonna have to take backup roles and they're going to compete for for starting positions or at least compete for that backup spot and and it and it changes just a little bit for them So this weekend, though, from the meetings to the on the field stuff, is really going to prepare them for the next you know, five weeks. I guess that we're here, Brian.
We talked a little bit about this last week. Obviously, they played big time football. These are high level players in college, but getting to the NFL is a little bit different.
Yeah, you know, last weekend, Kay, the process took center stage. You know, where you meet, where you eat, where you walk to get to the locker room, all of that stuff. This week is they get onto the field, even though they're not competing yet, it's about the pros and they're going to see big, strong and fast. They're going to see a different level of competition because these are grown men and they are highly paid and this is about
their livelihood. So that's an interesting transition year to year from the college kids who were celebrated, who were seen as the big men on campus, and then they put their feet here and have to figure it all out.
John, Yeah, I laughed. I saw a story over the weekend that said some Jaguars rookie was bawling out at the rookie ging, and I wondered how because there was no one on ones and there was no seven on seven, so I guess they were balling out running routes. And I mean, if you have to write the stories, I'm not necessarily criticiding the story. But there's a misconception about
what rookie Uni caamp Is Doug said it best. They were trying to get the rookies to the point where yesterday when the veterans got here and the rookies walked in, that the rookies weren't eight steps behind and slowing things down, and they wanted to give them a chance to compete. And that's what last weekend.
Was balling out.
We'll get there.
We'll get there soon, John, I promise.
Our second big thing this week is here today is new curriculum.
Because they're back in school, they.
Got to learn a lot of new things and that goes for some of the that's as well because of a new defensive coordinator and his staff.
It's a bit of learning curve for the players.
I mean, it's just a different scheme, right, it's a different scheme, and and you know you're you're you're switching gears a little bit from that that three you know three four mode to to kind of four down mode. And and even though you spend so much time in you know four down defense a lot anyway, and I think some of the techniques are going to be a
little different. Obviously, there's learning with the verbage and terminology linebacker, you know, the fits, and just the way what I've seen so far, the way the coaches have have have coached them, and some of the drill work that they're doing on the field.
John, We're making a lot about this scheme being totally different than last year. How difficult is this going to be to pick up for the defense?
Well, I mean it's it's new. Uh, they're pro football players, so I anticipate them being able to pick it up. The dbs. The corners will play more press. Man, it's not you've never done that before in their lives. Their cornerbacks and they know how to play football. So it's a transition. I don't think it should be a transition that come Week one they have no idea what they're doing, but they have to work on it all offseason.
A lot of these guys have played together before and that's where the communication comes, right. Guys like Josh Allen looking to the back end and looking at a safety and saying, hey, Cisco, this is.
Where we do this.
The terminology will come and there are some new faces out there, Ronald Darby, Eric Armstead, But for the most part, these guys are in the locker room and in the meeting rooms and on the plane and the bus together and they'll figure out how to communicate the new verbage because they know how to communicate with one another.
Our final big thing today is going to be homework complete. At the end of last season, GM Trent balk And said, you wanted this team to get bigger, faster, and more physical, and head coach Doug Peterson addressed some of those new additions, both from the draft and also free agency.
I think number one, we've gotten a bigger right, just physically big right, with some of the draft picks and undrafted guys and even some of our players coming back, we've gotten bigger.
I think speed.
We've got a tick faster. You know, obviously we know Brian Speed is a wide receiver, and some of the dbs. Now, I mean we've gotten faster.
And then when we put.
The pads on in July in August, we'll see where we are physically.
We got two out of the three checked off, Brian. When you look at this is how much of this is going to be mentality And when they go into training camp and kind of getting that now that they are bigger, faster, stronger, if you want to put it that way, to be more physical and use that as a pro.
Well, you know every coach wants to be bigger, faster, stronger and more physical every year. But you hit on the keyword there, Kai and that's the mentality. And last year they just didn't play big in big games. I think it's a mindset. I'm not sure whether it's preparation.
I don't know.
They have to be bigger to play better, But to me, I want to see this team convert from the potential to the actual, which they didn't do in the biggest games last year. And so you say, well, you're bigger and you're stronger. With Eric Armstead, well he also brings a certain mentality from a championship caliber club. Same thing with Ronald Darby out on the edge. I mean he played in a Super Bowl. So these are guys that bring the mental side of the game into your locker room,
and you don't quantify that on a chart. You just understand it by the way that they prepare and the way.
That they play.
Yeah, I think Doug's headed best also last week. Look, everybody in the NFL is big and strong, and they play physically. I think more than anything the theme of the offseason. Yes, they're a little bigger. I think they may be a little faster at wide receiver, but they wanted to be more of a team that in the last five games of the season when you had to have a win, they just figured out a way. And maybe you couldn't even point to it after the game and say why they won, but they could take a
game by the throat. I think Doug want anything withou like a team that's raw. You know that that's the intangible you want. You know, I'm gonna grab it and take over and maybe you roar a little bit around.
Here, Kay, little rar, I'm dressed for it.
Was just about to say, between your dress, Ki and that roar, we are certainly in costume today.
Let's do it. Stay with us after the break, more roaring, more roaring.
We're gonna hear from some of the new players here in Jack Middlle, Move the freight, the fright Magellan Transportation voted the coolest office space in Jacksonville. You can apply online at www dot Magellan Logistics dot com.
Welcome back to jag Zam this morning.
As you had Mini camp last week, I know that's your favorite activity of the year, you guys, But we do a VOKS coming up, which is exciting to get everybody back in the building and kind of feels a little bit more like football. And then training camp is here, which that's a whole other thing. So let's talk a little bit about mini camp. We got to see some
of these rookies for the very first time. Obviously, Brian Thomas, the first round pick, was out there running routes, probably killing it as they would say, you know, John probably has some other verbal balling out.
And Brian Thomas did look I mean, in mini camp, you want guys to look the part. Mason Smith looked bigger than everybody else and looked more physical than everybody else, and Brian Thomas looked faster and looked like he was touched by God more than anybody else on the field in terms of playing that position. Jarvis Lander, who was in for a tryout, said he he's got elite talent. You can see it. He's quicker, catches, the ball cleaner, all those things that you want to see a guy
when he's running routes on air. So, Brian, you've heard the same analogy I've heard for years. What you don't want is the GM and scouts walking out going and I didn't since you saw any of that. We'll see more this week.
When you look at him, there's no chance that you could be anything other than entus.
Just his length stands out to me.
And and when you see a shot of his legs, how long his legs are, and you.
Look the part.
Now, get in and learn it and be ready to go so that you can make a contribution in training.
Camp play the part for sure.
You mentioned Mason Smith John Uh, he's one of those uh that tecond round pick for us that physically is one of those players that Trent Palky is very excited to get out here. He spoke after practice a little bit and about what he's most excited about.
I always been accustomed to hard work, man, just having having to see my mother, you know, she's a family pediatrician doctor. Seeing her work, you know, early morning is long night. Seeing my father work in the field for thirty plus years. Man, I'm accustomed to so you know I never really shy await the p no matter what I ever went through, man. And uh, you know, the cream always rides to the cr I mean, the cream
always rights to the top, man. And you know, i'ma just keep my head down and keep working and continue to progress.
Man. That's all I can think of.
Hard worker, exactly what you wanna hear, especially going into OTA in training camp around the corner. They're banking a lot on him, kind of rebounding from that injury that he suffered when he had an ACL. Terry played last year, wasn't quite all the way back, but they're hoping now that he's fully recovered, we'll see a different player.
When you look at him, you see a guy that you want on your team. And then when you hear him talk about mother being a pediatrician, dad working in the oil fields, which we all know is a tough, rough, blue collar job, it gives you a lot of background information on how the kid was raised, and so it gives you a lot of opportunity, a lot of hope that he's going to come in here and apply that towards being who he was before the injury in twenty twenty two.
Yeah, there's been some buzz, Oh why they picked that guy. He was hurt in college. Look the ACL. It happened in early twenty twenty two. The common comeback from that is difficulty coming back. First year, maybe a little slow, started to come out of it, and then by year the second year after an ACL, anybody will tell you a young guy below the age of about twenty five or twenty six, there's no reason in the world this
day and age, they don't return to full potential. He was dominant when he was a freshman, and you can see the size all that stuff. To me, this, you know, is it the turning point of the draft? Probably? I mean it's probably what the draft. It can turn the draft either into great or if he's not good, it's eh. But all second round picks are short of a crapshoot. If you get a guy who you think might be dominant, there another wrong with a pick on that.
Front to me, when as well risk it of course, and as he's mentioned, obviously a hard worker, and I think now he trusts that. I think you mentioned earlier that kind of that trust factor. You're not sure if your need's going to give. So now that he has that back, hopefully he'll be able to get back to his freshman year form. We also heard from his former
defensive coordinator now linebacker coach here Matt House. He was at LA of course three picks from LSU coming here, but that House actually weighed in a little bit on Brian Thomas because going up against him in practice every day, it was certainly difficult.
Yeah.
BT's got I mean, really good length, obviously elite speed.
He's a matchup problem and he can go up and get the ball. So you know, in particular last year at LSU when we were dB short, he was a tough, tough matchup.
Johnn I know we haven't seen a ton from Binding Thomas yet, but it's exciting to see that kind of have that option for Trevor and also a wide receiver that can maybe grow with Trevor a little bit right, Like he's had some veteran presence, but now a younger player, this drafted hero'll be here for the next however many years to grow with him.
Yeah, he comes into a nice situation. He doesn't have to be the best receiver immediately. Christian Kirk's perfectly capable of be in it. He didn't have to be the go to guy Evan ingers for the cable doing that, so he can immediately give the team a wrinkle and have time to develop. I've said many times since he got drafted. There before the drift, there were three elite receivers, and out of the rest of them, the analysts thought that he had the best chance to eventually develop into one.
The mean, he's going to be it immediately. He can give them Brian Deep the threat, jump ball threat while he's developing into an overall player.
Well.
I shared this after the draft, But to Cortez Hankton, who was an undrafted rookie year back in two thousand and three, is his position coach and was his position coaching offensive coordinated at LSU, told me he's the most physically gifted receiver he's ever coached, and he obviously coached at Georgia before LSU, so that tells you the caliber of athletes that he's accustomed to.
Said, he's one of my guys.
Guy will get after it, but physically gifted in a way that you just haven't.
You have difficulty drawing it up. It just shows up like.
That, and again it's routes on air, but he just makes everything looks easy. I mean, you have things that are hard for other players trying to make the NFL as without you thinking about it.
Well, something that Howse said is that it's he's a difficult matchup, and we're a matchup league where you're trying to create this matches.
It's different than in college football.
So you know they're gonna find that other teams or other teams are gonna find that it's tough to have a corner who is as big and long as he is, and if he's as fast and physical as we've heard kai, it'll be a great pack.
Excited to see him and Trevor kind of figure it out and get going. That'll be definitely fun to see. And also we should mention in the wide receiver room Jarvis Landry and for a tryout. So he was part of that rookie mini campu miss last year due to injury, but he's been around for quite some time, and he talked a little bit about what it was important for him and just coming back to football.
It was stressful. It was stressful, you know, I learned a lot about the man, you know, and getting healthy and things like that. Spending more time with family kept me ground it. You know, had a good support system. But you know, it's always it's always good to be back out here.
John.
What do we see from from Jews out there?
Because obviously Jarvis Landry has been around, he's done it for a while. He was with injury and to kind of come back with that appreciation, but also the skill set had he has.
You could tell who the veteran was. He was precise to me, he looked quick, particularly for his age. You know, I don't necessarily know that they brought him in thinking we have to sign him immediately in order to have him on the team. I think they wanted to give him the opportunity. They wanted to see what it was and then perhaps as time moves on, now you know a little bit more about a guy. Doug said beforehand, Look,
it's a tryout and that's what it is. Cold he would you feel fine putting Jarvis Lander in an NFL game right now and having him get you through a couple of weeks where somebody else isn't isn't performing for you as an available Sure? Is he a frontline starter. You know, I'm not sure anybody thinks that right now.
It's a young man's game, and it's hard for guys who have been to five Pro Bowls to let go. And clearly he has decided and he's not ready to let this one go, So it made sense for him to come. And I would think that at some point later in the season if they don't like any of the five undrafted rookies that they signed, right they stacked up on these guys for camp and you have an injury like last year with a Jones right where you were just you were lacking any sort of significant depth
at that position and it hurt the passing game. Well, then you've got a guy on speed dial if he's not anywhere else that you can go and bring in, and you have a book on him now. But they went heavy in.
The pain.
On wide receiver.
They're going for it, and so those young guys come in as developmental guys. And really that's where the roster spots are. The practice squad spots are in Jacksonville for receivers. With that room as expensive and as draft capital has been put into it.
And Jarvis also made the comment he has to figure out if this is something he wants to do sure and completely commit to it. I'm not to say that privy those conversations, but you know I at this stage of careers, that's the verbid you hear is is and I say, oh my goodness, I have to go get this. It's I have to find the right fit. I have to decide this is what I wanna do. Uh So that's what a tryout you Well.
If you didn't, you probably couldn't next, right, being one year out, two years out not not not as many opportunities for those guys.
We've also seen that before though obviously you know veteran players coming in around training camp, getting into training camp, maybe like this is kind of f going a couple games in, like figuring out this is kind of the end of things. So whether that'll be the situation for him, or whether things will work out and he'll get picked up either here or somewhere else, we'll remains to be seen.
Stay with us here on Jagsam though. Coming up, we're gonna go over some ozone mail bag questions and get them answered for you with all the latest Jagged style. Shop now get today's special offer at fanatics dot com.
It's officially licensed everything. Oh zone rolling in. We're gonna get our questions answered by John.
He's so wise, he has all of that wisdom in there and that nugget of top.
Thank you for sharing with us, John.
No problem, make no sense.
Any sarcasm there?
Oh that's second.
When Mike from azas he has a question about Gabe Davis's injury that Doug alluded to in his press conference last week, he says, is Gabe Davis still recovering from an injury that he suffered while he was still with the Buffalo Bills. Why would you when you sign a free agent? Isn't it pending up passing a physical? Did the Jags not check gave out physically? Why wouldn't you
disclose the injury at that time? There's a lot of questions, more than one question in this or is this a new injury that no one wants to take the blame for.
I'm confused.
Well, Mike came in, and Mike came in kind of hot. Yes, Gabe Davis was hurt in the last game of the season last year and didn't play in the playoffs. They knew it. I don't think it's as uncommon as perhaps Mike believed, and they knew this is gonna be the situation coming in. H. He's a veteran. Yes, they have an idea where the knee injury is. It wasn't disclosed because there was nothing to disclose, so H, I anticipate
that he'll be ready to go in training camp. And uh, you know Darius Williams first year here a couple of years back, remember, didn't participate until I think training camp. Uh, it's pretty common.
Eric Harp said as well, the background injury, So it's very common.
Let's check it.
As I said to Mike, breathe, it's met.
It's okay, We're okay. We're getting a little lamp up, all right.
Sean from Oakley, if wanted to know, when will be the first opportunity for the Jaguars to practice that new kickoff rule simulating game conditions obviously, because they can't go against each other right now at this stage.
Well practice they'll get a chance to simulate it. And you know there's different levels they can do. In OTAs, they can do everything except hit each other while doing it. In training camp, they can get helmets on and actually hit each other while doing it, and then you can really simulate in a preseason game. This one, to me, Brian feels like they're going to have some theories on
how it's going to look. Everybody's going to have their approach, and then starting in preseason is when you're gonna see what the league always does, which is, hey, this guy's doing this, and start copying it. It will homogenize once the preseason games.
Well, yeah, you have thirty two different special teams coordinators sixty four if you count their assistant special teams score.
In ninety six if you count the other it's right.
And they all have different ideas and they've collaborated to help.
The league come to the conclusion of what the rule could be.
But everybody's going to have a different spin on it, so it'll be interesting to see a month or two into the season who's really good at it.
But it was an interesting question because there has been a lot of conversation as soon as this thing came into being. Remember it wasn't put in until the owners meeting, so they really didn't attack free agency that much with this thing in mind. So all of a sudden, the draft becomes a and they had to talk amongst themselves
and figure out what everybody else is doing. I'm sure different special teams coaches are talking to each other, but then not given away too much of what they're going to do.
So it's going to be an interesting rules change. I'm excited about it because we all should be. The kickoffs went away and this is a clever, innovative way to bring it back. And if this goes well, maybe they'll come up with the way that is that the XFL does. The on tide kick was fourth and ten from your twenty five high risk, you know, because on tide kicks have gone away too, and that was always a fun part of the game when games got close.
Hopefully this leads to something like that.
We'll have to see how the things go, but I am excited to see it in game action for sure. Our final question for you John a little bit broader of a question from Bob and Bobsville. Of course, confidence is key, particularly in the NFL. Confidence grows through success, but even the most confident player can be shaken by too many failures. It takes a season to get used
to the NFL and meaningfully contribute. Why does so many teams put rookies or young players and sit your in which they're likely to fail.
Well, this was sort of a quarterbacks based question, but I think I think it sort of applies to other positions as well. Yeah, you would love I think most teams, most coaches would tell you most rookies, it would be great if they had a year to develop, and realistically, that's sort of what happens. Everybody wants to see rookies contribute immediately, and some do. But for the most part, if there's what you know, three hundred and fifty players in the rookie class, you're gonna get a few that
make a huge impact. Most of them are really ready to be big time players or you know, real contributions at the end of the season. Why don't they wait? Because it's a win now league.
Well, and for way back, the cyburkept change the game.
Right.
It used to be you bring guys in and they could play behind an established veteran. But now with as much money is committed to players, you can't keep all your veterans. Free agency takes them away. And so now in the last three years since free agency has become a really important part of building a team, they need rookies to step in because they lose guys.
And the dynamic has become the way it's set up now. It's necessary, but it also causes way too much early criticism of a lot of young players. Now the development that used to take place sort of behind the scenes
takes place as rookies. So whenever there is a mistake, oh, it's the worst he's the worst player I've ever seen, when in reality, a lot of these guys always go back to Reggie Wayne, who played seven games as a rookie, did not give any indication that he was going to be good, and then by his third or fourth years a Pro Bowl and it might be in the Hall of Fame. Reggie wasn't a bad player as a rookie. He was a young player who needed some more time.
So that we now get to watch the rough draft, and it can be rough on these guys when they're criticized for.
It, certainly as it's not an easy thing and taking that time to get used to the NFL. As we're seeing those rookies get in the building this week their first week kind of practicing off season with some of the vet players, so we'll get to see what that looks like in OTAs.
Stay with us on jags Aam.
We'll be right here after the break. Welcome back into jags Am here if we're getting ready for OTAs next week and kind of finally getting back into football a little bit. I did want to bring back our jags Am off season to do list cause they started this a couple of months ago. That's just what we know. We've discussed on JAGSAM them some things we wanted to go over cause I do want to give them credit. We can check a couple of things off. I'm very I'm a list person. I have the post sits all this,
so I want to keep track of things. So that's Josh Allen figured out. That was the big number one thing for me for sure. Addressing the line issues. We'll have to see how this ends up, but they seem to have addressed it as much as they're going to address it. They have a new center in the building, signing Ezra Cleveland long term and whatever they're going to try to do with some of the backups in terms of rookies and what they had last year in Cooper Hodges,
adding some depth on defense. We did see some additions there, some big additions there, and then what I have left is pay Trevor question mark. As we saw that deal with Jared Goff got done yesterday, so maybe now Trevor's looking at that, maybe coming up in the next week months, however many days, and then getting that new defense up to speed with their new defensive staff and defensive coordinator. You guys, if you want anything on the list, let me know. You know, I love to stay organized.
Now, so far, so good, and I think both things you too, you know, get new defensive to speed's gonna happy is what they're gonna be doing the next few months. I'd be surprised if Trevor doesn't get down before the season.
But we'll say, I keep hearing that they're working at it and that it's likely to happen, but no date.
Sure, well, we'll be keeping an eye and our ears open for that as well. Next week OTAs and we'll get that schedule lease that's coming out on Wednesday, So lots to talk about. Make sure you check in with us next week here on jags Am