Welcome everybody to Ram's iconic the show where I get to reunite with the greats of the past and visit with some of the greatest players ever to wear horns on the helmet. I'm your host to Marco farre former defensive tackle. Folks, I have seen it all. I'll be your to a guy. If you wiel we can look back on the stellar careers and slowly pull it forward to current day topics. We're gonna talk ball. Of course, it's a football show. There is no life without ball.
I'm a lifer. I love it. I love being around it. Can't play it, So I'm going to talk about it. And on this show, I get to chop it up with some of the greats and you get to listen. So my next guest, who I believe and I don't give a damn what people say, belongs in the group of greatest to ever play the game. Fourteen seasons in the National Football League and the nineties and the Outs played college football at the University of Florida. Was an
All American. Their first round pick in nineteen ninety five of your Saint Louis Ram went on to play for the Titans. Still hit him because of that. The Miami Dolphins and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers one hundred and four and a half quarterback sacks. That's twenty eight all time, twenty eighth all time, sixty two and a half for the Rams, fourth most in team history. A couple of guys named Leonard Little, Kevin Green, and some dude named Aaron Donald. Only guys that have more in a Rams uniform.
Two time pro bowler should have been way more. One time All pro should have been more. The man who literally had a bust of Superman in his locker, and only I know of one guy that ever messed with it, just one. The man who could run full speed literally without moving his arms. The man who almost ripped down the backboard and the team recreation area because we laughed at him because of his handles on the basketball court.
And the man who could give you a spot on cover of you spend me right round by dead or alive? The one and only number ninety three Kevin Carter, what's up? Man? Hey? You know what I think some of that information, like you know, shouldn't be allowundered readily. You know my rendition of you know, these family right round my better alive, like that's between us, like like that can only come out under certain situations. I didn't say how or what I saw. I just said, you can do a spot
on cover. Gotcha? What is up man? How are you? Man? I'm doing great. Just um just life after football is fortunately, it's been good. It's you know, the transition is never easy. And we we looked if we discover ourselves and whatever we can find, however, we can you know, give ourselves relevance in our own lives and that of our families. And really lucky, man, I've got a twenty year old son who's a sophomore tight end at Dartmouth. Um plan
for Buddy teevens Ivy League football. They had their schedule, they had their season canceled this which is a bummer. I'm up here, and I'm up here in up state New York. I'm working for CBS Sports doing studio for college football every weekend CBS Sports Network, and I love my love my job, and love my life right now. So I'm really blessed and doing well. We're gonna get into all that. Your son, I keep telling you every time I talk to you or text you when I
see him your son. He's a good looking kid. Don't get me wrong. You and Shema, your wife, have done great. He is he's a he was a gorgeous baby turned into a handsome young man. But he is an absolute monster. Kevin. That kid is huge. How tall is he now? He is six seven, he's two hundred and fifty five pounds. Turned twenty. He just twenty? So what size shoe? Uh? Sixteen? Oh Kevin? Good lord? And he's playing tight end? Yeah, he's a tight end, man. I kept him off of
the off the defensive line. How dare you look? Man? Don't you remember what we went through? Don't you remember the Yeah, the hell we went through with Wesley Walls, with OJ Sides, with Brent Jones and all these tight ends that used to drive us nuts. And you raise one? How dare you exactly exactly? I'd like, you know what, we were doing things the hard way for all these years, and these tight ends all they had to do is help block and they taunt us and then they go
out and catch passes. And I, man, I was tormented by Brent Jones, like my first couple of years in the league. You know, he was probably that forty nine
ers group. That just that just made me want to finally have my day and laugh and beat them, like that was my goal, Like that was our goal, like super Bowl year ninety nine, Like it was great that we won the division and did everything else, But if we didn't take care of those forty nine ers twice during the year and embarrass them when we did it, then the season wasn't complete. I'll tell you the whole group. I keep telling people that Ray Brown, who else was
out there? Derek des couldn't stand him. I mean, I love him when I see him now, it's all love and respect. But back then and you said like you wanted to beat the fort Brent Jones made. He almost turned me into a serial killer. He drove me nuts. You know. It wasn't even fair, you know, like good lord, in a room just being you, I would take your head off. But on the field, when you don't know if he's going out for a pass or blocking, and
they were good at it. He was absolutely dangerous. Yeah, man, I totally feel you, and I can't believe you have a tight end. Kevin. That's not fair to tell him to take it easy on the down, lineman, do what you want with the safeties and linebackers. Just with the guys with the hand in the ground. They're all good people. Just tell him to take it easy on those guys. Definitely. Yeah. And when you told me he was a basketball player at until his senior year, right, and then he decided
to go out for the football team and duck to water. Right, that's the story. Duck to water. Came out of senior year the spring before the spring wet, after basketball season ended, going into the fall, and he came out for spring football is just to try it out, and next thing you know, duck to water. The rest is history. He got like thirty Division one offers, got offered by six of the eight Ivy League schools, UCLA, Michigan State, Sarahcuse, A bunch of people came after him, and he decided
on Dartmouth. Wow, smart kid. Well I'm not shocked. Smart family, smart kid. And look that that position is like a luxe in the NFL. If you can do both, if you can block, and if you're an athlete, I mean you can make millions, good jillions of dollars. So this will be something to watch him. But that career arc in football sounds awfully familiar, and I said that to you yesterday. You didn't play football in high school until your junior year. Correct, correct, Before that, you were in
the band playing saxophone. And I've never seen a picture of you with a saxophone in the band. I still want to see that. But from that point junior year never played ball. To All American at Florida, you have got to tell me about that arc. How did you get from the band to I'm an All American for Steve Spurrier at Florida. Just a late bloomer, that's all, you know, I think some kids, you know, it's all depending on when we hit our peak, both I guess
athletically and psychologically when we come into our own. I was a little late, you know. I was the big kid who was a little chubby and had big feat in, big hands, and you know, didn't get any taller for a while, but really just struggled with coordination and you know, trying to get my athleticism. And then one day when I woke up after a summer of thinking that I had mono because I slept the entire summer way, I felt my body hurt in ways that I didn't think possible,
and I thought something was seriously wrong with me. We went to our family general practitioner and he said that nothing was wrong. I was just having growing pains and wow, I'm like okay. So for the entire summer I was under the weather feeling like crap. Between my sophomore junior year and then when I started school, I was six inches taller. And the rest is as they say history. I came out in the football field and they said, do this, you'll get stronger. I did it. I got stronger.
They said do this, you'll get faster, and I did it, and I got faster. And the rest is, like I said, as they say history. Wait, Kevin, Kevin. So so I'm your classmate, I'm a software I'm in the band with you. I don't see you all summer, and the next time I see you, you're you're a half a foot tall taller than you were when you left. I mean, what what what height? To what height? What are we talking
about here? We're talking like to like sixty three five nine five nine to sixty three over a over one summer. They must have thought you were an impostor. When you came back, it was it was weird. I walked into a room. I remember walking in to get my physical because back then, you know, you had to do the
county physicals with everybody, your whole team went. And when I got there, you know, it was I thought it would kind of be a joke that I was coming out for football yet again, because I went to a big public high school in the in the in the mighty football playing state of Florida, and I didn't make the team my freshman year. You know, I didn't make my JV basketball or football team. And I was distraught and said, I said, well, screw it, I'll just be in the band and be the best I can be there,
you know. And I enjoyed it, um, but you know I had I'd always had this love, this dream of playing football. And so when I finally came back out and you know, no one laughed at me anymore. I wasn't a joke. I wasn't the guy that, you know, why are you out here? Why don't you just stick to, you know, doing your band thing. It was like, who the heck are you? And uh, yeah, come on out here, and why haven't you been out here before? It was?
It was weird. It was another night transformation though. So that's the thing I mean, did it just come naturally for you? Because I'm thinking we met for the first time in nineteen ninety five, right, so you were a junior in high school in what year and I guess eighty or like ninety, like ninety, okay, so within so the guy I saw and that's the thing that struck me when I first met you, because you know, you've
seen guys come in draft picks. Actually you were the first first rounder because I was in my second year. But I've seen other players before, and then to see you come in and be so polished, I was impressed. It made me respect Florida because that's the way we worked. You could do some of the same things I could do. I was always shocked on that first rainy camp together. What what some other defensive linemen couldn't do? Like how were you guys trained? Didn't you guys practice in college?
But you were so polished day one, and then you've only been doing this for five years. I mean it must have been duck to water man, like, wow, this is what I've been called to do. I think the good thing about starting late, and which is why you know, you get to the NFL and you realize that it's most one of the most eclectic groups of people that you will ever find on the face of the planet. An occupation you you will never find fifty three more
different individuals than you will in a football locker room. Um, it's you know, that's one of the things that all of us, you know, every player you talked to, every coach, is you know, what do you miss? You missed the guys and that eclectic mix, you know, comes from so many different people in so many different schools, so many different situations. There are guys that you know, played rugby overseas that become football players. There are guys that were
lacrosse players that didn't discover football until in life. And there's people like me that you know, I didn't play until later on. But the good thing about that is I didn't have any bad habits. I didn't know, you know, what, what what not to do. I only know I only knew what to do. And I was really lucky because I got recruited out of high school, you know, by
the likes of I visited you know, Notre Dame. You know, Lou Holtz was there, and they had Chris Stellurch and Bryant Young and Michael Stonebreaker and all these you know, Todd Light and all these great players. And you know that these were the institutions that I was looking at. I visited Nebraska with Tom Osborne's I visited Florida, and you know, there were a lot of great coaches and great you know situations for me to go in further
my education and play football. And ended up going to Florida where my position coach was a guy named Charlie Strong. And that's you know what people realizes the power of coaching trees and and that's that's why football people, scouts, coaches and players alike. They want to know who'd you play for? You know, who taught you this? Who how'd you learn this scheme? You know? And you and I talked about it yesterday. If um, I was talking to
a buddy of mine. Actually, UM, you'll appreciate this. You know he played ball at Penn State, and um, he was a defensive back, you know, played Um played for the Carolina Panthers for a little while. Actually ended up becoming a producer for ESPN when I was there. And I mean he and I would always talk and he's like, man, if you're a young defensive lineman right now, how could you not want to go play for the Ohio State
University and played for Larry Johnson And no doubt? Yeah, I mean, the man's got a streak, you know of the Bosa brothers and Chase Young and all these defensive linemen that are coming out. I mean, he's he's got to have like, you know, three or four number one picks like in a in a row, in the in the in the in the NFL draft for the last
four or five years. And then that's the thing. The power of coaching tree, the power of instructions, how your game is formed, how you see the game, how you process. For me, I was a kid that you know, from a natural ability standpoint, you know, I was you know, we joke about it, but sometimes some people are born to play football, or they're they're they're really lucky and they're blessed and they're they're fortunate that you know, they come into something at the exact right time in their
personal history. You know, that's that was me. It was, it was the timing of everything couldn't have been better. I had no bad habits, I had nowhere and tear of my body, and and on the eve of me making my greatest growth physically was also where I made where I learned the game of football, where I learned it from from the ground up. I learned it from playing inside linebacker in high school. And then I went to the defensive line. And when I got to Florida,
the instruction from Charlie Strong. He was all ways reaching forward, getting me tapes of you know, Robert Porche, Reggie White, all these different defensive linemen that he would say, this is what you got to play like, this is this is how you have to play, This is how you have to see the game. You got to play this fast, you got to use your hands, and you know, was always seeking that instruction, and within four years at Florida,
you know, three SEC titles. You know, playing for an organization that you know, was such a competitive environment because there were so many great players around me pushing me, you know the entire time. That's why I was what I was. I mean, there's power and how you are developed as a player. I mean, you know, that's why everyone's seeking to get every you know, added training and or instructional advantage that they can get in this time
because it's it's all about that. A lot of people, you know, and you know this, you know, you go to combine or you stand up in training camps and everybody looks the same, whether they're from a big school or no named state, right, and it's like, and you know what separates you is your adherents, your craft, how much you look to get better, how how how much you are a student of the game. And man, when I came to the Rams, like I didn't know nothing, but but but what I had had a group of
great guys in the room. I mean you and Brad Oddis, you know, we were immediately you know, kind of my you know, new you know peers and you know slightly older big brothers who took me under their wing. But we had guys like Fred Stokes and Sean Gilbert, yes sir, and Robert Young and I mean, you know, Jimmy Jones, and you know, we had all those guys who had so much experience. And you know, I'll and I'll give Dean Pollard, you know, my first desensive line coach and
the in the NFL. I'll give him credit. Man that that little old man knew his craft. He knew how to make people better and and you just had to humble yourself and be coached. And I think for me starting later in life and having and having no bad habits, being very coachable, having a thirst for wanting to be the best, and and when I got to the Rams, my greatest sphere DeMarco was was being considered a bust.
You know, that was my greatest sphere. I didn't want to walk in as the sixth pick overall, the first defensive player taking in the ninety five draft, and not be anything less than a Pro Bowl caliber player. I thought, if I didn't do that, if I couldn't find a way to be great, then I would be it would be a failed experiment. And so that's I had the thirst, you know, to to want to get better. And you know that process of being coaching, humble yourself and deconstructing
and reconstructing your game. You know that happens over and over and you know when you see people like Aaron Donald who play the game, yeah, it just to pitom It just epitomizes the maximization of your talent and also your football like Q, you know, and no doubt, I love to watch Aaron play, because he's just processing like like he reminds me, and I'm and I'm gonna, I'm gonna blow some smokes at you, like he reminds me
of you. How he comes off the ball how quickly, because you were always so much quicker and processing and seeing what the defense was, was what the offense was trying to do to us, and your get off was crazy, and I thought, well, he's just getting off like that because you know, or maybe he's not as big, or maybe he needs to be quick. And it wasn't that
you processed quicker. You saw things. You there were certain formations where you knew what the play was gonna be, and if you could get in that get in that crack in the beac app if you could you know, establish that leverage, then it meant you one on a particular down. And I always admired that I always wanted to play that fat no no, no, I had to do it because I wasn't I wasn't built like Gattica, I didn't have a body like Thanos, So I had
to play that way. So yeah, I mean, you know, that's I'm glad you said that we have run out of things to say about Aaron Donald, about how great he is. And I'm glad you said that because I think the guy is special. And but I'm gonna use what you just said. He has no bad habits, um, and that that is you when I saw you. That's a great way to describe you. You didn't have any bad habits. Uh. When the play came to you, you
played it with proper leverage. When the play went away, you pursued it with proper speed, uh and great angles. You could rush two on one, one on one. You just no bad habits and uh not not bad body language. The thing I used to warn the other guys about, and I don't know if you know this, um the other offensive players is don't take his demeanor for weakness, you know, because he saw spoken or the way he speaks. I mean, if you make him mad, I'm just I'm
being serious. If he if you make him mad, you know, bad things are gonna happen, and not to me, to you. Um, And I've seen it, so yeah, I mean that's that's great stuff. And you you you won the sec what ninety three and ninety four? No, I think this is funny. I think you did. You play Auburn when you were in school. I did. I think you played against Less Need the Rams general manager. I think you guys were in college around the same time because we're almost the
same age. Yeah, I think you're right. That's that's crazy. That that's nuts. He was probably on one of those teams, one of those Auburn teams in ninety three or ninety four that actually handed us our lone SEC loss. While we still won the SEC championship that year, we had to get a thorn in our side and it was
and it was my junior year. It was Wayne Gandy and James Bostic, that whole group that beat us at Jordan Hair and we we went on to still win the SEC title, but they were a thorn in our side. So yeah, I need to look that up and see if less was on that team the shoulders said he was on. He was on an undefeated Auburn club that was on probation, So I think was that the team that was the team. What was the other thing I wanted to ask you? You played for Charlie Strong, dude,
that's awesome. Wow. What were those meetings like? Um, you know Charlie Strong, you know the thing that. Um, I'll tell any young person yeah is looking for is looking for an organization to join, whether it's you know, college or pro You can't you don't have control on the pros. But when you go to college, you can. You can choose who you play for. You can choose the type of men that you surround yourself with. And this goes
for parents as well. I mean, you have to evaluate the group of men that your son or daughter is going to go and join on the next level, because they will have a profound out you know, impact on who they become as young men and women. But for me, it was Charlie Strong. And Charlie Charlie was you know, he's sixty now, so he's not that much older. You know, he's kind of like the cool uncle age older than me.
And it's like, but he was he was old enough to reprimand me and treat me like, you know, a kid. But he was also young enough as to where he could identify with what I was going through and knew what I was thinking and where I was at psychologically at the time, and sing for him. You know, he challenged me. He challenged me on a daily basis and and said, look, he said, you know, you've been blessed with a lot of ability, and you've got a lot of great players around you, but who are you going
to be? How are you going to grind? It's like, you know, your work at that can't compromise no matter what you're able to do physically, you know, whether you try really hard or you don't, you'll probably be an All American because because of the competition in college, you know, if you're just if you're if you're a better player, or if you're blessed with some athletic gifts, you can get by with half assident, you know in college, you know, but when you get to the league, I'm telling you
you won't be great unless unless you grind, unless you work. And he was always that person, you know, telling me that whatever I was doing was not good enough. So the funny thing is, you know, people on the outside saw me, you know, is one way, and they're like, oh man, you know he's you know, big dude, and wow, you know he can do a lot of things or whatever. But in my mind, I was forever trying to scratch and claw at being better, you know, and and and
it wasn't and that work ethic and that adherence. You know, there are people along the way and our personal journey that make us realize who we are and what we can do, that give us that personal power and they they help us to unlock it in ourselves as we grow. And Charlie Strong was that guy man either early in my life, brought out of high school. He got a hold of me and I and I liked what he was preaching, and you know, and he believed in me,
you know, Coach Burrier believed in me, Um coach for Meal. Yeah, that man. That man told me when he was the first conversation I had with him after you know, he told us in three years will be world champs And everybody laughed. Right the first conversation, the first one on one meeting I had with him. If he says I need more out of you, I need more out of you.
You're not your best, you know, because I have a friend named Phil Tole who's a headshrinker and performance enhancement coach psychologists that you need to talk to because you're not You're not good enough. I need more out of you. And I'm like, I'm looking at this man who I admire and don't want to let down. And we had told the two years the two seasons before we had
trushed him, we were killing him. Yeah, but you know, but now and and that and that was you know, having people like that along the way, and it's always that story. It's like, you know, it doesn't matter how we see ourselves. You know, well, it matters how we see ourselves, But it matters, you know, how much we're willing to sacrifice and work and to create memories. And I and I remember the words of you know, Frank Gantz. You know, God arrested whole you know, um elite warriors
on the threshold of greatness. You know, who are you? You know, what are you going to do? You know, never let the other man down? You know, that kind of thing that creed that adherence to greatness. And you know, we we really spoke, acted and grinded our way into the reality that we wanted. We we were co creators of that, that reality of changing the narrative of the joke. You know, Rams, same old sorry ass Rams coming World Champions.
We were part of that transformation. And I don't think that people realize how hard it is to transform and know we see it all the time we see teams go from you know, from chicken crap to chicken salad. We we see this all the time, you know, and but we don't, you know, we don't pay attention to the process of how it happens. There's a lot of attrition along the way, but that process man of seeking
greatness and then manufacturing it, you know. I was lucky and blessed enough to be part of that when we got to the ramps, because that's no doubt what we did. I would take our team over just about anybody. I would match up and feel comfortable. If we're playing the eighty five Bears, I think the eighty five Bears are in for one that day with our with our team.
But as far as what we overcame, I don't think anybody has come from where we came from when we were the losing this team in the nineties to three years after Vermeil and he promised us, And I'm maybe we should write this in the book or when Kurt has a movie, I hope this is a scene in it. He promised us in three years we would be world champions. So when he is when everybody says it to me, they always say d Marco when he is pointing at every member of the football seat team and saying, you
are a world champion. That is because he promised us we would be. And there we are with ticker tape in our hair, just special. One hundred and four and a half sacks. Like you said, you were challenged along the way. We went through Deep Pollard, and I'm glad we had Deep Pollard in our life because that gave way to Carl Harriston, our d line coach in the Super Bowl years. He was perfect for where we were. Big Daddy. Absolutely. Yeah. So you finished one hundred and
four and a half sacks. You went through Tennessee. I forgive you, Miami for two years, then Tampa Bay at the end. It makes me laugh when I see Kevin Carter defensive tackle because now you see what I went through for years, right, one hundred four and a half sacks. When you finally said I'm done. A person like you, I don't think I've ever asked satisfied happy. I mean, when you see that number, there's only twenty seven guys that have more sacks than you in the NFL. I mean,
Hall of Fame, it is what it is. I mean I don't let's not get into that, but just you on a personal level with what you've done, Satisfied with
your career. Yes, And that's why I was able to walk away after fourteen years with no miss games in my career and walk away still with the ability to play, able to walk away after having meetings with Mike Fox and Bill Belichick in their office and then offering me, you know, three to four million dollars to still play at that point in my season, at that point in
my life, in my career. That's why I was able to walk away because I was in a sense satisfied, never never completely satisfied with the effort that you always look back and see things that you could have done differently.
But I had no more left to prove. I had gone out and I had and seemingly taken my respect, you know in every arena, every locker room that I walked into, and I had a hunger and a fire or that you know, when people looked at me the wrong way when I walked into that to that that into that new locker room and you had the resentment you know from other players and the offensive line guys, are you know, giving you that one, I'd look like, I know he's got a I know he's got a ring,
but you know, what the hell, what the hell are you making all this money for? And we need him to be better? And you know in my response as well, put your hand in the ground, buckle your chin strap, and let me show you why I make more money. There's there, there is something, you know. The reason I am here is because I've been a part of something special. I know what it's like to build. I am glue for for your for your team if you allow me
to be that for you. You know, I'm I was a paid mercenary at that point and then you know, went out and did my job. But but yeah, you earned that. Yeah, I had a certain satisfaction at that period in my life from just you know, like I said, always being challenged, never wanting to be a bust, wanting to live up to what I've been given and blessed with, and wanting to make every situation in the locker room better than I found it. And look, I felt that
I'd done that. You were the best I ever played with. Um, I have to move you over to that group because the best I've ever seen, you know, with all due respect to number ninety three, I think ninety nine watching him down in and down, that's something weird. So best I ever played with a different breed. He's a different he's he's special man and the other thing. And I'm glad you said that. And let me give you props for that, because I don't think we talk about this enough.
Kevin Carter, two hundred and twenty four games played, two hundred and nineteen started. You have never missed a game. You never missed a game in your career. Forget the other stuff. That alone is Hall of Fame worthy right there. That is amazing and playing at a high level too. Man, Um, special casey man. Never enough time, brother, Um, we need to do this again, either on the pod or off
the pod, or just hang out. Like you said, we're brothers for life, and we could take breaks for ten years and when we do reconnect it's like we never left. So you're one of my best. Love you to death, Love your family, Miss you guys, can't wait to see you. Miss your brother. I appreciate you, man. That's gonna do it for another episode of Ram's Iconic Thanks to all our fans for tuning in and wherever you are listening,
Please do us a favor. Hit that subscribe button and leave us a review and let us know which Ram's icon you would like to hear from next. Hey, look, before you know it, the twenty twenty one season will be here and we cannot wait for you to step inside the Rams House with us. There is still time to be among the first to experience so Far Stadium. To join us and purchase tickets, visit the Rams dot Com Slash twenty twenty one. That's the Rams dot Com
Slash twenty twenty one. Big thanks to Kasey Kevin Carter for joining us today. Have a great one and we'll see you next time on Ram's Iconic