by Denver’s new quarterbacks coach Davis Webb, 28, is in and Russell Wilson’s personal QB coach is out. Additionally, Bucs linebacker Kyle Trask and the Cardinals are looking into the college coaching ranks.
The Broncos continue to try to put the mess of 2022 behind them. Last week, The Athletic reported a week before the combine on a number of issues during Wilson’s first year in Denver, including his office at team headquarters and QB coach’s staff with access to the building. It was clear from the start that it would not continue under Sean Payton.
When asked at the combine about that comment, Payton repeated it and responded to how Wilson’s unusual office perks have become history in recent weeks.
“It was just an honest answer,” Payton said. “I know what I know and what I expect.
“But for me and this team, when we get into the offseason, I’m going to park a car with no mirrors — all of that is going to go away. And we have to overcome all these difficult things. It was a difficult year. … I don’t think the meeting room upstairs matters to anyone. I don’t think it matters because I didn’t see articles from any of you before Week 1 or Week 2 when this was happening. But that’s what happens when you lose. Then everything is scrutinized, including training.”
Broncos coach Sean Payton will seemingly have a tighter ship than his predecessor when it comes to Russell Wilson’s privileges in the team building.
Trevor Ruszkowski/USA TODAY Sports
Peyton talked about how his former quarterback, Drew Brees, and Wilson talk often and have homes near each other in San Diego to the point that Brees texted Peyton to jokingly beg him to take the job of the Broncos so Wilson would stop texting him. so much. Payton and Wilson shared a Super Bowl meal together with Joe Montana, and their working relationship is in its infancy with the offseason program yet to begin. GM George Paton acknowledged shared responsibility for how the situation spiraled out of control. Wilson’s private QB coach won’t be in the building, but Denver’s newly hired QB coach Davis Webb will be. Webb, 28, is fresh off the field having just completed his second stint with the New York Giants. It will create a rare dynamic in the QB room.
“I’ve been through this one other time when I was with the Miami Dolphins,” Paton said. “We had signed Jason Garrett late (last) season and had several quarterbacks hurt. Coach Saban came in and we introduced Jason to Coach Saban and he interviewed him and blew him up and we hired him. I don’t know how many times that’s been done – you’ve got to be quite unique, you’ve got to have a great football mind and I know he knows that position. He is ready beyond his years, he has been coached like Jason throughout his career. Jason played a bit more, but I see a parallel there, it can happen. He really impressed a veteran offensive lineman when he sat in that room (for the job interview) and I was in that room.”
McDaniels, Brady and the Bucs
Derek Carr isn’t working in Indy, but he’ll certainly be a man in demand as he’s expected to meet with several teams after his release from the Raiders on Valentine’s Day. As for why the Raiders made the move, head coach Josh McDaniels said it had nothing to do with potentially moving a former QB he coached out of retirement to fill the position: Tom Brady.
“This decision had nothing to do with any other player. It was about what we thought was best at the time for us.” McDaniels said. “(Brady) is a great friend of mine and the best for Tom and his family, and in this case it was to retire. I’m definitely happy for him and it won’t change our friendship.”
Because of Brady’s competitive nature and the fact that he was a quick tackle last year, it will always be hard for some to believe that he really shuts it down until the Bucks take the field in Week 1 and he’s not under center. Almost a year to the day, before Brady announced he would return for the 2022 season, Licht quipped that he would “leave the desk light on” for TB12 if he wanted to return. Today he said he will be a flashlight. Licht says he believes Brady has his mind set on retirement and is happy with his decision. As for where the Bucs go next, that remains to be seen.
Licht expressed confidence in Kyle Trask, saying the team took him in the second round of the 2021 NFL Draft for a reason, but stopped short of naming Trask the Bucs’ starter before the team even started the offseason or added anyone new in the QB room.
“You have to give everybody competition,” Licht said. “He’s the only quarterback on our roster right now. I’m just saying that if he was the first or if he was the only option we had right now, we’d be very, very excited to continue with him and he’s going to get a chance no matter who you bring in to be the starter.”
Hawks turn peach during the dipping process
The NFL and college football have a distinctly different calculus when it comes to selecting players within a team’s geographic footprint. It’s often just a nice coincidence when an NFL team gets a local prospect, and certainly not a necessary condition like when a college team wants to put a fence around their home state.
But to Falcons In GM Terry Fontenot’s first draft, he snapped the team’s decade-long streak of not selecting a Peach State player when he selected Georgia guard Justin Shaffer, who hails from Ellenwood, Ga., in the sixth round before drafting Shaffer’s teammate , with tight end John Fitzpatrick 23 picks later (though neither ultimately made the team out of camp).
With UGA at the top of the college game in Athens and its program drawing high levels of talent per capita, there’s certainly at least one way Atlanta keeps Georgia on its mind.
“There are some good players from the Georgia Bulldogs here, but there are also a lot of good players from Georgia here. In our magnets for whether he’s a board free agent or a college draft pick, we put a peach if he’s from Georgia. This is something that people lose sight of. A lot of players that grew up in this area and could have chosen to go to another school, there are a lot of Georgia natives that are really talented.”
Paton on the effect of NIL on the draft market
There are an untold number of knock-on effects that image and name similarity deals have had on college sports, but as this market continues to evolve, there is even an impact on professional sports that will be interesting to watch moving forward. Players have only been able to be compensated since July 2021, so any options in a market in its infancy are nowhere near fully formed. But one early trend to at least keep in mind is borderline draftable players staying in school because they can at least make a little money unlike the previous system where they weren’t allowed to.
“I think the depth later in the rounds – it happened last year a little bit more – the depth later in the rounds, I felt like we got to the later rounds and it kind of fell off here where in previous years it was a little bit more depth,” Patton said. “We’ll see, we’re still going through the process here, we’ll have the second wave of draft meetings. … we’ve talked about it a lot and we’ll see how quickly it goes down this year.”
Paton emphasized that he had no idea what was going to happen with the NIL and that nobody does—it’s part of an evolving market and NFL teams need to evaluate its effect on player motivation.
New Cardinals coach Jonathan Gannon hasn’t been afraid to recruit from the college ranks to fill out his coaching staff.
Joe Rondone/The Republic/USA Today Network
The Cardinals will lean on the college connections of Gannon and Ossenfort
College coaches going to the NFL is nothing new, and it certainly isn’t happening at a higher rate than before, but Cardinals Interestingly, they reportedly hired four coaches from the college ranks for Jonathan Gannon’s starting staff, two of whom (UF defensive coordinator Patrick Toney and tight ends coach William Peagler) were on the same staff in Florida. They will be joined by former Northwestern cornerbacks coach Ryan Smith and Stanford’s Klayton Adams, who will oversee the offensive line.
“I think that’s an advantage that hiring some of these college coaches has,” Ossenfort said. “They bring some institutional knowledge of players and players they coached and players they recruited. These are things we will lean on. I’m a fan of any information as long as it’s good information. It helps us in the evaluation process. We’ll gather what we can from them and use it to help us paint every prospect they know first hand about. We will use that to our advantage as we begin to evaluate these players.”
