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Interviews - TRANSCRIPT: DECOSTA INTERVIEW PART III

Posted On: 5/12/07
Written By:  
Tony Lombardi
TRANSCRIPT: DECOSTA INTERVIEW PART III TRANSCRIPT: DECOSTA INTERVIEW PART III
TL: You mentioned Yamon Figurs and his potential as a receiver.  You also discussed B.J. Sams’ limited ability to be much more than a return specialist.  Might Figurs save a roster spot that could be reserved for an additional lineman?  Last year I believe you had 8 offensive linemen on the 53 man squad.  Might you keep more this year now that you’ve added two first day picks to the mix or might one of the veterans like Mike Flynn or Keydrick Vincent be at risk now that Brian Rimpf is expected to return from his knee injury?
 
ED: That’s a question more suited for Brian.  We are in position to carry as many as we want to carry because the talent is as such.  We may have a player that doesn’t dress and I know fans get upset by that.  The important thing is how are the guys that are playing, playing?  If a guy like Chris Chester or Jason Brown or Ben Grubbs is down, that is not an indication that these players aren’t any good, it’s an indication that our depth is pretty good. 
 
Look when you see a guy like Dwan Edwards not dressing the fans get frustrated.  If Dwan was playing for another team he would be dressing.  He might even be starting.  With our defense, we are the No. 1 or No. 2 defense in the league and we have tremendous depth.  If a guy like Marshal Yanda doesn’t dress this year – and he may or he may not I don’t know how the numbers are going to play out or what Brian decides to do.  But if he doesn’t it isn’t an indication that we are unhappy with the player.  It’s an indication that Brian in a strategic way, there’s a lot more strategy involved in the 45 man roster than fans really understand and it changes from week to week.  Players don’t remain static on the 45.  There’s a strategy involved and the fact that a player isn’t dressing does not mean that we don’t have confidence that that player can play well, it just means that a player dresses because he can give us more on special teams or because he can play two positions instead of one position and you’ve got to take that into account.
 
TL: This draft was said to be rich in corners yet you didn’t draft any although you have brought in a couple of UDFA’s to compete.  Is that in part due to the corners you invested in last year and it’s time to see them step up…players like Derrick Martin, David Pittman and Ronnie Prude?
 
ED: I think so.  We were very happy with Corey Ivy last year and what he did for us as a nickel.  Samari, I hear this all the time – he can’t play, he struggled.  I would encourage fans who really want to put dirt on Samari to really find out what went wrong on some of those plays.  I consider myself to be very well schooled in defensive back play, I don’t even know half the time who is at fault or why this and that happened.  It’s appearance versus reality.  The point I want to make is not all the time when you see a player get beat or the ball go over his head should you assume that is his mistake especially in the secondary.  If you’ve got one guy thinking the coverage is something and another guy thinking it’s something else or both guys think the coverage is this but one guy is looking in the backfield instead of covering deep half a player gets hung out to dry.
 
I think we have a great stable of corners: Chris, Samari, David, Derrick and Ronnie and Evan Ogelsby.  I think all of those players are NFL players.  We love our young corners.  Ozzie says, and I believe it, “players get better.” They get to our level.  They learn, they get faster and smarter.  So we expect Derrick, David, Ronnie and Evan to become that much better.  We were very intrigued last year when we see David and Derrick and Ronnie in practice.  You see we have the benefit of being at practice every day and seeing how guys play.  A fan may see that Derrick Martin or David Pittman or Ronnie Prude is inactive and may question that and get frustrated.
 
We have a chance to see David Pittman cover Derrick Mason in practice or Demetrius Williams go up against Derrick Martin.  We see how those players can play in those types of situations.  And again, because of the 45 man roster and all that that entails, we have situations when good players have to remain inactive on game day.  I think when [those guys] get a chance to play they will play well.  We saw Ronnie do some good things and Derrick Martin play well for us on special teams.  I think that Pittman is the one guy who really didn’t contribute much and that’s more of an indication of his immaturity as a person more so than any indication of his ability as a player.  I think coming out of a small school and everything that entails, it’s a big jump.  In terms of physical ability with David Pittman, he has the ability to be a starter in the league.   We don’t have another player on our team right now who can cover Derrick Mason or Mark Clayton like David Pittman.  When he gets the chance, if he takes that next step, if he prepares like a pro, I think he is going to be a significant player for the Baltimore Ravens.
 
TL: You mention fans not having the luxury of seeing certain players compete in practice. Like David Pittman one of the players I’ve heard you and some of the coaches say nice things about is P.J. Daniels.  How will the competition for back up running back play out between Mike Anderson, P.J. Daniels and a reportedly healthy Musa Smith?
 
ED: P.J. is a guy who is a little bit different than the other backs because he’s shifty.  He’s got quickness and he can make people miss.  Another guy like David, we think that he needs to mature a little bit as a person and as a player.  But he’s got the ability and we’ve been very impressed from what we’ve seen in practice.  P.J. has great hands and he projects very well as a third down back because he can pass protects, he’s shifty and catches well.  When he came out he reminded some of the scouts of Chester Taylor.  Chester didn’t play initially very much [either].  Chester was fortunate because he came in essentially as a back up to Jamal.  P.J. came into a different situation behind Jamal and Mike Anderson and Musa Smith.  There’s a logjam a little at that position.
 
We drafted P.J. really not knowing what Musa Smith’s situation was going to be coming off the injury.  Musa rebounded well and P.J. found himself in a position where he was the fourth back.  It’s going to be difficult for the fourth back on any team to play much.  I think when P.J. gets the chance he’ll do pretty well.  We were disappointed early on in the preseason and he had a couple of fumbles.  That set him back a little bit.  As an organization we think that P.J.’s best football is ahead of him and we expect him to be a good contributor this year on special teams and as a third down back and we think he can be a great player for us down the road.
 
TL: You have several UDFA’s coming in.  Talk about the process of recruiting them and did any of the UDFA’s that you’ve signed grade out as 6th round or higher talent?
 
ED: We’ve done a good job over the years of recruiting free agents.  Rex Ryan is a great recruiter.  When Rex calls you and encourages you to come to Baltimore it means something.  Joe Hortiz, one of our scouts, has done an awesome job as well.  We’ve had a lot of success with players like Priest Holmes, Lional Dalton, Will Demps, Kemo, Mike Flynn…a lot of significant players – Bart Scott one of the best.  So that’s something that we take a lot of pride in.  And that’s one of the things that the coaches and scouts can really sink there teeth in on draft day because honestly the draft is Ozzie’s thing, Brian, George and myself.  We’re making the decisions and the coaches and scouts are little removed from the process.
 
But the undrafted portion of the weekend, that’s fun.  To give the fans an idea, imagine the New York Stock Exchange on the floor and everyone is screaming.  That’s kind of what it’s like.  Everybody is on the phone, guys are running up and down the hallway, competing, talking to agents. 
 
It’s not going to be easy for undrafted guys to make out team this year.  We have a solid roster – probably as deep as any team’s in the league.  It’s not 2002 when we had the purge and had all of these guys – you had a chance to see a guy make a mark like a Will Demps.  It’s not an easy roster to make and even some of our draft picks are going to have a tough time making it.  But that’s what you want.  I want our 53rd player to be better than other teams’ 50th player or 47th player, again building from the bottom up. 
 
A lot of teams take the approach of looking at the top part of their roster and then tweak it by bringing in better players.  George Kokinis and myself, our approach is to look at the bottom of our roster and get better players.  If you do that – it kind of goes back to Jack Welsh (General Electric) and his A’s, B’s and C’s mentality.  It’s kind of a business approach.  You basically want to cut out as many C’s as you can.  You want to get B’s to become A’s and not C’s.  And that’s how we approach our roster. We want our C’s to be replaced and if we can do that the quality of your B’s and A’s improves. 
 
TL: The contracts that these UDFA’s enter into is interesting.  Agents that represent them have to not only consider the money but the opportunity as well.  Talk about these contracts which I find to be somewhat comical when you offer them a $500 signing bonus yet they have to pay for their own airfare to get here.  Describe a typical UDFA contract and have those contracts changed since the salary cap got a big boost in 2007?
 
ED: Again that goes back to Bill Belichick.  We did a study – I didn’t do the study, I was in college when the study took place.  But Bill Belichick discovered that only one or two undrafted free agent per team make the final roster.  Instead of paying out $150,000 in combined salaries by the Browns at the time, if that’s the case that only one or two is going to make it, why pay that money because it counts against your cap.  That’s half a veteran player’s salary.
 
So the policy at that point was about $15,000 – TOTAL!  Now you might bring in 20 players.  $15,000 doesn’t go very far.  I’d say on average our guys get $1,000.00.  Some guys get $500, some guys get nothing.  Every once in awhile if there’s a player that we covet we might give him $2,000.00.  What we offer is an opportunity.  Because of our track record, success breeds success.  We will get players because agents know what our history is.  I think we are an attractive place for players because of our success on the field.  If we made the playoffs four times in the last eight years, players want to be on winning teams.  Players want to play with good players.  It’s easy for us to recruit a linebacker because he wants to play with Ray Lewis.  He wants that experience.  It would be easy for us to get a quarterback because that quarterback wants to play with Steve McNair.  If you’ve got leaders in place on your team, players want to play [with them].  If you build it they will come – it’s that mentality.
 
When you see Priest Holmes associated with the Ravens or Bart Scott.  Bart Scott has told his story.  Everybody knows that story now; how we scouted him…that we were the only team to scout him.  We brought him to Baltimore.  We bring players to Baltimore before the draft that we don’t even necessarily want to draft.  We’re bringing them to Baltimore because we want to recruit them.  We want to let them see the place.  If we can get a player who has actually seen this building even if we don’t draft him, they want to come.  It makes our job a lot easier.  When you’ve got Steve Bisciotti recruiting you, Brian Billick recruiting you, Ozzie Newsome, Rex Ryan that goes a long way. 
 
TL: Talk about what you hope to accomplish in the Rookie Camp and are there any players that you’ve drafted or recruited whose work here in Owings Mills might be curtailed due to the classes graduating late, like Haloti Ngata, Demetrius Williams and Drew Olson were affected last year?
 
ED: I haven’t really looked at that yet.  I know that George and Ozzie talked about that yesterday.  Some players are on the quarter system and if they’re on the quarter system in college and their classes haven’t yet graduated, they can’t be here for the OTA’s. 
 
I like to see the guys move around.  I think the biggest thing that the players get from this weekend is mental, the teaching.  The coaches throw a lot at these guys early.  They spend a lot of time in meetings.  It gives us a chance to evaluate the players.  Not only will we watch the practices outside, we’ll watch them on tape.  We’ll get an early read on the position guys…can they play, how they can fit.  Can Marshal Yanda play right tackle and guard?  Can a guy like Yamon Figurs be the fourth receiver?  We’ll get a chance to judge potential.  Last year when everyone saw Chris Chester move around – and there were skeptics when we picked him, he’s undersized…only played the position eight games…I remember talking to the coaching staff, people in the media or even PR people and the comments were, “Wow, we’ve never seen a guy move like that.  This guy moves like a linebacker and he’s an offensive guard.”
 
Hopefully you get the same impression of guys out there this [Rookie Camp].  That’s what you want and that’s a verification of what you saw in college.  Fortunately with a lot of these guys we’re not expecting them to play right away.  They can learn, they can get stronger, they can get quicker – it’s an investment.  You are not going to get a lot in return right way.  But 3, 4, 5 years when you look at it, you’ll see that we made a lot of money and that’s were you want to hit.
 
TL: You mentioned that the 2007 draft wasn’t as deep as the 2006 draft.  Let’s look ahead to 2008 and compare it to 2007.  This time last year, I know you did but I had never heard of Joe Staley.  Will there be more of those in the future?
 
ED: I think 2008 looks good but you are always banking on juniors.  We’re in a different situation now because we don’t evaluate the juniors but we know who they are.  The draft is always bolstered by junior prospects.  There’s probably about 7 or 8 offensive tackles; 4 or 5 quarterbacks that I can of off the top of my head that are intriguing prospects.  There are some running backs.  McFadden from Arkansas is probably one of the best running backs at his age that I’ve seen in a long time.  He reminds me of Adrian Peterson but might even be a little more athletic.  Jake Long a tackle from Michigan is a very, very physical, Tony Boselli type prospect that is probably going to be a top 20 pick.  I would say as a tackle he is an excellent prospect.  There’s a Nigerian defensive end at Iowa, I can’t pronounce his name, he’s an excellent prospect as a pass rushing defensive end.  Brian Brohm at Louisville is widely regarded quarterback, a top 10 pick, very accurate guy with great intangibles and intelligence. 
 
So it’s going to be a good draft and that’s the thing that is intriguing but we should get, although it’s really too early for me to start thinking about this, but we would anticipate getting a third round pick next year for the Adalius Thomas loss.  His contract, his salary, is such that based upon what we think we should get a third round pick so we should have a full stable of picks – probably more than that because we lost Pashos, we could get a fourth or fifth rounder.  So we may come out of this thing next year with eight or nine or ten picks possibly.  Again, a full allotment of picks or more than that. 
 
If all of our picks make it this year it would be nice but probably unrealistic, that would be about 25 players in the last 3 years that we’ve added to the roster and these are guys that are playing well.  If you include guys like an Adam Terry in the mix as a starter this year, I think we’ve added 8 or 9 starters in the draft over the last 2 draft classes.  If you put in Grubbs, Figurs and possibly McClain, now you’re talking about 11 new starter on offense, defense and special teams – I have Sam Koch in that mix as well, that’s pretty good over 3 draft classes. 
 
I think we can do better.  We strive to have as many  of our players out on the field as quickly as we can.  Hopefully the fans will get a chance to see players like P.J. and David and Derrick.  Those guys can contribute.  Justin Green is another guy.  Hopefully he gets a chance to contribute this year.  It would be great to see a guy like Devard Darling who I know most people have written off.  It would be great to see him make some plays this year. 
 
Devard is a guy who really had a great training camp last year and he had a great preseason and again I think there’s a perception that he can’t play.  Well, he’s behind some pretty good players.  How can a guy like Devard Darling really get on the field?  It would be great for him to get a chance to make some plays.  We think Yamon is a guy who can compete with Devard.
 
A point that hasn’t been made very often is besides Yamon Figurs as a return man and a receiver, there was no better gunner in college football this year.  Talk about a weapon.  This is a guy who can absolutely fly and he makes an unbelievable impact as a gunner.  Now I don’t know if we’ll use him as a gunner because of his value to us as a return man.  That’s up to Frank Gansz.  But he’s a double threat who goes downfield and makes tackle after tackle after tackle after tackle on special teams and punt teams so we think that he can contribute and compete to play as well. 

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Posted On: 5/12/07
Written By:  
Tony Lombardi

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