2024 Seahawks Football Scouting Methods; The Science of Observation | First Kick Seahawks

he is so smart has seen so much that he can make the complex so simple that it humbles you and embarrasses you I was embarrassed yesterday listening to him how smart he is how simple it was he went which what he we went he he went four and a half hours just with the coaching forget the clinic like he came in and met with our coach staff and um with three and a half hours in I was like coach would you like a water cup of coffee like to use the restroom because I desperately had to use the restroom you know and he's like I'm fine Matt I was like yes sir um uh yeah so I was going to do a great Bill bellich impression I had been working on it before but then I had to take care of my dog I'm sorry you guys missed out on that I was going to do Bill bellich describing the Oki 54 and it went it went poorly separations in the preparation sometimes you just fumble and I fumble well welcome to First kick Seahawks where we try to be prepared for the first kick of everything and I was not prepared I'll let you know though I find that clip with Matt rule absolutely hysterical I think I think we need need to go over this one more time because just listen to what he had to say about Bill bellich just one more time I've seen so much that he can make the complex so simple that it humbles you and embarrasses [Music] you but also he said it took 4 and a half hours I find that hysterical cuz have you ever heard Bill bellich talk of course it took 4 and a half hours for him to say something simple but also he probably had this very very arrogant tone about him like it's not that hard you just put the zero over the center and then you put the threei over here and you put the five ey over here the Spinners over there there the center goes that direction the spinner wheels off that way you keeping up and then the spinner go then Matt rules just jaw a gape right because I don't know I maybe he's just trying to be nice or maybe he was bored to tears at any rate um today's episode is not going to be about the other Seahawks coaches it's actually going to be about Heritage I talked talk about Heritage in the NFL all the time and how it leads to where you want to go but if you completely forget it you're G to fail and crumble like the Jets and um most notably I want to talk about scouting and today's episode is going to be all about scouting because the NFL draft is coming up and we have a lot of people like myself who are like I got to look at this tape right I got to see what my favorite player my favorite Prospect might look like well I would like to make the case that drafting the most physically intimidating Prospect out there isn't really always the best decision in fact don't even sweat it out you might swerve in the wrong direction if you will so let's go ahead and start with a classic Bill bellich clip because we're going to start with Bill bellich I then want to talk about his dad because he has a book called football scouting methods it's technically out of date but this is the Bible of football scouting methods and thank you to Dylan Jackson who wrote a review back in 2015 the top schemes it talks about are the single wing offense the straight T offense the wing T offense the Oki 54 defense and the 6t def uh 62 defense which the Seahawks were trying to do the last few years and it wasn't really working out well but The Vig fangio system right heavily involved with the 62 defense so often times the claim is we have moved past these old ideas and we need to be looking for new ideas well yeah you can you can say that new DJs are creating new digital Technologies and progressing but those DJs also wouldn't exist without grandmas flash or grand wizard Theodore because without them the record player would still be just a record player not an instrument and so without football scouting methods by Steven bich we would still be thinking about football players in a completely different light and that's why when it's been a decade but when I read this this is where I started because I felt like you got to start at the very beginning of the book right so his dad was about special teams as well and so I I wanted to start with how Bill bellich who's normally quiet and I I GNA answer a dumb question with this short answer right but when he's asked about long Snappers and special teams he won't shut up hey good morning Bill I have a question that a little out of left field it's about roster building and and not having to do with the game this week but it's something I've been thinking about for a while while and it's about long snapping actually and I was just kind of wondering and this is no with all due respect to Joe Cardona and all the also could you crack a smile could you could you show any pulse at all anyways come on man long Snappers out there but is long snapping that difficult that you need to use a roster on one player who does only that can't you just cross train a few guys to do long snapping and then use have more Flex that roster spot yeah well you know uh Ben it's it's an interesting conversation one that's really um uh I would say honestly during the course of my coaching career has has kind of traveled that that long and Winding Road um from when I came into the league uh The Specialist first of all there were no long Snappers but the Specialists the kickers and the punters um were frequently position play players uh and that's where they came from in so if you lose a position player who's also a Long Snapper you know you're looking at some some real problems um and that evolved into the punters for the most part becoming holders because the amount of time that they could spend with the kickers versus having a a wide receiver or quarterback be the holder which again you don't see very much of that anymore um assuming the punter is you know a capable and good enough you know has good enough hands to be the holder uh and so then that kind of whole unit has really evolved into you know a specified Snapper a specified kicker a spe specific punter and generally the punter as the whole so the three of those guys can work together all practice because they're all available and so are are you telling me this guy talked for four and a half hours you know that's just three minutes in he goes for 10 minutes just on Long Snappers right this dude loves the finer details and often times when you're talking about Scouting For the draft your favorite players are the exciting ones right who's excited about long Snappers Bill bellich who's excited about fullbacks I get excited about fullbacks I get excited about will dley blocking down the line right because I'm weird right people wanted Jimmy Graham people want a Travis Kelce they want a gronowski where's the next one of those you're not going to find them you have 53 guys on your team and you're probably going to have one Travis Kelce and maybe a momes and then a bunch of Knuckleheads you got to figure out how to make it work together or you could do what bill bellich and Steve bellich did and find really really smart players who might not necessarily look like Olympians but they all work really well together it it is often noted that what the best wide receiver that bill bich really drafted in the last 10 years was Edelman I mean Randy Moss didn't they get him from the Vikings I don't remember I didn't follow the story of Randy Moss because I don't care about wide receivers but you know he doesn't care about the the big shiny objects he cares about the gravel that they're running on the minute details he cares about the long snappers where did he get that from well it brings us to his father this is not his father and and he'd make a hole in his mouth and he wouldn't move his jaw when he'd say what the hell you doing I can't replicate it but I hear it it's in my head and it's in my head to this day going through some of his routines and his indoor workouts in the gym legendary I've done a lot of tough physical things in my life never anything that I could think of was as tough as going through those indoor routines with him in the gym that was brutal and you couldn't see it then when you were a kid you're like who is this Maniac on Bill bellich che's a bit of a Maniac too right that dude that dude will stare you down while you ask him a question without even flinching anyways my ass incessantly as you mature as you grow up as you go through that program you come to realize and that guy loved us it was tough love uh it wasn't always what you wanted to hear in fact it usually wasn't what you wanted to hear but it was the truth it was honest it was fair and once you thought about it and got past the feeling sorry for yourself and actually heard the words that he was saying you knew he was right and uh and a lot of times very prophetic John F Kennedy Stadium Philadelphia December 2nd a near Full House turns out for the 73rd renewal of the Army Navy game so we go into the army game and we we lose it's an army day 23 to 15 this is the the kicker that's talking so after the game we're reporters talking to prominent players in the locker and one of the players came by and said something mad about uh losing to Army and so I said something uh I wanted to make it loud enough that others would hear it to I guess to draw attention to myself as a Brash teenager and I said something unkind about some of the army players I didn't realize that that coach belich was in the locker room and and I think he just was standing nearby with his arms folded as he does just observing so finished changing and headed out of the locker room and there's a tunnel there in the bich is in the in this little tunnel on their way out and as we're headed out he just sort of grabs my arm and pulls me against the wall and he said 'I heard what you said in there about the Army team and he says look he goes one of the things that you're going to have to remember is that yeah they're your opponent today on the football field but someday you may in fact be on a battlefield with them they are your teammates too don't ever forget that but sure enough was he right and fast forward now to to 911 and I am uh an admiral working on the joint staff and the Pentagon and bang we get hit yeah went in yeah so who you teach oh no it jumped all around who you teach and why you teach them what lessons you never know where they're going to go in life but this dude's Dad Steve bellich noticed that the punter was talking trash after a loss and he waited to go talk to the punter to teach him a life lesson who cares about the punters you should be more interested in hey the quarterback might be depressed after this he's the team leader right isn't that isn't that what typically needs to be said we need to get the whole locker room together that's not what Steve bich first thought of he first thought we lost and this guy doesn't have the humility to respect the other side and also because it was specifically Navy versus army you know they would eventually be on the same side but it's it's an important part of scouting to be able to actually empathize with the players on the field you had this guy who was a total heart ass but he took the time to emotionally connect to a player and by doing so you could motivate the player to be better and so you don't have to really think about it later remember I was talking about hot Keys the other day hot keys and so what happened to this guy John stuttle Bean well stuttle Bean of course became Admiral and during one of our Wars he had um am I showing you there we go he had only two years at Navy 1972 folks it was a while ago and I looked through a few of these names we got ourselves an ow a Fred a Dan a Bert we got ourselves a Larry a Ken a bob a jack a Steve a Roger we could a gy and a Gary all we need now are a Luke and a Timothy right the these names were just making me cackle I had to show you um but the coach at the time of the 1972 Navy was this dude Rick fonzo and after 72 he ended up going to the Detroit Lions as an assistant and then he ended up being there as a what as a head coach yeah so I guess he was an assistant head coach and then became a head coach from 74 to 76 so not long but what's notable about this is when you look at Bill bellich cheek's career what's going on where are you yeah Detroit Lions 1976 so he joined along with the guy who was his dad's head coach he followed him to the NFL now granted he did have an opportunity before with the Baltimore coats Colts in 1975 as a Special Assistant but look specifically assistant to special teams in 1976 what was his dad's whole thing special teams what was Bill Bell's whole thing starting out special teams and so if you didn't have the heritage of him just being around his dad loving special teams he might not have had the opportunity to even get here not only that his dad had a unique way of actually getting into the [Music] NFL he looked for you know some jobs uh after college and his college coach Bill Edwards had taken the head coaching position within Detroit Lions he offered my dad a job as the equipment manager uh so my dad went up there and was the equipment manager for the Lions the offense that uh coach Edwards Used was a little bit unique and it was a spinner series out of the single wing uh my dad was the fullback and in that offense at Western Reserve and uh it involved some ball handling and some U you know intricate parts of uh the overall offensive system kind of like the quarterback in today's system anyway as the year went along and they didn't have a very good year about halfway through the season coach Edwards kind of said to his staff like you know you know Steve can run this offense um better than what we got running it I love that part this dude starts as the damn equipment manager and they're like well he's he's smart enough to do it so let's just throw him out there see what happens but the key name there was the damn Lions wiped out with a crack back and I'm dragged off the field and on my football career oh yeah I don't care about this guy right now sorry sorry to him um noted when the dude said spinner Bruce Irvin was also a spinner but on the defensive side of the ball so if you don't know the difference you can get confused but it's it looks like I I I don't know the difference as to what the spinner R is on offense so I'm confused is what I'm saying the spinner Ru was why Bruce Irvin was brought in okay we're cruising right through this this is good back to this specific review as we said the top schemes talked about it is single wing the straight T the wing T offense the Oki 54 Oklahoma and then the 62 defense which 49ers use a bunch of these Vic fangio defense is used there I don't know how many of these the um Gams use I think they might use a single wing but these are all basically just basic fronts how to start right and that's often what college is is this is how to get you going this is all you need to know and people ignore these people completely ignore the fundamentals you when when you look at clips of Scouts today the big media Scouts right I'm talking the big media Scouts that are on TV they're talking about the guys with the big arms that can throw super far and they're they're they got good pocket presence but what does pocket presence actually mean what what does Big Arm actually mean and what does the accuracy actually mean you got to be more specific than use your buzzwords and they never ever ever ever ever talk about footwork they just don't and it bothers me to my core but when you talk to a Steve bellich Bill bellich fan it's about which way is the ball turning you need to catch it this way nah n n it's going the other way you need to turn your hands and catch it this way anyways sorry got off topic Kennedy Stadium Philadelphia December he make a hole in his mouth no no I don't need him to make a hole in his mouth I was hoping for you to talk about this right here I'm trying to be efficient with the time Ste bich helped us that all of us had and he was recognized as such Steve bellich helped us as young men not only on the football field but what we were preparing to do to focus far beyond what we thought our limits were I don't think that's it either we completely lost the clip I wanted to show you it's not that close to the end damn that's what I get for using hot Keys that's what I get for what was I talking about I was talking about how new technology might make things easier but if you just stick to the fundamentals you'll probably be okay was it this one goes far beyond anything that happened on the football field the thousands you know in the offseason that was really critical to well it's too late deleting this sorry man okay since we were talking about the NFL Scouts I'm going to show you what I mean finding professionals we've been talking a lot about finding professionals I made a a comment about sweat earlier car c uh DW big defensive line Talent that's being uh talked about in the draft and then oh no he gets a DWI last year Jen Carter uh involved in a car crash bunch of people die cornerback uh something something Whats his name there there's always some dude who's just not getting it and is it because of the coaches around him is it because of the teammates around him it doesn't really matter at this point in the draft process you need to choose a dude so finding professionals when you're in college you can skate by on your athletic you're going to be better than the guy that you play against and that's going to be enough when you get to the National Football League everyone's just like you these are the best of the best this is the most talented men who play this game on planet Earth which means I I need to make this Oho clear I need to make this so clear to you guys if if you see a guy who is super athletic and you just got to have them there's probably another one of them out there somewhere too and he's just not that special in the grand scheme of things I love DK metf and he is special but are you willing to overpay for a Ferrari when you can have two of something else sorry you can block that's where everything speeds these hocky keep screwing me up gets the ball out come on man okay he ends up talking about the type of technology that they use we have ways now to sort this is not what I wanted where okay no more hot Keys cam that's beyond where's finding professionals I'm sorry guys this this stream is falling apart now isn't it but you know the art of College Pro days the art of um failing is being able to just [ __ ] ride with it solid where the heck is finding professionals and a fil scouting combine then they talk about the surface oh come on I can't have backto back segments of the stream ruined because of this nonsense is it this one pro Cas study putting it all together this is the worst stream I've done yet it's falling apart I had it all pre-planned and I got too fancy with the hot Keys which is very ironic I do not want to let this segment go because it was part of the closer finding professionals I'm not you can skate by on your athletic Bo you're going to be better than the guy that you play against and that's going to be enough when you get to the National Football League everyone's just like you you these are the best of the best this is the most talented men who play this game on planet Earth so if you're just going to show up when it's time for practice and you're just going to show up when it's time for the game and that's all the level of commitment that you possess you have zero chance of being successful in this league I need to talk to your coaches I need to talk to your teammates I might even talk to some of your opponents who knew you when you were a kid because Talent it's not enough when you're watching Talent is not enough but all the time a Zack Wilson is drafted all the time that type of [ __ ] is overlooked because oh my God I need a quarterback ultimately when I look at quarterbacks I'm looking at their footwork not the how exciting they are now we can talk M about Mac Jones it looked pretty obvious to me at the end of the bellich era that they were spending out there ass and didn't quite know how to handle the new era but if you're going to assess quarterbacks you have to start with their ability to process information it starts with their feet and a lot of people aren't doing that a player you might think he's fast when you watch him on tape but you can't account for who he's playing against and how fast or slow that player might be one of the values which means when you see somebody run this type of speed or that type of speed you need to remember that the play has different timings if a quarterback is hitting step three then that means you need to be at this position the quarterback is hitting step five you need to be at this position step seven you need to be at this position there are similar timing r r rules for running because if you overp pursue as a blocker you blow up the entire play continue of the NFL scouting combine is you get a chance to see all these players in the same environment on the same field and they're competing not only against the guys in their position group and their draft class they're competing against a standard that's been set from previous combines and previous draft classes the college G okay but here's my big thing what is that standard they're setting okay this this offensive lineman was able to run a 49 but this offensive lineman is able to run a 53 he's coming out of a sprinter stance what does that matter to a guy who's gonna have probably both of his hands in the dirt or one hand in the dirt and he's gonna probably be going backwards and then accelerating forwards or if he is coming he's going to be coming straight out of his snap so you're not focused on necessarily how long he can maintain this but how powerful is he releasing out of the initial few steps but also the numbers don't really tell me anything because these guys aren't professional sprinters you can see someone like a John Ross at wide receiver and he is fast as [ __ ] and he's an okay receiver but also he's got bubble gum for knees so why would you ever draft him then again you can see a Wes wilker who's just Compact and you just need to get him the ball game while it's similar to the NFL it's also different they're asked to do different things at the combine you get a chance to see them do exactly what they'll be asked to do at the NFL level the metrics in the that's the thing they're not being asked to do what at the NFL level they're being put in strength and Agility tests so you can guess I'm not a fan of the way that we go about the current combine and frankly a lot of players aren't either the numbers that matter are going to vary by position you can be a 4640 receiver and you can make plays because guess what if you're running 46 the guy covering you is running 4 six as well if you're a corner and you run four except that's not always true because if you're getting out of a block then you're probably running like a 5 seven because your endurance and everything is all blown out and you're not in a straightup sprinter stance because you're starting in the stand you know the upright position looking to your right at the quarterback and then doing a little noop doop doop dance to try to get around the guy it's very unlikely that you're getting that giant accelerated burst from the wide receiver position unless you see wide receivers starting in the Sprinter stance it doesn't make sense to evaluate players using the 40 time unless you want to look at hey this guy knows how to actually get into a sprinting block maybe we can have him go back Canadian football style and he can get a head start it doesn't make sense but you can see like theoretically the type of power he has but you know what else can do that straight up leaps can how far can you jump from the standing position into stand how far can you jump straight up verticals it's simil right and it's it's less complicated than you need to be able to stand here and balance here put your fingers there get your hand over there and then come out of your break perfectly because that's a completely different sport it's literally a completely different sport and the 40 time is a waste of everyone's time there are other parts of the scouting that that can be useful at the combine but I am tired of SE 40 times it's because they're exciting to people they like seeing the excitement but who would care about special teams six and you've got a receiver who runs 4-3 now we got a problem we got an issue here so the 40 matters for the corners more than any other position if you take offensive lineman and defensive linemen it's going to be the 10 time so they're going to run the full 40 yards but Scouts when we get in the meeting we're going to care more about what they look at this the full 40 yard why does this guy need to start in this position as an offensive lineman he's not going to be starting on his toes like that with one hand down in that exact position with his head barreled down he's going to be having his hips completely tilted in a different direction this this is the wrong tilt so they're they're grading him on something that has nothing to do with his jobs but Scouts when we get in the meeting we're going to care more about what they clocked in that 10 time because we're not going to ask offensive linemen to run 40 yards down the field th this is like asking them to take a baseball and Pitch how fast can you throw a fast ball it's a completely different sport wide receivers the three cone drill that time is going to represent how loose and fluid they are the three drill three drill is really good and the broad jump when it comes to pass rushers how high you jump how far you jump goes a long way in explaining what type of juice you have in your body what type of athleticism what type of explosiveness do you possess you watch a guy jump up you watch a guy jump out you'll find out oh my gosh it's also just straight up balance um yeah so they're they're looking at the wrong things they're looking at the wrong things nowadays they have so many cameras on everything that they're not thinking about the basic fundamentals of why we're supposed to be doing this well we're supposed to be doing this because we're supposed to be taking good football players and empowering them to be great football players we don't need to take projects at the NFL level because they're exciting we need to be able to identify through these however many candidates what is it thousands of candidates that want to be drafted every year we need to be able to be able to quickly go through each and every single one of these guys and based off of tape see if they naturally have the abilities to play football well and then go meet them and see if they have good character to at the professional level because we don't have the time to you know evaluate everybody in deep uh you know let's let's have you do a a freaking javelin throw and all these other crazy things we just need to focus on the fundamentals can can you run this can you do this let's go are you a nice person I guess not see you around and it's it's that simple but with all the shininess you'll often see a bad player increase their stock at the draft and it happens time and time again specifically at the quarterback and wide receiver positions you're like holy crap he just secured himself a spot why you just spent all of this time evaluating all of these players and then flying out to meet them and then you see the combine and this guy runs a certain speed did you not see that on tape before it seems really wrong it seems off to me I want to close with a few other things first of all shout out to Aaron from Q13 sorry Fox 13 Sports he has footage of Bill bellich at udub practice today he uh he didn't just go to Nebraska he also spoke to the coaches at University of Washington I believe he went to uh a few other schools as well so I won't name them because I don't know for sure but what's most important about this is that he was probably talking about this football scouting methods he was probably talking about the single wing offense all the way to the 62 defense and how to identify the players and and it but it took him four and a half hours to just say the basic stuff because everyone is too quick trying to Sprint and do a 40 into their NFL careers you got to take the time to focus on where things started uh is that I wanted to talk about the Oki front really quick but because everything got obstructed in the middle I missed the opportunity I was going to talk about how people think that oldtime ideas are no longer relevant but the Oki front is still present in today's NFL the Rams are here using it against the 49ers um so it's it's not like it's not like the wheel is being reinvented except for like Bill Walsh but I think even yeah bill this was after Bill Walsh when this book was produ uh was published so yeah if you're not reading this then you're way behind or you're just you're leaving yourself out a giant chunk of knowledge that would help you and if Matt rule was blown away by anything that Bill bellich had to say no wonder he didn't make it as the Panther's head coach I want to I want to go over this again as we close out on Bill bich and and The Scouting today I was embarrassed yesterday listening to him how smart he is I was embarrassed yesterday listen how smart he is how simple it was he went wish he we went he he went four and a half hours just with the coaching forget the clinic like he came in and met with our coaching staff hey guys I just want to know that today we're going to talk about the single wing offense the straight T offense and the yeah no wonder it took four and a half hours and um three and a half hours in I was like coach would you like a water cup of coffee you like to use the restroom cuz I I mean illuminates things and makes things so simple that you're like oh my goodness the only reason why we didn't learn more is cuz you had to speak slower to us right right it's it's ridiculous anyways uh I know we were all over the place today because I had some issues with my notes in the middle we made it uh thank you for being here I need to continue with the Seahawks offense master class for 2024 we're going to focus on the quarterback coach and Sam Howell probably tomorrow and how that relates to everything we talked about yesterday with Mack Brown and nent uh I expect a lot of screens whether Gino Smith is starting or not specifically because of our current offenses connection to Alvin Kamar and Austin eair so be excited for that uh please like the video and subscribe to the channel and I'll catch you guys around okay