NFL Legend Joe Theismann Previews the NFL Season

there's Joe thyman Hey Joe good morning sir good morning to all you guys I hear you talking about Jim gaffan I'm telling you man yeah he's just he is so great I listen to The Comedy channels all the time on my radio but uh I've also had a chance to see him in person anybody who's listening and I know there's millions and millions of people listening um if you get a chance to watch him go have a great night with him he's a lot of fun yeah Jim Gaffin is terrific and uh we're hoping to get chick here in the chick my buddy chick are you you kidding thank you seven I appreciate that you're welcome so Joe I last and now here's Tom real real quick question this is this is just by way of a so I in by car last year and I and I popped this interview on it's in the middle and it's some guy talking football I'm thinking God this guy really knows what he's talking about and it kind of goes on and on who is this this guy really knows his stuff and but the the guy's not saying who he's talking to turned out to be Joe thyman oh well no wonder he knows what he's talking myself it was great there's a lot of people like me that have no idea what they're talking about so to hear from someone that knows I know chick's got a couple questions about this the changes in this in the way football's going to work this year at the kickoff oh yeah what do you think about that Joe the uh the dynamic kickoff they're calling it and why didn't they just back up the kicker I'm not sure Joe what's funny they they call it a dynamic kickoff but I've seen nothing Dynamic about it yet no not yet no has anybody I mean if anybody has seen something Dynamic please let me know and uh we'll be able to watch I I think it's you know they've done this in an effort to supposedly supposedly uh make the kickoff a little safer but I I don't recall many guys coming off the field being checked for concussions after the kickoffs during the course of a game or the course of a season or the course of Seasons so they they have statistics and they'll base it on that and you know they want to make the game as safe as possible I certainly understand that what I was curious about though with everybody lined up where they are on the kickoff so close to one another does this eliminate the onside kick uh I think it does and I and I don't think you can have an onside kick unless you declare you have to tell the other team and it's the end of uh the last two minutes of a game is the only time you have even a shot at having an onside kick I guess well even if you declared does it change where the players line up I don't know the answer to that I don't know see these I'm I'm very curious because you know I started thinking I started watching the K kickoffs and we haven't seen anybody break one yet and they you know you hear the announcers dur the during the preseason say well you know coaches aren't going to show a lot during the preseason they want to sort of mask a little bit of what they're thinking I don't know how many things you can do with everybody lined up where they are on kickoffs it'll be interesting yeah the one thing the NF did not want to see is like at the end of preseason nine kickoff returns for touchdowns and they certainly didn't see any of that matter of fact I don't think there was one if I recall correctly well a lot of people don't don't realize that you used to return punts I mean not only were you a Super Bowl winning NFL MVP but uh Joe returned PS early in his career I started my career at Notre Dame as a punt returner yeah first seven years of my sophomore uh first seven games of my sophomore years seven years heck I could go now seven years yeah coup years eligibility some of that nil money in my first seven years in college I played quarterback other than that no but I returned uh the first seven weeks of my sophomore year till Terry HRI got hurt I wound up returning punts and then my first two years in Washington in 74 and 75 which just seems like yesterday uh I returned punts and then I had a chance to play a little bit of quarterback after that did you score any touchdowns from the almost no chy I almost had one against the Cowboys in Dallas the Seas parted in front of I matter of fact it's funny you mention I can see it as soon as somebody says excuse me I can see pardon me I can see um the Seas parting in front of me and then all of a sudden there was the goal line and then somebody caught my foot I fell on my face that was the only chance I had the only one I really had yeah that had to be terrifying I don't know how you don't fall over looking up to catch a punch I'd fall over fall over it's the neatest thrill in the world it's you against literally 10 guys they don't count the kicker so it's it's you against 10 and the thing is it's not a matter of speed until you get going but it's a matter of quickness to make people Miss I watch guys today have a difficult time returning punts and I think if you just watch the ball it makes it a lot easier but uh some guys are so in such a hurry to get going they don't focus on the ball I absolutely loved it as a matter of fact somebody asked me one day if you could go back and good Lord kept you healthy if you could go back and do one thing in professional football what would it be let me go return punts no kidding that's it I loved it that much I used to stay after practice I used to stay after practice for 30 minutes and catch it behind my back uh catch it with you know barehanded catch it on the run I never wore gloves which I to me as far as punt returners go I a kid has a glove on I would not let him practice with them on if he felt like it might help him in a game but you want to be able to feel the ball you want to be able to see the ball and you got to look the ball in and it's amazing how many guys I've seen in preseason not be able to handle punts see now if you ask me what I'd like you to see you do is I'd like to see you go back and call 70 chip and we win the Superbowl would beine that's right there as well all right good thank you very much we are we are speaking we are speaking with Joe thyman I just heard belich the other day say that the preseason was essentially worthless you like to see it kind of go how close are we to doing away with the preseason games Joe is that certainly two games next year I think if at all but well if they go to 18 games and if they're going to go to 18 games they've got to increase the roster on Sundays to 53 yep yeah they can't stay where they are right so you know one has to help the other because you're running of players right do you know how many quarterbacks started last year oh go gam 65 whoa a quarterbacks last year I mean you know we've had Patrick Holmes is one of those rare people that played the entire season very very seldom do we see a quarterback play the entire season but then everybody else but here's my here's my problem with that is how are you going to evaluate ches and free agents you know we just we just purged the roster of 35 people 32 teams 35 people just hit the streets now you got two weeks to get ready to play football um I I I don't like the fact that they're going to go to possibly two preseason games because your veterans don't play anyway mark my words watch the amount of fumbles that happened in these first two weeks of the regular season because guys aren't used to getting hit watch how many hamstrings get pulled because they're not used to be able being run watch how many guys go down because of heat you know for example we the commanders we open in Tampa I mean you're it's GNA be pretty darn hot yeah but yet you haven't had you haven't had your guys get ready from a physical standpoint from an endurance standpoint to play 60 minutes because they just don't so now all of a sudden you get thrown into the fire and this is where guys really get hurt and this is where I think if the Players Association took a step back and looked at cutting back as opposed to economics for ownership the health of the players healthy not to play any preseason is it really healthy not to have guys banging against each other to get themselves ready and I just I uh I I I I would be dead against eliminating preseason I think you have to have some work you Jaden Daniels uh Caleb Williams even Anthony Richardson for example in Indian he hardly played at all last year um you have a young guy Drake May up in New England now they're going to get into an entirely different speed of the game we've seen guys look outstanding during the preseason one series two series you don't that it doesn't work that way yeah there's three different there's three different speeds of the game there's the preseason the regular season and then the postseason and really to be honest with you then there's a Super Bowl that goes to another so that this game is played at yeah these guys haven't seen at least two of them here's a really dumb question do you and practice do they play actual games in a practice situ like if you against each you know you're got the same team but you play a fake game so to speak so they get some of that experience I guess you could sort of Say Yes Christie to a degree it isn't a fake game you certainly don't hit one another that's they don't anymore we used to well the new uh the new CBA they cut down on when you can wear pads I mean they barely us to Bang Yeah Bang Hands bang Wednesday Thursday and Friday we used to bang at one another all the time what you do is you you basically go through situation football you have about 35 passing plays or you we used to we'd have like 15 running plays where guys bang against one another so you know these are the runs we want to run and then what they have is a scout team that has cards and they showed the scout team cards because this is the defense that we expect to see so they line everybody up with what they expect to see so it's it's quite scripted huh U but as far as game as far as playing actual game no but see my whole approach in in practice was I approached it like a game it you know playing the position in football is not a spot where you turn it on turn it off if you don't go hard in practice you're not going to know what it's like to go hard during the game so I treated I treated every huddle I forced these I listen I would let the guys lolly gag anywhere couldn't lolly gag to the line I wanted full attention my huddle was not a democracy it was a dictatorship it was just I got I got a lot of stuff to say in a very short period of time and I need everybody's attention well that makes sense I mean that's way it should be I would think that's the way I look at it you know you if you want to get good at something you really apply yourself I would not have done well in Joe's huddle [Laughter] chick dirty Joe did you always see the uh the coaches with the they've got their pieces of paper in front of their face with all that stuff did you have the thing on your wrist with the numbers and the plays and everything what you don't you see that we actually we actually used a signal system Don bro don don bro b r e a ux would signal in Joo to play yeah you should ask me that we had a numbering system yeah that's right real real quick the way our offense was set up it was a three-digit numbering system for example you you'd call the formation say trips right and then you'd go 989 which you know it our our our routes ran from one to nine they each had a different designation a nine was a go route a one was a quick out a two was a quick post and so on and so forth and what we used to do is we numbered our system from the single receiver side to the two receiver side because we didn't have a lot of two by tws by then two on each side so the first digit went to the single receiver side that would go basically to Charlie Brown the second the second one would be the inside receiver to the two receiver side now if you had trips there it would be the second receiver out and they would run like a three and then the other one would run a nine so it'd be 939 and and those and D we had designations like the top of his head his shoulder his nose his chest if he touched those different parts that was the indication of the uh of the play that should be called and then there would be certain designations that would be the formations that were called and we used to sit around and you know as a group as the quarterbacks and bro we'd sit there and we'd make up signs you know we'd make up different things and you know have fun with them and you know but Joe would tell Don what the Run Don would signal it in and I would do it and you spend so much time in meetings soon as he started signal something in say it was third down I knew what Joe was thinking right away so half the time most of the I never saw the full signal from Don did you ever uh Shake him off go this next one's going to be a Joe thyman special did it against did it against the Dallas Cowboys in the NFC Championship Game well that was the is that the Russ is that the Russ Grim story where he wouldn't stop that one run right is that yeah that's right we just ran we ran 50 gut um so what happens is Joe signals in 60 outside I step in the Huddle this is the end of the game we got to kill the clock and you know Russ and Randy White have had this ongoing battle like two Warriors going at it so we get in the I get in huddle I go all right let's go H let's go spread right um 50 gut Russ goes or no 60 outside Russ goes no I said what do you mean no he said no I want to run 50 cut I said but Joe wants now I'm I'm middle management okay I got I got I got a really tough decision to make so I said spread right 50 gut we gain four yards i' look to the my signal spread right outside huddle all right spread right Russ goes no I said what do you mean no he says run 50 gut 50 gut first down look to the sidelines 60 outside get in the Huddle don't even give a chance to I go 50 gut I think we ran 10 finally I looked at the sidelines and Joe went forget it the only time I've ever seen him sort of go okay fine but we had we had built in audable systems if I didn't like something I could go from a run to a pass very seldom would we go from a pass to a run unless we got it you know we didn't really get that kind of looks because the offense that Joe created was so creative and inventive that we basically forced defenses into the coverages and into the fronts that we wanted them in and then we ran the plays accordingly today there's a lot of Multiplicity in the defenses there's a lot of up and down and changing and you know obviously formations and you know a lot of times when you see teams with movement when you see uh a tight end or a running back moving all they're trying to do is tell the the quarterback is it zone or is it manto man if somebody moves with the guy moving it's manto man if they stay stationary you can expect his own which helps you read the defense oh these are these are good things to know Joe thyman is our guest Joe it's always a great pleasure I want to remind everybody that Joe among other things has the book How To Be A Champion every day uh six Timeless keys to success from Joe Theisman you can grab that and uh get yourself a little smarter uh what other outlets does one have where where can one find what you have to say about the the games all fall are you posting somewhere I'm not hosting anything I just I'm doing a lot of different shows um I do shows around the country I do podcasts um gives me a little more freedom to be able to you know if I want to travel my wife and I want to go on vacation for a while you know it gives me a chance not to be locked in you you know what it's like being locked into shows oh you're preaching the choir to these I like a little more flexibility yeah yeah this is like the Huddle and I like to be in charge but not working no it's not working at all well give Jaden all the help you can buddy I appreciate it um my goodness hey thanks Joe it's always a great pleasure hope to get you back in the studio on one of these trips yes sir oh anytime I'd love to I love catching up with you guys miss you chck we're gonna have a good year uh okay thank you you know me I'm I'm a nervous Nelly you know that Springs Eternal chck Eternal thanks buddy thanks Joe thanks so much bye