The Pressure of Draft Night: Thomas Dimitroff's Experience

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Transcript

00:00So did you, like the stress of this night, of this round, of the entirety of the weekend,

00:10and when you're the GM of a franchise and it's on your head and your opinions and knowledge

00:20and advice and choices and everyone in that room, there's a, you know, the franchise has

00:26several people involved in it. You got your, you know, your brass, your front office, your power

00:31brokers, your scouts. What was the stress like on your side? It's, you know, these kids wait around

00:38to get selected and they know that every time someone gets picked before them, they lose money,

00:43but they're still all going to be rich. What was it like on your side, the stress of it?

00:49Oh, the stress is unbelievable. The stress is not only unbelievable to pick the right player,

00:54it's to make sure that the pick is going through. I got a call minutes before we drafted Matt Ryan,

01:00basically saying to me by a close agent friend of mine, another agent, not Dougie Fresh,

01:05who said there's a lot of rumors that, that Ozzie Newsom is moving up with the Baltimore Ravens.

01:10He's going to take Matt Ryan. I'm a neophyte general manager. Mike Smith comes in, Scott,

01:15and he's like, Thomas, hold your water. Took a deep breath. We didn't move up to the first pick

01:20to Miami. We stayed there and we were able to get the guy. So there's a lot of information flying

01:25around and stress is flying around on it all. You just don't know all of the leading up into these

01:31picks because you go, you sit down and you're talking to your owner a lot about the scenarios

01:36of what you want to do. And you want to come across if you've got a firm grasp and understanding

01:41of everything. And you really don't. You're kind of being wagged by, it's a wild ride is what it is.