- 7 months ago
Seth and Sean lay out and discuss Seth's streamlined 4-point plan for ways CJ Stroud can get better this offseason.
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00:00Okay, so this is the first one.
00:02So these are four salient and important things.
00:05Where CJ can improve.
00:06Yes.
00:07Okay.
00:07And honestly, first and foremost, we love to see Instagram videos of Jameis Winston doing his crazy exercises and all that stuff.
00:16Yeah.
00:16We love seeing off-season workout videos of guys throwing routes to wide receivers.
00:21Yeah.
00:21This, as CJ himself alluded to, the boring stuff is by far the most important thing for the off-season for CJ Stroud.
00:29And when it comes to operating the nuts and the bolts of the pre-snap operation, remember Kirk Cousins when he was on the Netflix series?
00:37Quarterback.
00:37I do.
00:38Where he would spend so much time throughout the week just practicing the verbiage, getting all of that stuff down.
00:44The pre-snap motion, when to send guys in motion, getting the play call in, all of that, that needs to be the really, really boring stuff that CJ is doing.
00:54I'd rather see an Instagram video of him out there with 11 guys not running routes at all and just doing nothing but pre-snap guys.
01:01I would prefer if they go and do it in cold weather somewhere.
01:03Or in bad, no, not even cold weather, raining weather.
01:06They need to go somewhere where it rains a lot.
01:08Yes.
01:08The Pacific Northwest.
01:09This is Liam Cohen talking to our favorite creepy guy, Peter Schrager, about Trevor Lawrence learning the system in the off-season.
01:21Early on, he couldn't throw because he had the shoulder surgery.
01:24And so everything was above the neck, I guess, right?
01:27Above the neck and below the waist.
01:29So it was footwork-related and learning the system and teaching the system without having to worry about the result of a completion of did you complete the ball or not.
01:41We don't have to worry about that right now.
01:42Let's just worry about and work on learning the cadence, the motions, the shifts, the cans, the alerts, the protections, and then let's work on your feet.
01:51We made a little bit of a change from his right foot up to his left foot up.
01:54That was something he wanted to do.
01:55I credit Trevor for the amount of time that he put into this, especially when he wasn't able to throw.
02:02I mean, this dude was constantly on it, constantly working through the formations, the motions, the shifts.
02:09Like, the amount of time that he put into this with Spencer Whipple, Grant Udinski, and myself, like, he worked his ass off.
02:17Yeah.
02:18That's what CJ needs.
02:20Yes.
02:20And this is one thing.
02:21I'm not convinced that CJ is in love with all the pre-snap motion and everything, and people love to blame the coordinator for, why isn't the more pre-snap motion like a modern NFL offense?
02:32Yes, that's a good question to ask.
02:34It's not always the offensive coordinator.
02:35Sometimes it's the quarterback.
02:37With Aaron Rodgers, that was the issue.
02:39With multiple different people wanting Aaron Rodgers to do more pre-snap motion, Aaron Rodgers didn't like it.
02:44He didn't want to modernize his NFL offense.
02:46He wanted to do things the way he's always done.
02:48And this is why, when CJ couldn't participate in OTAs last year because of his shoulder, because he'd worked too hard in the weight room, that's why I was way more annoyed.
02:58And then I became increasingly annoyed at the people who weren't annoyed.
03:02It's that that's the most vital thing about this system, if you want to really get the most out of it.
03:09It's all pre-snap.
03:11It's all that stuff.
03:12And it's a lot of stuff that's drudgery and boring and not highlight reel worthy, but that's the stuff that sets you up for the highlight stuff.
03:21And the Texans were awful at operating it this year in the pre-snap operation.
03:25So between Kaylee and CJ, they both need to understand, and CJ needs to understand that, yeah, this is the boring stuff you need to work on.
03:33It's really everything in the 20 to 40 seconds before the snap that needs to get way, way, way better.
03:41That's the type of stuff, too.
03:43There's all these conversations about how off-season program and especially training camp have changed so much through the years because with the CBA and guys are, you know, the union's gotten good at getting less punishment inflicted on their body and things like that.
03:57There's nothing about what you're talking about that involves any physicality at all.
04:02Right.
04:02These are all things that are easily worked on, both either out at practice or behind the scenes and things like that.
04:07Yeah, and this is where, when it comes to being a smart quarterback, it's got so little to do with book learning or any conventional measure of intelligence.
04:17It really is about reps.
04:18You know, Peyton Manning's offense was never overly complex.
04:22It was reps, reps, reps, reps, reps.
04:25Yeah.
04:25And all of the things that you saw pre-snap, you can make adjustments, and your wide receivers are on the same page.
04:31So that part of it, I think, just needs to be light years ahead of where it was this year.
04:35And it's understandable that it wasn't a finely tuned machine in the first year.
04:39We saw that with Trevor Lawrence.
04:40In the first half of the season, they were still very clunky in a lot of ways.
04:44And all that stuff that they'd been working on really hit.
04:50So in the same spirit of that, I would say my second point is going back to basics as every athlete should every offseason.
04:58And I used to love hearing the stories about Eli Manning and Peyton Manning going to work with David Cutcliffe in the offseason,
05:03where they would start literally from the ground level of just seeing coverages from field level.
05:11How are you recognizing cover two?
05:13How are you recognizing cover three?
05:15What's your process?
05:16How are you doing all these very basic things?
05:20And being sure that that was all rock solid.
05:23One of the most annoying things that happens when you go to work camps sometimes is that kids always want to work on the really, really cool stuff that they see Miles Garrett doing or something.
05:34And you just have to explain it to them.
05:36Like, no, it's the really boring, basic level stuff that is the bread and butter.
05:41Coming out of your stance.
05:42The great defensive lineman, just looking at it from my perspective and guys I've watched, they spend so much just time on their get-offs.
05:49I'm just watching the ball and getting off quickly.
05:51All of that.
05:52Like, the really boring stuff.
05:53Quarterbacks, likewise, much more of a mental challenge, obviously.
05:56It's getting back to basics in that regard and just breaking it down from the elemental level and starting from scratch again.
06:04Yeah.
06:04That almost feels like an attach or a corollary to the first one that you have.
06:08These are both two, like, very boring things that you've got to get down if you're a quarterback.
06:12The third, and he might be doing that already.
06:14You know, maybe that is his process and maybe it was last year.
06:17I don't want him missing OTAs again.
06:20Certainly not because he was working on setting his PRs in the weight room.
06:23Yes.
06:23I don't, if I ever hear about a PR from a weight room, I'm going to vomit, man.
06:28Yep.
06:28Nobody, you need a Tom Brady physique and that's all.
06:32Yeah.
06:32Okay.
06:33But the thing I would like to do in terms of taking care of the body, twofold, but whatever
06:40he has to do to get over this hurdle he has about scrambling since his concussion.
06:43That's real.
06:44Yeah.
06:44That's real.
06:45That's 100% real.
06:46It's verified by statistics.
06:48Yes.
06:48He was just reluctant to run when he came back from his concussion and who knows how
06:52much that filtered into how he felt in the pocket.
06:55I mean, he was staring, he was dropping his eyes and staring at the rush in a way that
07:02he hadn't been doing when he came back from his concussion, especially in the playoffs.
07:07I think that's partly psychological and maybe he does this already.
07:12Maybe he doesn't, but you got to see a sports psychologist of some sort.
07:16Maybe he does already.
07:17They're like, Tom Brady was doing it from the time he was in college.
07:20You got some kind of hurdle and it's mental.
07:25Find a professional to work on it with you and you can throw out any reluctance you have
07:32because you don't need a head shrinker or anything like that.
07:35Screw that.
07:35This is about doing the best thing you can do to actually be a better quarterback.
07:40The other side of it would just be, like, honestly, I know people laugh at everything,
07:45but, like, Tua Tunga-Vailoa doing the stuff he did and learning how to slide, learning how to fall.
07:49Yeah.
07:50100%.
07:50Tom Brady worked on learning how to fall properly to stay off of his throwing shoulder and all of those things.
07:56Yeah.
07:56Like, he's got to get to a point where there's a systematic approach to avoiding injury.
08:03Yeah.
08:03And it can't just be, like, oh, I saw this, so this is what I'm going to do.
08:07No, you've got to practice it the same way you do any other skill.
08:10That's wild.
08:10Practicing sliding and practicing falling, and yet it makes total sense.
08:14All right.
08:14So, nuts and bolts of the pre-snap operation.
08:17Back to basics.
08:18In the way he sees the game and reads coverages.
08:21Yep.
08:21And then the mental hurdle about scrambling, absorbing injury, absorbing punishment, practicing sliding.
08:28Those are the first three.
08:29What's the last one?
08:30The fourth one would be actual leadership training.
08:34And, you know, because this is something going back to college that CJ said he had to work on with his coaches
08:39regarding his body language and everything else like that.
08:43Look, I mean, it jumps off the screen.
08:44I hate to talk about body language, but, man, when independent observers use the word moping as often as they do with CJ,
08:52I can't remember who the last effective mopey leader was.
08:58There's a few out there, I'm sure.
09:00I'm sure there are.
09:01Text him.
09:02Moping is not a word you want to ascribe to you as a leader.
09:06And yet that's what people look at CJ and they say, why is he moping?
09:09Now, this is, and I love the feedback I get from military people when I talk about this,
09:16because I hate making the military analogy when it comes to football.
09:20Obviously, football is nowhere clear.
09:21But there are some, you know, military people use the football analogies all the time.
09:26So I try to do this as respectfully as possible.
09:28But the thing about the military is they actually train leadership.
09:32They don't talk about it, about, you know, the things that you can do or anything.
09:37They have a systematic approach to training leadership.
09:41And it starts with posture and it starts with presentation and moving forward.
09:48And there are things you can do to systematically train leadership.
09:52I don't know if the Texans do this or not, but I think CJ needs it.
09:57There was a company called Afterburner, which is, they're a consulting company
10:02that uses former fighter jet pilots, former special ops guys that go in and they teach companies
10:11how to basically mission plan and analyze and work on a system where you operate like a special operations unit
10:21or like the Blue Angels or something when it comes to planning a mission,
10:25assessing how it went afterwards and everything.
10:28And the thing that's so intriguing about them is that that's who the New York Giants used
10:33to come in and work with them before they won their Super Bowls.
10:37And specifically, it was really helpful for Eli Manning.
10:41Yeah.
10:42Because Eli Manning was put into a role with a formal structure where this is what was expected of him as a leader,
10:48how they operated, all of those things.
10:51And I think Afterburner is still in existence.
10:53But I went and did their training once.
10:55It was awesome because I had a friend that was working there at the time.
10:59But it was like that.
11:02That needs to be addressed.
11:03It can't be.
11:06He needs to improve in that regard.
11:08What does it entail?
11:09Do you go off to like some campus somewhere?
11:13And how long?
11:14I'm really curious about this.
11:15When I did it, I went down to Miami.
11:16Okay.
11:17Because my friend Scott Leonard was working for them at the time.
11:20I mean, this was after they had worked with the Giants and they were kind of trying to figure out ways to market it to sports teams more and everything.
11:27And you just do it like it was me and then like five other companies that had sent executives there and everything.
11:33And you just – the cool thing about it is –
11:36So it was an NFL player in a room full of executives taking this leadership.
11:40Yeah, yeah, yeah.
11:40But it was cool.
11:41There was a group of – there was one that was like a hog farming operation out of Iowa and everything.
11:46Did you go out to dinner and stuff like that afterwards?
11:49Yeah, yeah, it's all – you spend like 12 hours a day with everybody and everything.
11:51Yeah, yeah, that's fun.
11:52That's fun.
11:53And you sit and play pool like with the officers that are in charge.
11:57It was cool because like it was a couple of former generals.
12:00There was a –
12:01Dude, it sounds amazing.
12:02Yeah, it was really cool just hanging out with the former officers and everything.
12:07But the really cool thing about it is that like –
12:09So one thing that the military does a better job of than a lot of football coaches is they recognize and understand that people get sensitive when they get criticized.
12:18And they basically say, you know what, we got to – you try to make it – you recognize and acknowledge that.
12:25And you figure out a way to give feedback without it feeling like a personal attack.
12:29And the way a lot of these, you know, elite units operate is that any – no matter what your rank is, you can – when you're assessing how a mission went.
12:40Yeah.
12:40You – anybody of any rank level can put his two cents in.
12:44Yeah.
12:44And one thing you do is you don't say the person's name.
12:48You talk about it by position.
12:50Yeah.
12:50You know, so like say if you're the quarterback, you don't say, you know, Nico needs – Nico, you need to run the route differently here.
12:57You might say the X receiver – so the X receiver in this instance needs to do this or whatever.
13:03Okay.
13:03You kind of – you take the person out of it and just talk about the – and it creates an environment where people can have these conversations without feeling attacked or whatever.
13:14And it also makes it easier for the leader.
13:16But the leader also has to accept feedback from like say Nico.
13:21Say like so Nico can be like, well, you know, so the X receiver here was, you know, what the X receiver might have thought was that I, you know,
13:28I was going to break in on this instead of extending my route and everything.
13:32So anyway, so whether it's Afterburn or anything else like that, there are systematic ways to teach leadership.
13:37Yeah.
13:37And to create leadership that elude a lot of football coaches who just like to talk about, yeah, this guy's a great leader.
13:44That guy's not a great leader.
13:45All right.
13:45Well, what is a great leader?
13:46Yeah.
13:47What isn't a great leader?
13:49How can they improve their leadership?
13:50Like that's the – there's – and maybe the Texans do something like this already.
13:55If they don't, I would encourage them to do it.
13:57Sure.
13:57Sure.
13:58Those are good ones, man.
13:59And so you had 12 of these on your YouTube channel?
14:02Yeah.
14:02All right.
14:03Go watch that episode of Seth's YouTube as well.
14:05Oh, that would be another one.
14:06The fifth one that I would throw in there too is just operating with wet footballs.
14:11Oh, yeah.
14:12Like I don't know.
14:12If CJ goes the entire offseason throwing nothing but wet footballs, I think that would be awesome.
14:18And it might look glitchy and he doesn't – he's not making as many receptions and all of that stuff.
14:22But the biggest thing holding this team back right now partly is that CJ cannot hold the damn football when it's slippery.
14:27Wet footballs in training camp is the equivalent of working on a new pitch at spring training.
14:34You're right, right.
14:35You're right.
14:35Like, oh, my God.
14:36Lance McCurray – Lance is probably a bad example.
14:38But, you know, remember, like there was spring training.
14:40Verlander's got a 5.86 ERA in spring training.
14:43Oh, no.
14:44We go through this every year, Sean.
14:47I tell you that at the beginning of every spring training.
14:49And then you rapidly forget it.
14:51That's not true.
14:53I've gotten better.
14:55I've gotten better.
14:56I've gotten better.
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