TT On Day 1

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Packers.com » News » Press Releases » April 22, 2010: Ted Thompson Press Conference Transcript - April 22

(Is this a startling development?)
Startling? No. I've been through a lot of drafts, as most of you guys have. There are always surprises. We were a little surprised that Bryan was still available, and we felt like it was a very good value pick for us.

(Are you going to look at starting him inside or at the tackle position?)
We'll let the coaches do that. It's my understanding we're going to put him at tackle. Whether it's left or right or whatever, we'll figure that out as we go along, but he's going to be a good guy to add to our group.

(What do you like about his makeup and the way he plays the game?)
I like his makeup very much. He's a finisher, he's a tough guy. He's athletic, he's got great size. Loves football, real gung-ho type attitude. He's the real deal, I think.

(Are you confident the thyroiditis he had last year is not an issue anymore?)
Yeah, I don't know much about medical stuff, but our doctors were fine with it.

(What do you think about the Iowa impact and him coming from Kirk Ferentz's program?)
I think it's an asset. First of all, the Packers have had good luck with Iowa players in general. But their offensive linemen, even sometimes guys you don't rate as high, they come into the league and play, and they play well. We have coaches on our staff that have worked with Coach Ferentz and his staff and so we have a lot of information about this young man.

(There was a report on NFL Network you were trying to trade up. Was that the case, or did you feel there were enough good guys that would fall to you that you wouldn't need to do that?)
We were fishing going forward, we were fishing going backwards, but we're always doing that, and we'll be doing that tomorrow night and on Saturday. Nothing really of significance, though.

(Last week you said you'd be happy with any position. But now that you've made the pick at tackle, can you tell us how much you really wanted to solidify the future there?)
It's not any different than the answer last week. It really was. This was a value pick for us, we felt like. But yeah, clearly whether it's on the defensive line or on the offensive line, sometimes it's tilted in that favor because there's fewer options. But the answer is still the same as it was last week.

(At the Combine, Bryan talked about how his illness really affected his strength. Did you look at lot at the 2008 tape as well as 2009?)
We did. Believe me, with all these fellas, we've watched a lot of tape in the last whatever. But we focused a little bit more on the end of the season this year, the last few games, and felt like that was when he was at his best and healthiest.

(He struggled a little bit against Graham and Schofield. Does he have trouble with speed?)
No, I don't think that's any more ... those are two pretty good college players, though. But yeah, he did, and that's something, I don't know. He did, he struggled against those guys.

(Does that worry you at all?)
Not overly, no. Everybody has bad days.

(How much does him playing in a zone scheme help you out projecting him?)
Didn't factor in very much at all, nor would it if he had been in another kind of system. But it's good to be able to see that he does some of the same stuff that we do.

(Was it a no-brainer when he was there, or was there debate in your draft room?)
We were pretty solid on who to pick.

(Do you have the luxury of bringing him along slowly? You don't have to put him in the starting lineup right away?)
We don't know. You never know when you're going to have to play, but we'll put him in behind somebody and let him go and take some reps and see where he goes. He'll be competing for starting jobs just like everybody else on our team does.

(If you knew you could get this guy, would you have needed to re-sign both of your tackles?)
Sure. You can't just have five, you know, as you've all seen with our team. You have to have more.

(When did you start to think he could get to you at 23?)
A couple, three picks away.

(You weren't getting your hopes up earlier than that?)
No, I was trying not to even look. The draft, it's a hard thing, picking at 23. I'd rather pick at 32 because that means we're world champions. But it's a hard thing to pick that late, and it will be hard tomorrow to sit there and watch 23 or 23 players come off the board before it's our turn, but that's just the way we have to go through it. Fortunately for the organization I think it worked out OK. I think it's OK.

(What does it feel like now that you don't have another pick until tomorrow?)
I don't want to get in trouble with the league, but I liked it the old way. I liked going three rounds and then four rounds the next day and getting it over. I think sitting around all day today was hard. It probably was for you guys too. Sitting around again tomorrow, there's more time for teams to think up things. It's possible something will surprise me tomorrow. Most of the time, things aren't a real surprise, but it's possible somebody might pull off a trade that surprises you.

(What did you do today, and what do you do tomorrow when you have all day?)
Today, which is not what I'm going to do tomorrow, but today I went through in my own mind several different scenarios. What if this happens, what if this happens, and I caught myself going back into another office, because I usually watch tape in the draft room, but that was made over. So I watched some more stuff and tried to make sure where we are. But we've been doing this for eight or nine months trying to figure this out, so you kind of overcook the goose sometimes. But in fact I was talking with my staff today. I think in the future if in fact it goes like this or even goes beyond this, which it probably will, to maybe have a normal set of tasks, whether it's working on the month of May and scheduling and assignments for different scouts, or maybe working on our summer plans for training camp. Something that you can do something that's productive rather than walking around the building and wondering who you're going to get to pick.

(When you were running through those scenarios in your mind, did one of them have Bulaga at 23 for you?)
Well, yeah. Some. But it was all kinds of different positions, and that wasn't the main focus, though.

(With the first-round offensive linemen, some of them you know they're left tackles. Do you know that with this guy, or would he be a right tackle?)
I can't answer that. I couldn't answer that with anybody, but he's played left tackle. I think that's probably where we'll start him out, but we'll see. Like I say, that's up to the coaches.

(Do you envision him as a guy you can plug in for 10-plus years and let him go?)
(knock on wooden side of podium) Let's hope so. You guys will get mad at me if he doesn't.

(What did you think of John Schneider's picks?)
Good picks. I can't remember what they were, but they were good. No, I talked to John several times. In fact, this is the first time we've had a lot of time to talk and when you're sitting around for three hours waiting on your pick, you have a lot of time to talk, and they did a nice job.

(What did you make of Denver's move to jump up one ahead of you to take the Georgia Tech wide receiver? Did it affect you at all?)
No.

(You said you were fishing either way, but did you get many calls about 23 from behind you and was anything tempting?)
No. We were pretty ready to pick. We were preparing in caes of certain scenarios to be able to go back if there were different options available to us. But when it got to be our pick, we were pretty satisfied and anxious. Our people had been in there for a long time.

(Is there work to do tonight yet or is the board pretty well set?)
Yeah, not much. Sometimes during the course of drafts, and we might do this after tomorrow night's thing, sometimes you adjust the board a little bit based on what you've acquired and what other teams have acquired and what's available on the board and things like that. But right now I think we'll just play it like it's just a continuation of today.

(With sitting around all day tomorrow, could you be doing a lot of trade talks?)
I don't know. People lie to you though. Nobody really tells you the truth. It's hard to do that, because nobody's going to make a trade ... like if you're just trading picks, and somebody says OK you've got the 56 and something else, why don't we make that trade right now. And nobody is really going to do that until it's time for that pick. My guess is over the course of the next 24-36 hours there could be more trades than have been done before in the past with existing veteran players. Like somebody drafted a defensive end on a team and they have a couple extra defensive ends, veterans. My guess is people will try to do that. Because normally during a draft it goes so fast, it's harder to trade veterans because there's physicals to take and other things like that. But I'm just guessing.

(Is that something you would consider, looking at some of your veterans?)
I don't know. We considered all kinds of things. Leading up to the draft, we talk about a lot of different players. But we're not that anxious to do anything, and most people are the same.