Going Long with Chase Daniel | A New Orleans Saints PodcastLuke McCown Interview | Going Long with Chase Daniel | A New Orleans Saints Podcast
Daniel with a Fay touchdown. Introducing Going Along with Chase Daniel, Daniel throws Touchdown, a brand new podcast from the New Orleans Saints Joan Chase Is. He sits down with eight former New Orleans scenes quarterbacks, dealing into their careers and catching up on their lives today, just as only an NFL quarterback can je. I mean, Brie, you sort of look like them.
I mean, how often do you get confused for Chase Daniel?
First of all, it's Breece with an ass, not Brie. I never get mistaken for Chase Daniel because about two inches taller than him.
Going Long with Chase Daniel.
Daniel so the mzon caught for the touchdown?
Man, what's it like looking up.
To a guy like me?
Starts now.
Welcome back to Going Along, a Saints podcast. I'm Chase Daniel, your host, and to day I am joined by none other than Luke McCown. Luke, how you're doing brother?
What's up?
Chase?
I'm doing well, buddy? How are you good?
Where are you at?
Man East Texas? A long star lone star?
You know, yeah, man, I see that, I see that buck behind you right now? You're still into hunting. Is it hunting season yet? No, I don't want to lose the start.
Absolutely, it's we're about three weeks away from the beginning of both season, and so I was. I was actually came in off the ranch. I was out playing food plots and putting fertilizer out and man, doing a whole bit. Man, just enjoy it.
Is that your everyday life now? Like takeing like so obviously you know, we talked about what the Saint's podcast is about, but it's just letting everyone into your life as of now. We'll get back into your playing crek because I think it's fascinating all the way back really to high school. But right now, like, just tell everyone what the day to day life with you. I know you guys have got a lot of kids. We want to We saw you guys, I think two years ago at Peo camp all that stuff. Just tell everyone what's going on. Man.
Yeah, we still have a lot of kids, even even since two years ago, still got a bunch of them. So uh yeah, six six kiddos and we just sent one to college. That's how old I am? Wow?
Well how old are you though?
Forty three?
Okay, see I'm thirty I'm thirty. I'll be thirty eight in October. So six in one to college man.
Yeah, sent one to college. And so he's a he's a freshman, redshirt freshman at Limestone University of Division two program out in Gapnee, South Carolina. Mike Furry, former receiver the Gosh, the Bears, the Lions. He was the head coach out there and recruited Jonah to come out with Mike Furry.
I was Mike Furry coached for the Chicago Bears. Yeah, he was there in twenty eighteen to nineteen, no kidding.
Yeah, Mike's a great dude. Man known Mike a long time. Josh played with Mike. My brother Josh played with Mike and Detroit and and so they've got a great staff. Mike is now left this year. I had a couple of great seasons at Limestone, left this year. He's now the the wide receivers coach at South Carolina and Jericho Kattrie another name is not the head coach. Erica and I were in the same draft class about six picks apart, uh in two thousand and four. So so a lot of familiar faces out there, so it's good. And then you know, I've got I've got five, I've got to the junior in high school. I've got a freshman in high school. I've got an eighth grader, a sixth grader, and a fifth grader. So we've got j V football, football, We've got eighth grade volleyball. Man, We're so we're were to eat up with ball games and dance competitions. And how are you?
How are you surviving? Man? How is your wife survived? You're spread as college to fifth grade?
Dudel, Listen, she is. She's unbelievable. I mean when when they talk about kicking your coverage, I absolutely did that. For sure. She's pretty amazing. But you know, my days, it starts at about five point thirty in the morning, and with a little coffee and a little Bible and U and then getting kids off to school, making breakfast, making sandwiches, and then you know, some amount of a workout not quite what it used to be.
Yeah, be able to feel that, man.
So, and then I'm doing some quarterback training. You know, I've got a handful of kids. I'm director of skill development for Apex and Tyler and So, which in particular is quarterbacks. And so, yeah, I trained a handful of kids on a weekly basis, and and then I take care of a four hundred acre ranch.
Man, you well, thank you for coming on this podcast, because I don't know how you have any time, man, because I have. I have three kids right, one that literally just turned seven two days ago, a four and a half year old girl and a three year old girl. And man, we are trying to survive right now. It is like we're getting we're getting into sports. Uh, My daughter's in soccer, she's in dance, she's in tap. My sons in basketball, football, and baseball, and I'm coaching all the teams and I'm still trying to work a little bit and it's just it's crazy. So we're getting into the fun phase, oh with sports. But speaking of kids, like you grew up with two older brothers, right, who also played quarterback. What were some of those backyard football games like, man? Because I had a sister growing up and she was five years older, so we never really were that close like where we could go out in the backyard and play. She was in high school, I was you know what I mean, what were those football games like? Man?
Yeah, listen, I mean we were a small town you know, small, small four a school, and so every weekend was, Hey, we're going to the high school football game and then gonna have three or four sleeping over cousins sleeping over. Like my whole family, all of my aunts and uncles and and all of my cousins were all here, and so we just kind of grew up doing life together. And so the weekends it was all football in the front yard. And so whether football, wolf football, whatever it was, you know, it was we were doing something, uh sports specific. We were playing ball some way shape or forming. And then when it wasn't that, it was one on one in the driveway. I mean we probably did more one on one basketball me and Josh, Josh and Randy, or me and my dad against Joshu and Randy. And then then we did just get out and uh and throw the football. So there was always a competition to be had, yeah, and that's where kind of it all started. I mean, you know, my story was always you know, everybody's a little bit different. Mine was always, Uh, if my brothers can do it, I can do it too. It was never like I lived in their shadow. It was always like, hey, if they can do it, shoot, I can do it, I can probably do it better. You know, that's just kind of my mindset was. Yeah, my brothers to this day, will We'll tell you it always frustrated them that I would I would come home and every day was a good day for me. It was just like it didn't matter three.
Selling my youngest man, She's just always in a happy movie to pass.
It is like Luke never has a bad day. And but it was because you know, I competed with them every day, and it was it was something that, uh, something that shaped me and molded me and helped me be a confident young man.
Yeah, man, that's awesome. Heye, so total everyone. I mean obviously didn't say the names of your brothers, but random Accown and then Josh McCown. But Josh was also he played eighteen years. He was like one of the guys I looked up to because I fall and you know, singing with you because we followed a lot of different teams to play on a lot of different teams. Yeah, uh in our career journeyman type guys. But Josh is currently the quarterback coach for the Minnesota Vikings. Yeah, how does he like?
He was?
He was in Carolina, uh last year and in this year is now with the Vikings. How does he like coaching? Man?
Yeah, he loves it, number one, he loves it. He loves the the opportunity to impact men, you know, and that's that's it's more about that than it is about football.
Yeah.
You know, as as believers, you know, our our desire is to have an impact on this world while we're here one way or the other, right and and through whatever vocation, whatever means we get to elbows with people. We want to have an impact and hopefully not leave bruises. So you know, it's it's uh, he he really enjoys that aspect of it. I think there's uh he's got two boys in Division one football. He's got Owen his quarterback, a U t s A right now and uh and doing well was was actually week one was the Manning Award winner for that for that week game. Uh Aiden is at Lamar and he's a he's a gonna be a red shirt freshman this year. And so I think there's you know, on those plane flights on Saturday, he's like where can I find a game at? You know, absolutely loving it, you know, and and it's it's what he's always kind of wanted to do. Yeah, is he knew at at some level he was gonna coach when he retired. You know. That was that was right at the right at the beginning of COVID, And they were in Carolina at the time, and so they shut down football out there. Well you know, us in Texas, we weren't gonna shut down football anything. I mean, it could be you know, nuclear blast, and we're gonna find a way to find football if we can. And so so they they made a tough decision of moving from Myers Park, which is where Drake May was playing at. So Owen was back up to Drake May and and so Josh they were out there, and so they moved here at the beginning of COVID so that he could play football, so that Owen could play football for two years junior senior year. And and Josh you know, jumped into coaching at that point, enjoyed the heck out of it. Then the whole Texans thing came about, where you know a lot of people don't understand, like Josh never uh. He signed with the Texans later that year to just kind of help mentor Deshaun a little bit. Was never I don't think he was ever active that season actually, but after that season, there was a lot of talk about Josh and and coaching and all this other stuff and uh and they're the ones that approached him about the head coaching position.
I know, that coaching position.
Why is Josh getting an opportunity to be a head coach and all this other stuff. Yeah, so he was he had gotten approached by uh by the Texans about considering or about interviewing for the yeah, the head coaching spot. And uh and there had been some uh you know, Hugh Laurie and Philadelphia had encouraged him, like you know, Josh spent time at Philadelphia, Uh, and uh, you know, spent a lot of time there, Uh, you know, talking to Doug about being a being a coach, talking and just kind of picking Doug's brain about about stepping into that space. And then the Texans say, hey, we'd love for you to interview. Well, he interviewed you. What's gonna what's gonna hurt? Right, at least get my feet wet with.
The experience, absolutely.
And he and he knocked it out of the park. And so you know, uh, there was a lot of they were really close to signing, signing on the dotted line, and and then the Flora stuff came out and a lot of just kind of a lot of stuff that would have muddied the waters for anybody. And so it really worked out. I really believe this that it really worked out because at no fault of his own, there would have been a lot of of shade throwing Josh's way and maybe towards his family for for no fault of his own, he was just doing what somebody ask him to do and then did well at it. And so it really ended up working out that that he didn't step right into a head coaching spot. Then he goes to Carolina, you know, they draft uh Bryce and and uh you know, have have a tough season out there last year. And and then Kevin calls him and says, hey, what do you think about, you know, coming and joining us up here?
And it's a little bit colder up there in Minnesota, Man, Minnesota, a little colder. That's that's man, that's fascinating insight. Yeah, crazy, All right, let's go. Let's go to your high school days, man, And really from high school you went on and you signed with Louisiana Tech. But I heard from a little birdie with some research, you had offers from Oklahoma and Florida State. Why did you end up signing with Louisiana Tech?
Yeah, A million dollar question, right, So I got to stand on my brother's shoulders. Randy was a Dave Campbell Super Team quarterback coming out of high school. Went to Texas A and M Josh actually didn't get to play. He didn't start a high school game until he was a senior because he was five to seven when he was sixteen years old. And so we're notoriously late bloomers. My son probably went Division two because he's kind of a late bloomer. He's just now kind of growing into his body, and so we're we're notorious kind of late bloomers. Josh was five seven on his driver's license sixteen years old. It's five foot seven now he's six ' four, you know, And and so so he was kind of late to the game. Had a tremendous senior year, uh and and ends up going to SMU. Yeah. We had three different head coaches and three coordinators in three years. So he's like, this is not He started as a freshman, started about half the games as a freshman, ends up transferring to sam Houston State, has a huge year there, becomes a third round pick, does extremely wealthy combine in the senior ball this other stuff. Third round pick. So I say all that I had a name because of my brothers, and so I just just naturally had a little bit of attention because of that. Now I was a pretty good athlete, you know, I was. I was all district uh as a sophomore in basketball.
Yeah, you're a baller in basketball. People don't realize you're you're pretty good a basketball that I had some.
I had some. I had some athletic ability, and uh So I got on the field and we were rolling. We were we were a four eighteen small school, but we were uh generally the top fifteen team in the state. We had some guys. My running back my junior year was a senior. He went to Texas A and M. He was top two or three in the country as a running back, and so the name was Richard Whittaker. Uh So we had some guys that could play. But I did, I had I was Depending on the publication, I I ranked somewhere in from two to about eight in the nation as a quarterback. Uh So, I always tell people I ranked too, because.
You oh to you got to see too.
Yeah, Rock Berlin, who's a buddy of mine, was number one.
I was just about to ask who number one was.
Was number one, and so you know, all kinds of records that evangel Christian get a ready Player of the year, all this stuffy and uh so I had Florida State, I had Oklahoma had University of Miami. Bush Davis was in my fieldhouse. Offered me, you know, uh that that incredible recruiting class they had with John Vilma, DJ Williams, Kellen Winslow, Andre Johnson, like you got all those guys and so, but I kind of knew I wanted to stay somewhere close to home. I'd been to Texas, A and M. I kind of seen, you know, the the tradition down there and that that recruits itself. You know, I had been to SMU, but I was six four and about one hundred and seventy pounds stop and wet, you know, and so I kind of looked at Randy was a red shirt, Josh was a true freshman playing and kind of weighed those two and I went, well, I need a red shirt. I needed I need to gain some weight, gain some experience, and and but I also saw their two offenses. Well, Randy was in the kind of the three yards in a cloud of dust, Leland mceilroy, you know, play defense that win those guys, right, and so there wasn't a whole lot of throwing the ball. I think they played Nebraska one time and Randy was like three of six, you know, and so it was kind of so yeah, looking long term, it's like, go do what you do as a quarterback, like we want to we have vision for like trying to make it to the highest level, and so you're not going to do that only throwing it four or five six times a game.
Yeah.
Well, Louisana Tech was kind of air raid before it was cool. Right. Gary Croton, who had come over from BYU and helped Ty Detmer set all these ruckers, was now had been the head coach for several years that was in a Tech kind of installed this four wide, five wide, throw it all over the place. Tim or Tay setting records left and right, Troy Edwards, I mean, everybody knows about the Nebraska game where Tim throws for like five point fifty. Well, Troy has twenty two receptions for four hundred and ten yards in that game, and it's just kind of nuts, right. And so so my final two was Oklahoma and Louisiana Tech. And people are like, are you kidding me? She couldn't be more different. And Oklahoma wanted me. They had just had Josh Heipel and he was graduating. They wanted me to come in and compete. And Louis in the sex said now we've got a guy that's going to be a starter this year. We want you to coming to red shirt.
Yeah.
I was like, well, they throw the ball. They're kind of a small country town and kind of like that. A couple hours from home, not bad, and they want me a red shirt. And then a lot of prayer goes into it, right Chase, a lot.
Of player goes into it.
Just felt like, man, this is where God wants me to be. And so I get to Louisiana Tech. In first three games, I'm red shirting and starter tears as Aca Arter gets hurt, gets hurt, backup comes in and it's a little bit shaky, and so they come to me at halftime they're like, hey, it's up to you, but we'd like to pull your red shirt if you're ready to play. Like I'm looking at them, going, of course, let's go.
You know, let's competitive, let's roll.
You know, forty five games later and you know, a handful of NCAA records later, and fourth round pick and so and more importantly and meet my wife, yeah, you know, start a family there. So it was I mean, I wouldn't you know, I wouldn't. I wouldn't take it back for anything.
I'm looking at all the stats and it's like, you know, almost over a thousand completions, almost thirteen thousand passing yards. He threw for eighty eight touchdown passes, you ran for ten. The athleticism speaks for yourself. You're a fourth round pick and that's where I want to go next. I'm glad you brought it up. You did my job for me, so I appreciate it. You re selected in the fourth round of the two thousand and four NFL Draft by the Cleveland Browns.
Where everything wants to be draft.
I know, I know. We actually just did a segment on the TV show I'm on of like the Browns quarterbacks, and you were on that jersey just like because it's that viral jersey and it's just some thing like, oh my gosh, I'm I'm getting to talk to this guy tomorrow. But what did you what was your rookie year like? Because you were thrust into starting like weeks twelve through fifteen like early as rookie, which is really difficult to do.
Yeah, it was tough. It was tough. I mean so so Jeff Garcia had had several really strong years in San Francisco ends up signing a pretty good deal as a as a free agent to Cleveland. Kelly Holcombe had been there at played spot you know, kind of spot play for the last two seasons and they were kind of looking for some some stability, some young stability to kind of developed. They'd had a couple of guys that just didn't work out. And uh, and so here's the funny crossover is butch Davis was the head coach and a lot of that Miami staff, the Miami uh, Chuck Pagano, Uh, you know all these guys that came over from Miami that were in Cleveland now. And so I at the Combine. They they schedule a meeting with me at the Combine and I sit down with him, and they were notorious for kind of back room spotlight on you, kind of this intimidating you know, uh, you know, kind of feel of it. Uh. And so Butch's first question was, Man, I was in your fieldhouse, offered you a scholarship and you went to Louisiana Tech. What's going on? You know? And so they tried to spend it like we're you're afraid of competition and all this other stuff. And well, clearly I wasn't afraid of competition because the very next year, I'm starting as a true freshman and my second game is the start was against you guys, Al Blades, Ed Reid, Mike Rump, Phillip Buchanan, Dan Morgan, Jeremy Shockey, uh, Santana Moss. I mean, you name, it's a college football team, and uh and so uh, you know, and and I had a really good game. We threw it. We threw the ball seventy times.
I was just about to say that.
And we had eighty plays called. We had eighty called in the game. We threw it seventy two times. I ran at the other eight or was sacked and uh and and we were the reason that year that they didn't go to the national championship. The national championship game that year was Oklahoma and Florida State, and it came down to margin of victory, kind of the the you know, the quality of and and they beat us by eight or nine or something like this, forty two thirty three or something, some weird score, and and we were the reason why they didn't. They didn't go to the national championship.
Take that, Butch.
And so that's what I said. I was like, well, clearly, I wasn't afraid of competition. I just felt like that was that was where I was supposed to be. And but it was funny because Butch goes, I got you now, you can't say no to me now. And so yeah, so we get into the game and into that season, and it's it's been a struggle. We had some some astronomical number twenty two twenty three guys on end of reserve, like fifteen of them are starters. It's crazy. We had an entire new offensive line by the time I was playing. And so as a matter of fact, that my first start was against New England at home, but against New England after they had won twenty one in a row. It was then NFL record, Welcome to the NFL. Yeah, welcome to the NFL. And I had had a really good preseason. It was kind of one of those deals. I had a good preseason and so I kind of felt like, you know, hey, just give me on the field and I'll show you what I can do. And yeah, got on the field and it was like, well, this ain't the same as presew. I feel like I was probably like Caleb Williams this past weekend, like this ain't preseason anymore, buddy, Yes, yes, So that was that was my welcome to the NFL moment. It was. It was fourteen to nothing, no joke. It was fourteen to nothing in that game with about twelve minutes and fifty nine seconds left to go on the first quarter, so about a minute and the second had gone off and they'd already scored twice and we had it all one time. So they were turning open and kickoff and then they go three plays in a touchdown. It was it was Bethel Johnson returning open the kickoff, and but anyway, it was it was tough man, and uh, but you learn a lot. You learn you know whether or not you can make it in the league.
Uh.
And I took my licks for four games as a rookie, started four games the last kind of four games of the season, on on on, And I don't mind saying it. On a bad team. We were a bad team. I was a bad player. I wasn't ready for that.
Yeah, And it's hard for any it's hard for any rookie.
It's tough. It's tough. So yeah, but who you are?
Yeah, I mean that's what I was going to sort of ask next. I'm sure those that sort of helped shape who you were as a player and almost like dove internally to you, like build that hunger. Like, man, I can play. I just need to be in the right situation. Well, guess what, You're traded after your rookie season to Tampa.
What was that?
Like? Are you like, is this just how the NFL is supposed to working, supposed to get traded? I thought, you guys drafted me use the fourth round pick, and then you get traded to Tampa and you're there O five, O six, oh seven, and O eight, I think, right, yeah.
Yeah, so really crazy man, because you get to get to Tampa and and it's John Gruden and you know, they won a Super Bowl two years prior to beat the Raiders in the Super Bowl in two thousand and two and or three years prior at that time. And so, but you had heard about this real wordy, real complex West Coast offense that you know, and and you see Gruden and he's got the you know, he's got the chucky face and and and you know, you get there and it's like, man, this is stressful. This is different than you know, Hey, you're you're kind of the quarterback of the future in Cleveland, and one year later they ship you off for a six round pick to to Tampa Bay. Now, now we landed in his palm trees in beaches, so that was better. But but you know, he throws his playbook at you, and it's like, hey, not only are you gonna, uh, you know, compete with Chris Sims and Brian Greasy and Achilles Smith was there at the time, believe it or not. And uh, and but you're gonna you're not not only learn the offense, but you're gonna memorize the formations and the personnel groupings to where I'm just gonna give you the personnel grouping and like you know, seventy two all goes special and you're gonna know what formation we have it in that week, so you're gonna memorize that. It's like, holy cow, that's not what Cleveland was like. But again, it just it shaped you because it made you learn it. You know, I'm a firm believer that if stress doesn't wear you out, it teaches you what you need to know in terms of of preparation and getting you ready. And it was such a stressful environment that that John put us in that if I could weather that storm, I could weather anything in the NFL threw at me. And I felt that. And so by year two, uh, Brian, Brian Greasy has been the starter, uh and and done really well. And then uh, my second year there, Brian gets hurt halfway through that season. Let me go back. Brian gets hurt halfway through that seasons in a cl against Miami Dolphins. Chris comes in for the last six or seven games and leads us to a wildcard game against the Redskins, and Mark brunell Our Buddy brew Brew beats us. He beats us, and uh and uh so they they they trade Greasy. After that season, Chris is the starter and I'm the backup, and I feel really good about it. I feel like I've got the offense of playing extremely well through the through the O t as in mini camp and and and uh, you know, I just feel really good about where I'm at as a player. And the last practice of OT as the last period of OT as I get out of the pocket scrambling around deck Brooks chase me, I got to cut back on him and I pop my A c L. And it's like, oh gun it, you know.
And it's one of those.
Things that's just like the worst timing ever, right, because you go from a situation where you got just beat up emostly mentally, you know in Cleveland, maybe you know, traded. What is? What is? What is the league perception of me now is after a rookie year that wasn't very good and all this other stuff, and now I've got an A c L and I haven't gotten any you know, good film out there. How's it? How's it all going to work out? And you know, the the silver lining and all of that was back as a rookie. They made me sign a five year contract, which was a little bit unusual for a fourth round pick. That was retarted for kind of the first and second rounders and usually a fourth round pick. Third round PI would have signed a three year deal. Uh, they made they Cleveland made the whole roster signed five year contracts. The whole draft class signed five year contract And it turned out to be a silver lining because you know, had I been on a three year deal and I just popped my a cl Tampa would have had no reason to keep me around. Yeah, it would have been. But I healed pretty quickly. I was running in two months. I was actually they instead of placing me on IR they put me on PUP. I was back for the end of the season. Uh, just kind of as an inactive third with a brace someoney, But I was practicing full speed and and and come back and in year four uh and ended up starting, uh a couple of games at the end of that season, played really well. Actually beat the Saints. I think it's the reason why Sean probably UH signed me when available after after spending some time in Atlanta. UH beat the Saints and what was kind of the deciding factor for the NFC South that year. In two thousand, we were both I think we were both eight and four at the time and uh, and it was kind of kind of came down to this game. It was Week twelve in the Super Dome and I throw a touchdown pass to Jeremy Stevens with about, uh, with about twenty seconds left in the game something like that, and end up we end up winning that game. And so I always got that on Drew, like, you know.
Like yeah, yeah, oh for sure.
We went head to head twice and we're five hundred, so you know, I'll that's amazing. All good?
How you know? You you you spent some times with different teams, right, you went to you know, Jacksonville, Atlanta and then to the Saints. What was that like for you moving around and being in all these different teams? Because I did it as well. I think it was with six teams in my career, and it was like two teams the first seven years of my career, then like five the last six, so I'm moved around a lot. How was that on you and your family when you were doing all that?
Yeah, it was tough. I mean this is where you you you lean on your your spouse, right, and my wife took care of a lot of things so that I could focus on on work. We homeschooled during that time to make it easy so that kids weren't kind of getting pulled in and out of school, you know, one day and and and the next, and so there there there was at least some continuity for them. I'll never forget being when I got traded from Tampa after signing an extension in Tampa and and they signed Byron left, which and draft Josh Freeman and uh, and so there's kind of this three way battle for the starting job, and uh, they end up going with Josh at the beginning I guess, going with Byron at the beginning of the season, and and trading me to Jacksonville. And it was literally an overnight trade. And Mark Dominic calls me. It's like, hey, I'm gonna trade you tonight to Jacksonville, and he said I and Mark's a great guy. Mark's a great guy. And he called me. He's like, listen, Mark marks me the extension. And we'd always had a really good relationship and he said, listen, you know, I won't lie to you. We we kind of had, you know, different metrics for several of you that were in this quarterback competition as far as what we could get for who and we could get the most for you, and so we had to do what was right business wise. And I said, Mark, I got it, you know, and we can take that right you explained it to me. I'm good, right, And so he said, I want you to know that the highest bidder that I that I found I tried to consider you and your family was Jacksonville, which is just three hours up the road, so it's not just this move across the country type thing. And but it was overnight, it was literally So I get the call that night and we wake the kids up the next morning about five o'clock in the morning and I was like, hey, we're going on an adventure, you know. And they didn't know any different, right, And so you know, I go up there and so for the next three years when Jacksonville. But again, I mean by the end of my care and you know this, but the end of your career, you kind of understand. This is the way the NFL works, and and we're always looking for opportunities. I always wanted that opportunity to to to go be a starter. I know I can do it. I know I can do it. But I always tell people this, The league rarely gets it wrong right when they say you're a backup, you probably are. The league rarely gets it wrong, and so towards the end of my career, I was going, hey, I'm good with who I am, and I think I became a better quarterback because I could. I could. I didn't have to try and prove myself. Now, some of it was because we playing behind a guy like Drew. You kind of go, oh, no, that's a good that's a guy that's really freaking good, you know, and and so there was no like I'm trying to be better than him. It was just like, I'm gonna go be myself because I'm not. I'm not as good as that dude. So there was there was an element of that, but there's an element of of understanding that God's got plans for me in my career and everywhere that we went, we tried to have an impact through Bible study, through community, just different things that we did with other players, with other young players and other young families, young parents, young players that just became young parents, and what we could share with them, and so it very much became like a mission field chase where hey, amen, man, God was the one that kind of said, hey, I'm I'm kind of through with you here, but I'm not through with you altogether. I'm gonna move you over here. I've got work for you to do here. And every place we went it was like he was putting us in a new position to have an impact on somebody's life. And by the end of that, you know, we go to the Saints in twenty twelve or twenty thirteen rather and me and Ben Watson get there together and saying at that time didn't have a chaplain per se. Rob Wilson. Wilton did the most of did most of the chaplain stuff. But Ben and I very much same draft class, known each other for a long time. I saw it as, hey, this may be our last stop, and so let's let's let's try and leave something in this locker room. And so, you know, trying to do our part with pouring indo guys, spiritually, emotionally, you know, more than just football, right, And that made getting picked up and moved and traded and those types of things a lot easier.
That's awesome, man. And yeah, I was asked at the time of the Saints, but but you hit it, and I mean you ended up retiring in twenty eighteen. What did that mean to you?
Did you have?
It was a thirteen year career. I don't want to get it wrong, because I had to get my mind wrong.
That's exactly right. Thirteen. I started a year fourteen in Dallas and tore a musclim my shoulder the first preseason game. Yep, and just kind of said, I, yeah, I really did with another team after I left.
Yeah, because yeah, you were the Saints for a while and it seemed like home. And I was just like, to your point, you and Ben, right, I came back in twenty seventeen, I believe and the chaplaincy with Rob and Drew and everyone was rolling, and so it was like a breath of fresh air to come back and be like, man, this is just like jump right in morning studies, nights like all this stuff. So that's probably a big deal to do with you and Ben. I just want to let you you know that. But last question we got two minutes before we got to get out of here.
What was it?
What did it mean to you to have the career you had in the NFL thirteen years? You said it was very much like you know, sharing your faith was a big part of your journey. What would you leave us with with the last two minutes.
Yeah, listen, it was it wasn't what I'd always dreamed. It was that. That's not going to mince words with that. Nobody dreamed of going to the NFL and being a journeyman backup. But the one thing that I tell my kids is, yeah, I didn't win the Super Bowls. Yeah, it was never the career star. But this was hard. And I did it for thirteen years, and it wasn't easy, And it wasn't always roses and and and I never went into a training camp where I felt like, I say never, maybe very rarely where I felt like at my spot solid, I'm good in here, right, And so I had to grind and for thirteen years, man, it was a grind to to prove myself year in and year out. I can name off about eight of those thirteen years where there was a draft pick that came in, whether third round or first round, in Blaine Gabbert who you know, or you know, various different things. I mean, So it was a grind, and it was you know what, when your opportunity comes, you got to be ready. And it it sharpened me, and so I take a lot of pride in that the journeyman badge. When people will call me a journeyman on Twitter or whatever else, dude, I'm like, you're dang right, I'm a journeyman.
I like it with you.
Brother, because for you, for guys like you and me, most guys that play thirteen fourteen years were those guys like my brother who had fifty sixty starts in the league and for whatever reason, it just didn't work out. But we want to keep you around because you've got experience and you're you know, you've you've got a lot of skin on the wall, right, But for guys like you and me that had six, eight, nine, ten starts, we had to prove our value to the team every day we walked in the door.
Yep.
And and so I wear that with a that's awesome, with a lot of pride, as you should, and a badge of honor. Yeah, and go man. For the better part of thirteen years, I was I was, you know, one of the sixty four best in the world, and I had.
To work really hard that Yeah. No, I I agreed. I feel the same way, man, And we should we have more time to chat but man, I appreciate you joining the podcast. Man it was it was an honor talking to you, for sure.
Absolutely, brother, do more often, Mane.
Yeah, yeah, you too.
Thanks for tuning in to going along with Chase Daniel. Catch every episode on New Orleans Saints dot com, the Saints Mobile app presented by Verizon, Seius XMS app, or wherever you listen to your podcast,
