Every General Manager in the NFL is different. Some like building their teams by spending a lot of money through free agency. Others like trading their draft picks away for solid players. Finally, you have the GMs that like building their teams through the NFL Draft, and that is the kind of GM the Chargers have in 40 year old Tom Telesco. Telesco learned under Bill Polian who was an incredible man to learn from because he built the Colts 2006 Super Bowl winning team.
Yesterday was Telesco’s voluntary workouts/NFL Draft press conference. He was asked various questions from what his draft philosophy was to his biggest concerns about the current roster.
Telesco said that he doesn’t rank players by the needs of the team; rather he ranks each player no matter the position. One thing that jumped out at him during his 1st day watching the team practice was their conditioning and the way they looked ready to go. He even credited Kent Johnston and Rick Lyle the team’s Strength and Conditioning Coaches.
Telesco also said that just because the workouts have started doesn’t mean they are not evaluating this team anymore, he mentioned he is still evaluating to see what positions they need to fill or which position they can add more depth.
When asked about whether seeing players makes a difference on who the team is leaning towards drafting. He said that it will not. He said, “OTAs is really much more instruction based and it’s not where guys are winning or losing jobs. That’s training camp, training camp is where guys win and lose jobs. OTAs and mini camps, we try not to evaluate players in this environment.”
This is Telesco’s 1st draft as a GM and on Tuesday Afternoon he was asked how long he had been waiting for this day, he answered by saying, “Since the first time I was in a draft room which was in ’95.”
There has been much talk in San Diego whether it be on radio stations or in newspaper that if neither Luke Joeckel (Texas A&M) Eric Fisher (Central Michigan) or Lane Johnson (Oklahoma) aren’t there at number 11, than the Bolts might trade down. Telesco talked about trading down and said, “It’s always an option. It’s always an option to maybe move down and pick up some picks, which would be great. The board will tell you a lot of times if you can do that. If you’re going to trade down, you need to know what you’re going to get if you do trade down and then the other side of that is can you find someone if you want to trade up.”
Telesco is coming from a team who had a franchise QB in Peyton Manning and just recently drafted their next future QB in Andrew Luck. Here in San Diego he has inherited a franchise QB in Phillip Rivers. Rivers has been a bull, put this team on his back and is trying to win this beautiful city a championship. When asked he thinks his QB does best Telesco said, “Well, number one he’s the leader of the football team. We have to make sure everyone around him, not just offense, but defense, special teams, coaches, everybody and everyone in the organization does their job better. He absolutely loves the game. He loves to be here as much as he can. He wants to learn every little detail of the offense. Even out there today, he was asking some great questions about the next step in what we’re doing and it’s like hold on now, slow down, it’s just day one out there.” By the sound of it, Telesco is very excited to see his franchise QB try and lead this team/city to the promised land.
When asked if he thought the new league rule changes will it make a huge difference on the way the Bolts practice he said, “I think the most important thing is that our players learn how to practice without pads. Obviously, some times in the past couple of years, depending on where I’ve been, it’s really been off of what kind of football team you have. If you have a younger football team, sometimes you wish you had those pads. If you have a veteran team, a little older group, then sometimes you wish you didn’t have pads on. So really in the past it’s really a feel—the head coaches that I’ve worked for—where’s your football team at, how many injuries do you have at the current time?”
Judging by the comments made at the press conference it seems that Telesco is determined to study every aspect of not only the team, but the game itself. He is coming from a winning franchise and was hired because he presented Mr. Dean Spanos with a blueprint on how to make this team into a winner again. You can bet that when the Chargers go on the clock next Thursday night Telesco will be prepared. Whether it be choosing a new player or by trading down, Telesco is ready for the challenge and now it’s time to sit back and see what this young man can do.
