Q. I assume you probably got some calls to try to trade down there and you were interested in Jadarian, what was the thought process there?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Yeah, great player, great person. We thought he had some opportunities for a minute. Fell apart. A lot of trading going on right ahead of us, but I mean, he was he kind of stood alone. Great player. The person's outstanding, the competitor, he's just a -- he's a Seahawk.
It's really cool. We were kind of concerned people were going to go ahead of us because we felt like he was so out there in terms of mock drafts and what have you.
Q. You felt like someone was going to jump ahead of you, is that what you were saying?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Uh-huh.
Q. Talking about the culture you created how are you projecting?
MIKE MACDONALD: I think it's a testament to our process and the alignment we have from personnel folks all the way to Thomas Hammock, the process on the coaching side. I think the great thing that we have done in the three years we worked together, especially the first round, the guys we brought onto our team we're really confident about the type of person they were and the Seahawk way of doing business around here.
That in addition of being a great player and being dynamic, and our vision for him and our offense, just can't help but be really excited about it. I think it's a great fit.
Q. What about him says that's a Seahawk, that's the guy?
MIKE MACDONALD: It just comes in different forms. You learn about the person, about the leadership, the resiliency, the humility, just the commitment to Notre Dame by staying there.
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Yeah, loyalty.
MIKE MACDONALD: Loyalty. The family story. All these things. It's a great, cool story. Something to get excited about. You love talking to and you can envision him just sticking out here. You can feel him in the building and feel like he's one of us.
Q. You talked about the --
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Are you guys fighting for air time?
Q. Talked about the fit in the offense. How do forsee you see skill set meshing with offense that Ken Walker had so much success in last year
MIKE MACDONALD: Well, we're going to run wide zone and he's going to run wide zone and we're going to run some gap scheme. He's going to run some of that too and then, and then the pass game can come alive, too. I think that's part of our offense in general, that we can take another step in including our halfbacks in the pass game, so...
And then he's a great special teams player as well. The kick return stuff, we'll see how it shakes out in other phases, but he's going to come in and compete with the rest of the guys. Let's go rock and roll.
Q. He was not a starter at Notre Dame for reasons, obviously, and only got (inaudible) catches in his college career. What's the challenge of trying to project some of that on the workload front and the receiving front when you're trying to figure out what he can be as a full package for you when he didn't necessarily have that in college?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Yeah, great question, but believe it or not, it really wasn't that hard. His pro day was outstanding. You could see the way -- I'm very good friends with his agent. His agent went to him a couple years ago and was like, hey, you need to improve in the passing game or whatever, so he would listen to him, A, you know.
Went and got with the receiver's group and worked with those guys, the receiver's coach, too. Yeah, I mean, I just think it's a pretty cool story that these guys get drafted in the first round too, from the same school.
It was really the story you watched all fall. I mean, these guys were dynamic, the two of these guys. Different runners.
But, yeah, he's -- I feel like it's like talking to you guys about JSN, just like with his high school career in Texas. Like 5,000 yards and like 55 touchdowns. Yeah, I mean...
Q. You both talked about loyalty. Over the past few years you've been rewarding players that stay at their school instead of transferring. Why is loyalty such an important part of being a Seahawk?
MIKE MACDONALD: I don't know if we have explicitly talked about it. I think it's just part of the overall picture of the person we evaluate and it probably isn't a coincidence that it keeps coming up.
But, I don't know. John?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Yeah, I think that stuff manifests itself in the competitive scale, too.
There's a level of certain character aspects that you have to conduct yourself in a certain manner to compete at that level, too. Really just part of overall character score.
MIKE MACDONALD: That's a better answer.
Q. You mentioned that in the first round the trades were hard to figure out what's going on. Were you surprised how many trades were happening over and over?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Yeah, it was weird. I thought we were going back for sure and then things just went no, no, no. I think everybody must have been hyper-focused there with Rutledge, Chris Johnson, Faulk, I forget who else right in there. Sorry, it just happened.
Q. Can you talk about the role your running back coach played in making this choice?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: We're all part of it. He did some great Zoom introduce though. He had a great --
MIKE MACDONALD: Thomas is a stud. He's a beast. I think he's just kind of dove in head first with how we operate here and he's someone that I've leaned on since he got here in terms of the big-picture head coaching stuff.
I mean, obviously you trust his opinion. I mean, been coaching high-level running backs for a really long time in addition to being a really successful head coach, so, but I think it's about par for the course on position coach on position coach involvement in terms of our process.
Q. What are some of the skills as a runner that stands out?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Man, instant acceleration, vision, cutback-ability, but his ability to work it back, not just completely bouncing all the time. Just kind of like it back inside. And then probably his contact balance.
Q. How much more (indiscernible) complicated your efforts to trade back?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: I'm not sure. I can't answer that.
Q. He's a cornerback. (Inaudible) anticipated to be a 32...
JOHN SCHNEIDER: You try to project these things out and we identified a couple of teams that it might happen with, but it was a little -- I don't know who was trying to trade for him or not. I can't answer that?
Q. He measured 203 at the combine. How does that factor in the eval, and what would be the ideal weight you would want him to play at?
MIKE MACDONALD: I think that's a little light. I think that was a few pounds lighter than he said he played at. Once we figure out what the best body comp is for him -- I don't know if there's an ounce of fat on him, but we'll look at him and see what's best for us and best for him and go from there. We'll see.
Q. He has 11 touchdowns. What does that say about his decisiveness?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Yeah, like I said, one of his super talents is basically just his ability to cutback and crease it. He has home run speed. He has a lot of explosive runs. He'd returned three kickoffs for touchdowns in his career; Two this year. That's such a unique feel. The USC game was ridiculous. Yeah, just like that. That instant acceleration.
Q. Talk about how you got your team and also trying to figure out where other people are going to pick. Was this a harder year to kind of scout where people were going to fall in this draft?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Yeah. Sorry, there was a big gap. I was trying to think of it. I don't want to -- yeah, we'll talk about it later. (Laughter).
But, yeah, it was a little more -- it's been a little bit -- it's unique. It's been a unique first round.
Q. Mike, obviously you have --
JOHN SCHNEIDER: It went really fast.
MIKE MACDONALD: It was three hours.
Q. You have Rashid, but do you anticipate Jadarian helping out on the kick return?
MIKE MACDONALD: We're going to train him and take it from there. That's probably all I know right now.
Q. Talking about Jadarian, he's a Seahawk, is it instantaneous, do you know right off the bat?
MIKE MACDONALD: John can answer it, but to me, it's a culmination of the process. I think the common denominator is the shared excitement from everyone that's had an encounter with these people, and that's what gets you fired up.
A lot of people you respect, they know him way better than I do and then that's what gets you fired up about it.
Q. Is there any concern with only having three picks the rest of the... (indiscernible.)
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Yeah, there's concern. No, absolutely not. (Laughter) No, I did honestly think we were going to be able to move there for a minute around still maybe have a shot at him, but sometimes these things just don't work out.
We talked about it on the radio show today. 2021, I believe, we had the three picks and we really wanted D and so we picked him and then the next pick, it was like we couldn't really move and then same thing. So just at some point you have to make a decision.
Q. As you guys studied Jadarian, was there a play that really stood out?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Cool kids call him JD.
Q. Was there a play that you watched over and over again that really stood out?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Good question.
MIKE MACDONALD: Against Pitt?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Yeah, that was cool. The Arkansas, caught a swing pass.
Q. Mike, philosophically...
JOHN SCHNEIDER: I wasn't done answering the question.
MIKE MACDONALD: You get that?
Q. Philosophically, you like hey, he's a first round guy. With Zach hurt right now, has he won from the first snap or does he have to work his way up? Where does he stand on that type of thing?
MIKE MACDONALD: I don't have a standing philosophy, honestly. Just come in, coach him up. He'll get reps at some point. We're not just going to stick him right there at the once. He's going to have sample opportunity to earn a bunch of carries and a bunch of touches.
Q. Mike, you mentioned Jadarian's family life. He talked about his mom. Did you see how that made him, what kind of impact that was?
MIKE MACDONALD: I'm hearing the story from the people involved in the process. It's an interesting exercise to put yourself in their shoes from when that happened in their life and that really grounds you pretty quickly, you know? A lot of these guys throughout the whole process you're just like holy smokes, man.
For them to be able to put themselves is this situation, their lives, given a lot of things they have had to go through is just really, really impressive so you can't help but respect some of these guys.
Q. On the scouting report, there were concerns about ball security. What have you seen from him in that area when scouting and evaluating him?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Yeah, I think it's three times in the last two seasons, and it's something that -- Thomas Hammock's awesome. He's already talking to him about some of these things in these Zoom calls. So, yeah. I'm sure it will improve.
Q. Mike, as you're evaluating whether he is RB1 or RB2, wherever he is -- what is Zach's timeline by the way? Just a rough timeline?
MIKE MACDONALD: I can't give you a timeline line right, now but he's killing it as we knew he would. If you're going to bet on anybody, it's Zach Charbonnet.
I'm excited for him. He's in great spirits. The guys downstairs are doing a great job with him. With these long-term injuries -- I say it all the time, you have to just stack these things. You have to be able to get to the next thing and go rip it and that's what he's doing. I'm excited for Zach.
Q. John, whether it was Jadarian or somebody else, how big was the priority coming out of this draft with a running back for you guys?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: It was important. We weren't going to completely force it, but it was important. There's still some darn good running backs left.
If you said her, your needs? Yeah. We just lost a really good runner in Ken Walker, so, yeah.
THE MODERATOR: Anything else?
Q. Brian said --
JOHN SCHNEIDER: So that's a yes, Dave.
Q. ...if you could draft a running back every pick, you would.
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Yeah.
Q. What's your background?
JOHN SCHNEIDER: Well, I played the position growing up and then when I started, it was like the position I was best at evaluating. I didn't really know how to evaluate safeties very well or quarterbacks so I was kind of like, well, this running back's pretty good and that running back's pretty good and that guy is good at this and that.
Yeah, he's not wrong.
On that note, have a good evening.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports