Q. With Kadarius, do you see him as a finished product or is this a receiver that you can bring in your building and go from where he was last year to reach a ceiling that maybe you guys are projecting going forward?
JOE JUDGE: Look, every pick in this draft is a projection. There's not a single player who is NFL ready. Let's not make that mistake. Everybody here needs development and part of the evaluation is identifying how high their ceiling is. We're excited about adding him to our team. There's a lot of things he can do and has a lot of versatility, but like every rookie coming in here, they've got to earn what they get and we're going to work them multiple positions to find their strengths. We can't assume what we saw on college tape is the best fit for them.
Q. Joe, can you speak to the roller coaster of emotions as the first round was unfolding, and I know Dave just addressed the fact that you guys addressed the possibilities, and the fact that it was Philadelphia, as you know as well as anybody are not very well liked in these parts that made that trade a jump ahead of you, that dynamic, can you speak to that?
JOE JUDGE: Yeah, just first on the trade, trades happen a lot. Normally doesn't happen within the division but hey, look, the enemy of my enemy my friend. They made a move that worked for them and that was a good business move.
That being said, in terms of the roller coaster of motions, you just let the round play out. Evaluate all these players for a reason. You never know how it's going to shake out. You know where you want to take certain guys. You know what you're looking to fill in terms of best player available and some positions of need. We are very happy how it turned out but we added great value.
Let's not mistakes that these picks, they are people, so let's not forget about that. You're adding people to your team. You know, you talk about the value of having good, young developmental players to work with, and we just went through a season of free agency, okay, where we invested a lot in a team by adding veterans to our team and this is an opportunity to get more picks to add good young developmental players to our team, whether it's this year or next.
Q. Curious if you had a point where you wouldn't have felt comfortable going back, was 20 as far as you would go and did you expect that Toney would be there or were you not sure when you made the move?
JOE JUDGE: Yeah, you know what to be honest with you, you evaluate the players, you've got their value to the team. You can never assume anyone is going to be there. There's a lot of good players in this draft and there's a lot of teams that want those players for one reason or another. In terms of a point we wouldn't go back, again, we're always willing to listen to whatever comes our way.
It's the value of the trade relative to who you're looking at right there. For us it was a good move. We're pleased the way it turned out. We got a good player that's going to be able to come in and compete with our team and we have more sets to use in the future.
Q. Most people thought three quarterbacks, four quarterbacks would go before you picked and obviously only three did. Once you saw that happening, did you get a sense, oh, these two or three guys, we thought one of them would definitely be there was not going to be there?
JOE JUDGE: No, we played out every scenario beforehand, as Dave alluded to, we have lengthy meetings and a lot of what ifs, and that's the way we operate, as well as the coaching staff throughout the season. It's our job to talk through the scenarios, so when a situation arises we have a course of action and plan we can do go and execute.
Q. Kadarius had some injury issues at Florida and "character" issues, some things that needed to be investigated. You couldn't get him in your building and really get to know him, how did you figure that out and figure he's a guy that's worth a 20th pick?
JOE JUDGE: You know, the skill and the person has to add up together. We fully vetted every player on this board. We are very comfortable bringing him to New Jersey. We are very comfortable adding him to our roster to compete with other players on the team.
Listen, we use every resource we have, okay, Jeremy Pruitt who is in our building, Jeremy recruited him out of high school. So we have people in this building with established relationships who have known this guy through the course of not only being true college, but going back to when they were in high school developing as a player.
We have numerous coaches a long time recruiting have had this guy in summer camps for multiple days at a time and had extended exposure to him. We had guys at the pro day. We had Zoom meetings that were allotted by the league; we used those, phone calls. We have a great medical staff and we trust them to decisions for by the medical. I'm not a doctor, so I trust Ronnie Barnes and his staff.
In terms of anything else off the field, again, look, it's no secret I'm pretty particular about who I bring into this building, okay. I think sometimes you have to understand the person and you have to understand the character or on a deeper level than what just may be Tweeted out.
Q. Joe, we haven't spoken to you in a while, can you talk about the offensive overhaul going back to the middle of March?
JOE JUDGE: We are looking to improve our team in all three areas, offense, defense, and kicking came. Working through free agency there were some offensive players that were available we thought could come in here and compete with our team and possibly improve us through competition. We are looking to do the same thing with defense and the kicking game as well, all right.
We are not a finished product by any means in any area and we are always looking to improve. If there's a good player out there, we are looking to add them if they fit what we are looking to build.
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