Drew Davis | Why Talent Alone Won’t Get You to the NFL

Former Oregon Ducks wide receiver and Atlanta Falcons player Drew Davis joins Chris Spencer on the Intangible Podcast for a powerful conversation about football, identity, leadership, and life after the game.

Drew’s journey took him from Denver to the University of Oregon, where he was part of one of the most exciting eras in Ducks football, to the NFL with the Atlanta Falcons. But this episode goes deeper than stats, highlights, and football memories. Drew opens up about the mindset it takes to bet on yourself, the reality of being an undrafted free agent, and what young athletes need to understand about preparation, patience, and purpose.

Chris and Drew also talk about the transition athletes face when the game no longer defines them, why player development matters, and how the same intangibles that help you succeed on the field can guide you in life, leadership, family, and career.

For young athletes, parents, and coaches, this episode is a reminder that talent may open the door, but character, discipline, humility, and self-awareness are what help you stay ready when opportunity comes.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Welcome back to the Tangent Podcast. I'm excited to start a really good conversation with a fellow former NFL guy, Drew Davis. Drew Davis was an NFL receiver, played for the Atlanta Falcons. But he also, you know, I hate to bring this up, but he, you know, he grew up and he developed in the Pac-10 era. You know, it's not no longer here, but everyone still remember Pac-10. So transitioned into coaching at uh UCF, went on to UCL, UCLA to coach. Uh, and then he started to find his footing and trying to figure out what he wanted, in my uh opinion of what I've been able to dig up on him. Um you know, um went into some certifications, performance, coaching, working with the NFL trust, um, doing a lot of great work for young athletes and then former athletes. And so um, Drew, really, man, I'm so excited to have you on the podcast and talk about these different aspects of who we are, these different intangibles, the work that you've done. Um, my friend, welcome to the intangible podcast.

SPEAKER_00 1:14

Thank you for having me, Chris. Been a big fan of the show, been watching it for a while. Uh, went back and listened to a couple episodes as well from when you first started and how you didn't want to start this because you thought there were too many podcasts out there, which is the same thing I thought when I started mine. Uh, but I'm glad you found your footing. It's been really, I know it's been really valuable for parents and athletes out there. So kudos to you and thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_01 1:36

Man, he does some research on me. So I appreciate that, man. Um, you know, it's it's it's been a it's been a fun, it's been a fun journey. Uh, I will say it's been a fun journey and the response and the people that are, you know, um, you know, continue to give the support and say keep doing what you're doing. Um, I really have appreciated that. So um all right, man. All right, here we here we are. A young man who was undrafted into the NFL, uh, went over to UCLA as a coach, um, and has now been over at the NFL PA side of things. You've seen a lot. You've seen a lot of different things. Um when you think about um those different roles that you've played in the mindset and the tenacity, the grit, and things that it takes uh to do what you've done, what is it really what does it really take to make that that transition into those different spaces, knowing what your, you know, I would say actually starting to figure out what your your new purpose is as you've kind of going through each one of those different transitions because it is a different purpose at every stepping stall.

SPEAKER_00 2:49

Definitely. I would I would say through all of that, I had to really figure out what it was that my purpose was, and then also just what I like to do and what I enjoy doing. Um early in the time in college, I really realized and noticed that everybody would come to me for advice. Um, and not that I would always give them advice or tell them exactly what to do, but I'd help them find the way to get to the answer or get to the product that they wanted to get to. And so I knew I loved helping people, loved just guiding them in a way. And then also just as a passion, uh wanted to do something that didn't feel like work. And although I got into coaching at the beginning, um, because you know, as many football players as what we know, as many athletes, we've been doing that since the age of eight or 10. So we have 10, 15, 20 years of experience doing that. Um, but I had a director of player development when I was at Oregon by the name of James Harris, and he was a person that everybody uh just went into his office, you know, when they had a person uh family member pass away, or when they were going through some problems in school, or just when they just wanted to have a place to hang out and talk to him. And he was a young black guy who was married, had one kid at the time, and you didn't feel like he was part of the staff, and you also just knew he wasn't a player. Um, but the way we played around with him, messed around with him, he felt like one of the guys. And at a certain point in my life, I was like, man, I want to do something similar to that. Something that doesn't feel like work, still being around football, still being around sports. But you know as well as I do that athletes, they need, they have so many years of having a coach, you know, having somebody tell them what to do, what they need to work on, look over film with them, how they need to get better. And then at a certain point in your career, you pretty much go cold turkey from that. There's no coaching, there's nobody to sit there and wake you up to call you to come get you for your from your dorm room to come to practice. And so I felt the need that there are a lot of people out here that need a coach to coach them in life, um, whether they played sports or not, but also somebody to push them and challenge them and to kind of get into realms of, hey, what do you want to do? What are you passionate about? Let's explore that and figure out how to get you there. So a lot of it was me exploring what I wanted to do by taking some little side quests, going to coach at Central Florida and work on my masters, then coming to UCLA and acting as their director of player development. Um I just wanted to help young men along the way and then also watch some football and stay in shape while I did it. So it was a way to kill a couple birds with a couple stones.

SPEAKER_01 4:59

Absolutely, absolutely. Well, like I said, I mean, you've seen both sides of this thing, and not just both sides from a um being a coach and doing what you do now, but also you've seen both sides as a as a player, you know, um and you know, a guy who's trying to make it, uh, a guy who's going through a transition, uh, athletes who, you know, now that you work with, who's trying to make it and going through those different transitions. You know, how many, how many athletes do you think was prepared for life after football? And then in that same vein, were you prepared life after football? Maybe answer that one first.

SPEAKER_00 5:35

Yeah, no problem. I think probably maybe 25% are ready for life after football. And I wasn't, even though I had all the right things in place. And one thing that really helped me to kind of get ready and think about life without football was tearing my ACL, my sophomore year at Oregon, after my very first start. You know, talk about the most troubled and perfect scenario for a movie that you can write. Um, but it's real life. Um, and during that time, after I tore my ACL, I really had to sit down and think like, man, what would I do if football wasn't here? And that's when I started doing more with our director of player development. That's when he pulled me to the side and I started doing more, meeting with the boosters. I started doing more community service, going into school, talking to the young people, telling my story. Um, and then also at the same time, I really got this feeling that, like, okay, I'm more than just a football player. I can do stuff outside of this. I just haven't done much of that over my time period and my time frame. A lot was focused on football because that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to get, I wanted to get a scholarship and go to college. I wanted to play in the NFL. I wanted to have a lengthy career in the NFL. So everything that I did mirrored that. But once I tore my ACL, I started thinking and developing more as a person. And that's when I really found out that I can really help people. I have a knack for helping people and connecting with them. Um, but I feel like not that many players and uh athletes are ready for life after college because one, you gotta really get into it to feel what that's like. Like I said, with without anybody calling you to chase you down for you being late for training table, without nobody seeing where you are at practice. You go from, you know, playing your bowl game if you're a football player to possibly training for, you know, the combine and pro day, but you don't have anybody waking you up. You don't have anybody checking on you. You know, even if you did have a great coach in college, that coach now has more players to coach and getting ready for the next year that's upcoming. So it's not their fault, but also it's just not being in that situation. You know, we can talk about it until we're blue in the face as far as, hey, you guys need a resume, you guys need a cover letter, this is how you do your interview, this is how you shake a hand, this is how you make eye contact. But until you have that lifeline and that kind of life raft taken away from you of your sport, and you're really sitting there and you're looking around and you're like, oh, Snap is really here. Um so sometimes it's about us really being in that experience until it really hits home for us. And like I said, a lot of, you know, a lot of football players, we don't know it's over until we don't get picked up on a team uh or we don't get drafted or we don't get invited to a mini camp or a training camp. And then that's when it becomes more real. Um but along the way, I just had a lot of people pouring into me. And I knew that I was smart, I knew I was intelligent, I knew I was a hard worker. So it wasn't that I wasn't good at anything else, it's just that I hadn't taken the time to really dive in and pour into a lot of other things outside of football and sports.

SPEAKER_01 8:13

Yeah, man. I, you know, I think about this in the in the mindset of reps. It's, you know, we've we've we've taken majority of our life and got a lot of reps at one thing. Uh and now is it fair for us, even on the other side, looking back hindsight and and also as an athlete who is making that transition out, is it fair to expect us to fall right into these different aspects of uh newness and and really do well at it? And so uh so I guess my question is you know, that the you know, the the pressure and the um that we put on ourselves, do you think it's fair for for us to put that kind of pressure to to fall right into this next stage of life and not have any setbacks? Because you think about our career, there's always been you know set back setbacks to learn so you can get more reps to get better at it. And and you know, and what's that what's that what's that bridge to make sure that you are actually putting the reps in to get to continue to get better?

SPEAKER_00 9:18

Yeah. No, I don't think it's fair, but I think as athletes, we always want to be the best. You know, anytime we step out there or practice or we pick up a ball or we're playing hopscotch or skipping rocks across the pond, like we want to be the best at that. And the thing I try to talk to a lot of clients about is, you know, the first time you picked up a football, a basketball, a baseball, I highly doubt you were like, oh my gosh, that was the greatest though ever. Like, I'm gonna be really great at this. Like we all had that kind of period of just transitioning and really learning the game and kind of being taught and being coached, I guess you can say. And so when I look at the overall scheme of everything with people that kind of go into it, it's just we don't want to suck at anything for too long. You know, we don't want to have to learn and start from the bottom a lot of the times. You know, some of us that bravado that we've gotten from our sport, but also it's it's how the world goes. So if you spent so much time focusing on your sport, you know, imagine 10 or 15 years with you focusing on something else. You know, it takes uh 10,000 hours to be, you know, an expert at something, is Malcolm Gladwell Gladwell says Gladwell says. And looking back into that, I 100% agree because between high school and college, like I was putting in time on the weekends, going and throwing with a quarterback or working out with my high school coach on the weekend or after practice or after a weight room session. So it takes that kind of, like you said, getting those practice reps, it takes those, and it takes us to get those in different realms and different areas and careers in order for us to catch up. But the thing that I said works in our favor is we have a dogged work ethic. We know what it's like to compete against other people who are going for our same job. We know how it is to line up against somebody or across from somebody who might be better than us, and we know they're better than us, but we still have to play this play. And within that play, you might win a couple that you didn't think you were gonna win, but it's because your preparation, it's because how you prepared, it's because you actually have to roll the ball out there and play these plays and go through it. So for us, we need to have a little bit more grace with ourselves and knowing, and and that was a big problem for me is I finished with the NFL and I got out and I'm looking at people who I graduated with, who are working at jobs, and you know, they're moving up the ladder, and I'm like, oh, I'm behind. You know, I'm panicking. I'm saying, oh, I'm behind. Even though I went and played and did exactly what I wanted to do for my NFL career and for a dream that I had when I was young, I'm still telling myself in my mind, I'm behind. I don't have my master's yet. You know, I I have I haven't had a real job, quote unquote, you know, as a student athlete would say. Um, but all the intangible and the skills and the values that you gain from your sport, turn around and use that in the career that you're chasing, and you're gonna be very successful.

SPEAKER_01 11:46

Oh man, I you know, that key takeaway there is give yourself grace, you know, and with a dogged mindset, the work ethic, we you know, it's easy for us to fall into the the trap of man, I'm gonna be I'm the best at it right now, versus building up to become the best like you did in your sport. And so having that having that mindset, um, you know, that that key trigger word for it is having that grace, giving yourself a little grace as you as you continue to get the reps, understanding there will be setbacks, but also knowing that those setbacks turn into big games because of the work ethic that you're really putting behind it, man. So that well said, well said. All right. Now, when I think back to some of the things that I, you know, um you know was looking at about your past and things like that, I always think about people's upbringing. Um and seeing that you grew up in Denver, um, you got your you got your start your start at Oregon. You know, take me back to those the early mindsets and those foundational pieces that that uh shape you growing up in Denver that transition and transition you over into Oregon to excel the way you did.

SPEAKER_00 13:00

Yeah, no problem. I just remember growing up, man, I was a football and sports fanatic. Like, you know, on the Saturday morning, we in high school and in little leagues, sometimes we play games on Friday or Saturday morning. Um, but I just remember getting up and like turning on college football and watching college game day and watching around that time Michigan and Nebraska were on TV a lot. And so I'm thinking and I'm looking at I knew all the players, I knew where they were from, and I'm looking at a lot of places they were from. And I'm I don't think I really saw really anybody from Denver, from the state of Colorado. And so in my mind, I'm like, okay, well, either it's really hard to make it, or I don't know where the heck the people are from Colorado that are going to school where they're going. So we got to find it, we got to make one. Um, but just growing up, I baseball was the very first first sport I played because my mom didn't want me to play football. She was afraid I was gonna get hurt. And my little league coach talked to her, and I was a big kid. So my little league coach heard this, and he goes up to her. He says, ma'am, um, I don't think you have to worry about Drew getting hurt. I think you got to worry about Drew hurting other kids. So if you're afraid that he's gonna get hurt in this sport, like you, you need you can get that out the way right now. Um, but I just loved football and I wanted to go to college and play football from an early age. I know my parents and my family didn't have the money to send me to college, you know, like most uh uh middle class or lower class black families, it would have been uh taking out student loans and things like that. Um, but excelled at football and baseball when I was young. And then when I got into high school, uh played running back at first, but then I linked up with my mentor who's like a big brother. Uh, his name is Polika Houston. And and we know at that age, it's tough to have a work ethic, but then it's also tough to pair that with somebody who wants to help you or somebody who has the time and energy to help you. And he's a person that had the time and energy to help me. And once he learned that I really was serious about football and I do pretty much anything to get there, that's when we our Saturday and Sunday mornings started consisting of going to a random field on a Saturday morning at 6, 7 a.m. When I usually would have been watching cartoons, I'm out here jumping a fence to get onto a nice field to be able to run some routes and catch some balls and get some conditioning in. And once we started doing that at the end of my freshman year, continued throughout high school, and then the offers started rolling in. And so by the end of my junior year, I had 26 scholarship offers to play Division I football. And I was gonna graduate early from high school, so I kind of had to stop accepting them because I had to dwindle them down and figure out where I wanted to take trips to. Um, and that's the beginning of the process for me. And even outside of that, like I wanted to play football, but I had seen so many athletes before me who were better than me who didn't make it to college, whether if it was grades, drugs, girls, just not concentrating and focused on the right things. And I said I didn't want that to be me. And so I did really well in school to the point where, you know, I think I just had to score 18 on the ACT. But also, my dad wouldn't let me bring home anything less than a B. So for anybody out there that has African parents, they know that the standard is super duper high. And so paired with those two things of my dad not letting me bring home a B and me wanting to not have anything hold me back from going to college and playing Division I ball, um, I poured everything into those two things. And it ended up coming out right on the other end. And then the two schools it came down to for me were UCLA and uh and Oregon. And I can still not really tell you why I chose Oregon. I went to UCLA on the trip. They beat SC, I think it was 13 to 9, that knocked them out the national championship. They're filming videos on campus or they're filming movies on campus, and you're you're in LA in December, and it is like 80 degrees sunny, people are walking around in shorts and suntanning, and then Eugene, I went to the game, they got womped on by Arizona. It was rainy, it was cold, um, just everything that could go wrong on a trip did go wrong. But the thing that I felt in my heart and my stomach was that the coaching continuity they had was great. And then also just everybody A to Z. Uh, you felt you got a genuine interaction from everybody. There was nobody that was putting on or faking or telling you, hey, you're gonna come here, you're gonna start for three years. It was a lot of everybody just being themselves, and I just felt really at home at Oregon. And so that's what took me to the ducks.

SPEAKER_01 17:01

Yeah, man. I, you know, I was gonna ask that question. Um, you know, I get that question all the time from parents, like, you know, what how do I help my kid through this process? How do I, how do we have to narrow it down? You know, uh, what would what what's that final decision to say this is the place I'm going? And with the era that we're in right now with NIL and the transfer portal, and there's so much money moving around, you know, what advice would you have for a parent, a you know, a kid, a young athlete who's going through this process, uh, but very, very distracted because of the money and because of the social pressures and things like that to help them really clearly see um, you know, where is the right fit for my my development?

SPEAKER_00 17:45

One, I would say don't make it about the money. I know it's tough, I know it's hard. I I champion that the athletes are getting paid now. Like I love it because they make so much money off of their name and likeness, and being able to do that in their controlled environment is a great thing. Um, but sometimes when we make it about the money, we overlook all the other things. And just like you, I consult for a couple families and people that have reached out, and I had a family that reached out to me and they're talking and they're like, we don't know where we want to send them. This school wants to pay them this much, and this school wants to pay them this much. I'm like, okay, that's great. I said, okay, well, you know, where does he want to go? And they're like, oh, well, you know, well, this school offered this much and this school offered this much. And I was like, okay, once again, where does your son want to go? But at the same time, I talked to him for a little bit, and then I said he was a he was an outside linebacker. And I said, okay, he won't this school's offering this much, that school's offering that much. I said, okay, what defense does each school play? And they didn't have an answer for it. Oh, I don't know. They're, you know, they okay, well, that matters because if he's playing linebacker, outside linebacker, if he's a rush in in a 3-4 versus uh a 4-3 playing off the ball, if you're saying he needs to get after the quarterback, you know, a 4-3 probably is not the best thing for him as a linebacker. And so, you know, you have to have these more, um, these more IQ and more exit and nose conversations with them. And that's something if you're a parent, if you didn't play football or if you don't know that side of it, you don't really know. Um, but it's more so, I say, don't just look at the money because the money's great. But if I told you if he's able to make, I don't know, $300,000, but he doesn't play it down, are you okay with that? Rather than him go and play and be able to be an all-American and play 70, 80 plays a game and make an impact, but he's getting 100,000. But also, does he want to go to the NFL? Is he using this? Is this his last stop on what he wants to do for as far as an athletic career, or does he have aspirations to go further? So it's just layering, I just start layering questionings with them to get them to see the bigger picture. And then also just being able to grab as much information as you can. You know, it's it's really important to go to a place where you feel comfortable. Our guts, we've gone away from our gut instincts, which has been around since we were Neanderthals, which would tell us, yo, I probably shouldn't look behind that bush because there might be a line back there. Um, but like a lot of those feelings that we have are still alive and well. So if you have the gut feeling that, man, I don't know what it is about this place, but I think I could come and thrive here, look into it more, listen to it more, and sometimes be able to go with that rather than looking at the money and the numbers and and all the NIL stuff that you might get. Because the last time I checked, in order to get to the NFL, you got to play some downs. You got to get out there and make some plays. So having a bank account full of money is great. Um, but if your real overall goal is to play at the collegiate level, my uh my biggest advice and guidance to you is go do that and the money will come.

SPEAKER_01 20:27

When you think about again to back to your upbringing, you know, and the work that you're doing now, what do you feel like shows up that you've been able to carry over from your upbringing to now?

SPEAKER_00 20:39

Man, like I said, the hard work. I watched my mom and dad get up constantly every day, rarely called in to work. You'd all see them go out the door. I was a latchkey kid, so you know, parents would leave, go to work. You had to get to school, get back home, do your homework, do your chores, and then you're good to go. Um, but I I never, I rarely saw them call in. I rarely saw them complain. Um, I rarely saw that, you know, times where they passed a buck or didn't take accountability for stuff. And so I took that into a lot of what I did with sports, you know. I wasn't, I was very talented when I was younger. And then, you know, when I got to high school, I was one of the most talented. And then when you get to college, everything kind of levels out. You know, there's a lot of people that got some talent and you things like that. And so, what's helping you separate yourself from them? And usually the thing is hard work because a lot of people they start to get by off of their athletic ability. They've always been the fastest. So, why would I do any any speed mechanics to work on being fast? And I've always been the fastest. So I got that work ethic from my parents and then uh just also mentorship. Um, mentorship is one thing I'm really big at because they say if you know something, you know so you know when you know something so well because you can teach it to somebody else. And so, what I started getting real good at when I was at Oregon and in high school, cool, I mastered what the X receiver is gonna do. Now, what does the Z receiver have on every play? What does the Y receiver have on every play? What does the R have on every play? And you start to be able to get Those concepts, and you know what everybody's doing. So I knew when the ball was coming to me and when it wasn't. And that helps you as a receiver because sometimes you take some plays off to save some energy. Uh, but also just knowing when that ball is coming is is very is very good because then you know, okay, how am I gonna get open? How am I not gonna get open too soon to the point the window's not there? And so those two things are just great work ethic and just being able to outwork everybody that I line up against, and that's across from me. And then also just having a high football IQ of and and being able to mentor the younger generation because nothing's better than you being at a school and being a junior or senior, and you want that school to keep winning when you're no longer there. I hope you do. Is getting beat on. Um, but are you teaching the younger generation the right way or how to do this and how to be a leader? Um, because you're only going to be around there for so long. So those two things are very cornerstone and foundational things that that goes into being Drew Davis. Um, because I feel like there's never anybody that says, oh man, he works too hard. Uh you don't work hard enough. And that's and that's one of the things I like love to hang my hat on.

SPEAKER_01 23:07

Yeah. Hey, so being around the organ program, you know, at a high leak time, um, you know, again, there's a lot of demand. Um, you know, but you seem like a guy who is, you know, always was being very observant and looking at you know what was happening around you. Um you know, when you think about when you think about that time, you know, what was some of the little things that separated the guys who who actually made it and the guys who just they were close, but they they just couldn't get over the hulk.

SPEAKER_00 23:45

Man, it was always the little things, man. Do you are you where you need to be on time? Um, are you do you do what you say you're gonna do? Um, not just being able to show up in the weight room, but show up in all areas and facet training table. Are you getting into the cold tub and the hot tub and are you getting treatment on that little ankle or that pinky that's been bothering you for a while? Um, the thing I revert back to a long time, but we we had some great players that came through Oregon. And when I was a young guy, we had a lot of great DBs that that were older than me that I got to watch. And like we're wide receivers, so we go against the DBs a lot. So, you know, we have this special relationship. But we had, you know, some great, great defensive backs. We had Jarius Byrd, we had Patrick Chung, we had Walter Thurman, we had TJ Ward. All those guys were got drafted and went to the NFL, and I think three or four of them have Super Bowl rings. But during the summertime, I watched them a lot and they would always compete and challenge each other. Uh, whenever they dropped the ball, you would always see them doing push-ups on the sideline. Whether they dropped the ball or they didn't break on something right. I think they would try to do 100 or 200 push-ups within our seven-on-seven session. And if you dropped the ball, you had to do even more. Like, I think it was like 25 or 50 got added on to that. And so you got to see firsthand guys that like, it's not fun doing push-ups, but you know, that accountability that you have with your teammates. If I can't have my teammate be on me about me not making a play and me dropping a ball, like then what can I really do in life or just on the field? Like that type of accountability, if you get that from the player standpoint, then the coach's jobs are easier because they're like, well, they know that how they feel when they let each other down. So I know they're gonna come out here and be on their stuff. So it's it's about having that accountability and creating that camaraderie with each other. And like I said, it was it was more so, and it wasn't that they were on each other because they knew we were destined for bigger things. They didn't care what the score was, they knew defensively and secondarily, if we lose a game, it's not gonna be because of us. Like if we if we're if we're doing bad one game, it's because they ran for 300 yards, not because they threw for 300. So the accountability between them and you see, and like I said, I'm very observant, so I saw that. I try to bring that into the wide receiver room, and you do it with love. Like it's one thing to get on a get on one of your fellow uh teammates and cuss them out and call them every name in the book, but it's another thing to bring them in close and tell them, hey, you should have done this better, but hey, I believe in you, we're gonna get it next time. Like that's does so much for the psyche, for the ego, for your interaction with him. Then when you talked about mentorship, that's how they pass that down. That's how they coach somebody who comes after them when you're gone. That same mode of just, hey, we got each other's back because we care about you and we know you can be great or you wouldn't be here any otherwise. And so just that sense of brotherhood early on at Oregon is really kind of what separated people. And it is just that sense of care where you knew, hey, I don't want to let my teammates down rather than my coach or my school or you know, my university. It's like I'm accountable to that guy that I line up with every day.

SPEAKER_01 26:35

The little things, man. The little things. I didn't hear you say how much you bench, I didn't hear you say how big's your bank account, how many social media followers you had. It was the little things and being accountable to the little things. Um that's great, man. Um well, you we all we all want to get drafted. We all, you know, we we play this sport, you know. If you have the desire, this is what I want to do. I want to I want to get myself in a position to get drafted. You end up going uh undrafted, but you still earn a roster spar for the Atlanta Falcons, you know. And you know, I always I'm always curious about like when you go undrafted, is there a switch that flips to a different mentality when you go undrafted? Um was did anything for you come up around that?

SPEAKER_00 27:23

For me, it was a very special situation because the year I came out was the lockout year in 2011. So things are very, very different. You know, they lifted the lockout for I think the first round of the draft, and then they put the lockout back in place after the first round. Um, so I was back in Denver working at Red Bull and DirecTV before I got a call from the Atlanta Falcons to go there. So I literally was, you know, working with normal people and then went to go be an NFL player, um, so which is also another movie in itself. Um but just from that, like I said, I've always kind of had that chip on my shoulder. And you come into the Atlanta Falcons, they gave up five or six draft picks to get Julio Jones as a wide receiver. They have Roddy White that's already there. They have Tony Gonzalez that's there, they got Matt Ryan at quarterback. Like, you're not playing over those guys. You know, these are future Hall of Famers and Tony Gonzalez and Ring of Honor people in Roddy and Julio. But like, so you go there and you're like, all right, I gotta find a spot that I could fit in. And it's more so like, okay, I'm here, but what am I gonna do to stay here? And one thing I did at the University of Oregon, I played on special teams. I was a very good blocker. And like I said, when you're at a good college program, if you at a really good college program, they have really good special teams because they have guys and they have all this talent that they can't fit onto the field on offense and defense. So then finding your lane on special teams is really, really beneficial for you because in the NFL, it's still the same. Not a lot of people want to do special teams. Everybody wants to catch touchdowns, everybody want to have a face at the at the front of the program, all that kind of stuff. But when you find your lane and a guy like uh uh Matthew Slater, who did it for New England for a long, long time at a high level, we played against him when he was at UCLA when I was in college, those people make it really discouraging to play in a game where you know, dang, this dude is going all out on special teams. Like he can, he needs to slow down. He's trying to get and he ends up getting drafted. So for me, it didn't light an extra fire. I just had to go back into all those things that I did really well, uh, work outworking everybody, knowing the playbook. So I knew X, Y, Z. I knew what the running back had coming out of the backfield. So if we went four or five wide receivers, I knew my receiver coach would be like, well, Drew knows his stuff. He could play any position. We could put him anywhere. That made me more versatile, that made me more valuable. Oh, and he can play on special teams. And when you get to that level, if you're a guy that's on the fringe or on that borderline as far as who do we dress out this week, who do we cut, they're gonna look at the person that can do the most, you know. And that's I'm glad that's what happened with me. And I got cut my first year, got put on a practice squad, got cut my second year, got put on the practice squad, but then I made the roster even my second year after they cut me because somebody got hurt. But that's for me being in the right position. That's for me being in the right place to make these things possible. So I just continue to do what I did best. I dug a little bit deeper, spent more time in the playbook, knowing, hey, when am I hot as a receiver if two guys come off the edge, this and that, to the point where the quarterback and the coaches and my other receivers looked at me and they're like, well, Drew knows his stuff. Like, he's gonna be able to play because when he's out there, he knows what he's doing.

SPEAKER_01 30:18

Yeah, absolutely. Man, with with I think the numbers still 50% of the NFL is made up of undrafted free agents. Do you think that there's a misunderstanding about um the label of being undrafted?

SPEAKER_00 30:34

I do think there's a misunderstanding, and I and I think being drafted, of course, that goes with the the stats that you were able to occur in college and your potential that you have. But I also think there's value in being passed up. You know, do we all have a villain origin story where, you know, that girl that didn't go to the prom with us, you know, she's hating now. She's probably mad and knocked up now that she ain't with us. Um, but it goes along the lines of that. It's you can't measure heart. You can measure 40 times and bench press and all this. But let's be honest, some people peak later. You know, some people just need that one opportunity. Some people, like if you're I think it's Amin Ross St. Brown, where even he got drafted, but he wrote down all the names of the players and the wide receivers that were drafted before him. Like, and now he's one of the best receivers in the league. So there's some people where there's different things that light the fire within you. And when you got undrafted, people, that just means that you got to work even harder to get it. And for me, it just means that like now you know, hey, nothing's given to me. I wasn't drafted, I didn't get a signing bonus. They they flew me here or they drove me here on a Greyhound bus. Like, I didn't get all the same things everybody else got, but I still have this opportunity and this chance. And for me, you look at guys like um, you know, uh Debo, who's coming off the edge, James Harrison, like undrafted guys, they just have this don't quit. They just have this dogged work ethic, this uh I can get cut tomorrow, so I'm gonna do everything I can to be here today. And that thing, that type of thing goes with you. So I just think it's, and there's this understanding between, you know, teams and undrafted players, as far as like there's some guys you see, like, dang, how did they miss you? You know, and that's the good thing about it. Like when you roll a ball out there, like you go play, and nobody's worried about, oh, he's a first rounder, he's a fifth rounder, he's an eighth rounder, whatever it might be. They're like, nah, he can play, like, and he's gonna get a new contract soon. So it's a matter of just undrafted guys. It's a it's a label I wear, and I make sure I tell people undrafted. Because when I go talk to schools and students, they're like, hey, what round did you get drafted? And how big is your mansion? I'm like, um, I didn't get drafted, and my apartment is about 1400 square feet with an attached garage. But that's what helps me help relay them. Like the goal was for me, the goal was never to get drafted to the NFL. It was to play. And that's what I kind of continuously tell myself if I get the opportunity to do it, I'm gonna take full advantage.

SPEAKER_01 32:49

Yeah, man, that's awesome. And and and now, because of that, you get to have conversation with these young athletes and and and parents who who who is pushing for their kids and want their kids to have that kind of dream, you know. What's the real conversation with athletes now and their parents when it comes to playing at the next level? You know, the dream and the goal to play at the next level. What is that real conversation?

SPEAKER_00 33:12

The real conversation honestly is funny because it it varies based upon family, but it's also, is this is this your son's dream? Is this your daughter's dream? Or is this your dream? You know, I think we're dealing with a lot of that now where a lot of parents are pumping money into stuff because they're like, hey, this is our way out. This is a way for you know for me to never have to work again, or just, hey, we know he has the talent to make it. And if he makes it, then he's gonna take care of the rest of the family. It's a lot, a lot of pressure we put on these athletes to go out there and do something that's very hard to do, even if they want to do it. And so the first conversation is saying, hey, is are we sure that he wants to play this sport to the pinnacle it can go to? And then secondly, it's what are you doing as a parent to support him outside of being a football player, outside of being this athlete that you guys have labeled him and known him for being at the since the age of eight. And so a lot of that that goes into that is really just kind of like I said, going down and layering the questions, but really pulling everything back and saying, okay, if if if going professionally, if making it to the NFL or NBA or whatever, if that doesn't happen, what else do you see your son being great at? It's having these conversations of pouring into their son or daughter in other ways because we've always gotten this sense of accomplishment or pats on the back of support when we go out there and we drop 40 points or we throw six touchdowns or we make 22 tackles. But are you giving them that same energy when they bring home an A on a test? Are you consoling them the same way when, you know, they have a breakout with their boyfriend or girlfriend? Like, are you still being that supportive parent that's there for them in these other ways that help them build each other as young people? And so that conversation of if they can play at the next level, it's hey, how are you stacking up with the competition right now? Are you going to all the camps that you can go to or are you hiding? You know, are you are you taking all the workout sessions you can possibly take? Are you for real about where you are talent-wise? Um, I've had conversations with parents and families where the family's like, yeah, he's not going anywhere but a D1 school. And I'm like, well, is the goal for him to go to a D1 school or is it for him to play college football? And so you get into these, all these other conversations where it these days are as good as any for somebody to go somewhere that's not a division one because there's all these transfer rules and there's these coaches that want to go grab players that can play right away. So where you start might not be where you finish. And so a lot of that is getting on the same plane with them to really figure out, hey, what are we trying to do here? What are we working towards? And then also getting them to look into their family dynamic and seeing, hey, is the pressure that we're putting on our kid making him think that he needs to go to the NFL because of us? And that's a lot of the body of the work I do.

SPEAKER_01 35:47

Yeah, man. That's awesome. Because of the work you do, when you think about, you know, your time as a player development um at UCLA, you know, did you notice patterns that was that kept the these reoccurring themes that kept coming up that said that made you think like, oh man, this is where I think I can go and pour my gift into uh to really help develop young athletes outside of the college space.

SPEAKER_00 36:16

Yeah. I was just really good at connecting with them, you know. Um, a lot of times, and this is what I really loved about the job, a lot of times I was talking to them, it wasn't even about football. I go, you know, we can talk about practice, we can talk about the game a little bit, but I'd be like, hey man, who's that young lady you're walking around campus with? You you said what's up to me, but you didn't introduce her. You know, you gotta work on your social skills a little more, man. You gotta, if that's your lady, you gotta. So like I developed this rapport with them to the point where I'm asking about movies, I'm asking about classes, I'm asking about what they want to do community-wise or just a nonprofit and things like that, to the point where I'm getting great feedback on who they are outside of that helmet. And then I can pour back into them as far as, hey, you said you, you really you like movies a lot, right? You take any film classes on campus? You know, UCLA got a real good film school. Like you should really take a couple of classes, maybe minor, figure out what you want to do with that. And I can kind of pour into them in a way that's different than the coaches because I didn't care about the football stuff. Cool, you score a couple touchdowns, I'm gonna give you a big hug and give you a pat on the back. But also the thing for me is when you come back to me years later and you're like, man, Drew, thank you so much for telling me to take those film classes. Like now I'm I'm writing a couple scripts and I'm and I got a movie that might be a green light for a movie that might be coming up soon, and I would have never had that opportunity if it wasn't for you. So it's seeing things deeper into just their athletic ability. It's really seeing who they are as people, really challenging them to be somebody other than just the athlete for everything they do. And then also for them to just take that same energy, that same effort that they put into football and put it into this other aspect that's new and foreign to them. But if they attack it with the same tenacity, they're gonna get similar results that got them that scholarship to go to college and that got them all these different accolades, and they're gonna see that they can outwork people.

SPEAKER_01 37:59

Yeah. Um again, working with you know, young athletes, but making that transition to working with you know high performers, and young athletes are high performers, just a different, different stage. You're working with some some really successful high performing people. Um other than hard work, what other what what's an un underrated, let's go with underrated. What's an underrated intangible you see from high performers that that really that really people don't really think about?

SPEAKER_00 38:36

The people that handle that, that take the most mundane things and make them important. The people that you see them, the consistency with their routine and their schedule, like uh know a lot of authors and they get up and they write 500 words every morning. Like that's what they do to write their books, and that's how they get there. So, you know, as athletes, sometimes we don't like doing the mundane stuff. The stretching that we do every time, the the you know, the warm-up that we gotta do, the the protein that we gotta drink, and all that kind of stuff. We're not great at that a lot of the times because you're like, man, I don't need to do it today. What's what's what's gonna happen if I don't do it today? Um, and that's a lot of thought process. But the people that do the mundane things at a high level is pretty much what I see people that do great things with. Um, the people that continue to show up. I I go to the gym at about five, 4:30 every morning, and there's just a certain group that's there, save time every day, no matter what the weather is, no matter what they did the night before. And and it just creates this purpose and this kind of just this system of that's what you do. And so if you're able to have a very good system in place where you have a lot of consistency that brings accountability, um, that's very hard to break. It takes three weeks to make something a habit, it takes two or three days to destroy that habit. And so the lot of people, the high performers that I see, they have really great habits. And I'm not saying that they sit here and you know write 10,000 words every day and do this, but no, they're just really methodical in what they do and how they prepare. And I would also say just their preparation for something. Um, when I like when I go on stage for a keynote speech, just know I've done that speech about 50 to 100 times to the point that's gonna look easy. But just know it's just like a duck. I was paddling them feet under the water like crazy. I might look smooth and calm above it, but that's because I've had so many reps in doing it. So those are the two things I would say they make, they make they master the mundane, and then they also um are able to just pour in time and prepare like crazy.

SPEAKER_01 40:28

Yeah, man. Yeah. Man, I I think I can ask you this question. Well, I know I can ask you this question, and I'm I'm sure you've thought about this. If you had to really build an athlete from scratch, you know, what intangibles are non-negotiable that you're putting in this athlete?

SPEAKER_00 40:47

Oh we. Oh we. To be honest, and this is a funny thing, I don't think I've said this vulnerability. I'm gonna put vulnerability in there, somebody that knows like I'm not the greatest at everything, I'm not the best, um, I have this problem, I'm not as good in this area because that's gonna help him get people around him to buy into what he's doing because everybody has deficiencies. Um, I'm gonna put that in there. I'm going to put um a leadership quality of just being a leader. Um, I don't think like I with the a lot of the work I do, I'm trying to create more leaders, more role models, and more gentlemen. That's that's one thing that's very high on my list. Um, but for leaders, there's this sense now that, you know, leading, oh, well, I don't want to be the one that has to tell somebody not to do this or have to be the bad guy to get people to do this. But in essence, it's it's being accountable in every way. It's it's knowing that you hold yourself to the highest standard and you want people to come up and meet you there. So vulnerability, a leadership aspect, and then also just this is one thing that people don't talk about, man. I want them to be, I want people to want to be around them. I want him to have a sense of humor. I want, I want him to bring people together, not divide them. Um, if I'm starting from scratch, I want somebody that tells the best jokes or that's not afraid of looking silly from time to time. Um, people gravitate towards that, people like that, people love being around people like that. So I know that's a weird three, but as I think about it, like, imagine the people you liked working with or the people that you played with. Like everybody loved the funny guy. Everybody knew like he was gonna make the day easier for you. He was gonna make it a little bit more enjoyable. Um, and just being a leader and just having this sense of vulnerability, you get a little bit more from everybody because you're true and upfront with everybody, with your feelings and what you're going through and your path and journey to get to where you're at currently.

SPEAKER_01 42:31

Drew, I love I love that athlete you just created, man. Thank you for uh thank you for indulging me in that because I, you know, I as I'm thinking about the things that you've done and how and the people you've worked with, there's a there's some there's some things that you've drawn out that can can really help athletes when you think about you know building them from scratch. And so hearing that scratch, and hopefully someone takes that and say, Oh, you know, maybe I need to add this vulnerability piece in there because you know the body does keep the score. So if we're stuffing these feelings now, we've stuffing everything around us, you know, hiding and shifting and shaking from the things that scares us, uh, or we don't want anyone to know, those are the very things that come back and get us later in life. And so uh so hopefully somebody hears that, man. So thank you for sharing that. Man, this is it's been good. And as I started to think about the the closing aspect of it, um, I don't want to do that, but um to keep you on schedule. Uh I want to make sure that I'm very respectful of your time. And so when we think about you know wrapping the show up and thinking about reflection and the things that you you've done, um if you had to go back and talk to your younger self, what would you say to them?

SPEAKER_00 43:48

I think about this often, and I'm probably I'm probably really hard in saying this, but I would tell them to keep that same level of hard work throughout the whole process. Um, I worked hard in middle. School worked hard in high school, worked hard in college, worked hard in the NFL, but then I got comfortable in the NFL. I wish I would have continued to like go to film sessions with my quarterbacks and sit in there and see what Matt Ryan was thinking and what the quarterback coach is telling him. I wish I would have just done a little bit more on that level to last a little bit longer. Um, but I I I'm happy with everything I've done. I just I just wanted to tell myself just a little bit more, just the hard work, just a little bit more. It's gonna get you far, but just one or two percent more towards the end when you've reached and accomplished your goal would have taken you to maybe five or 10 years in the NFL rather than the four that you did. So just a little bit hard, a little bit more hard work and a little bit more just being available to be open to new things while I was playing to be more available to those opportunities.

SPEAKER_01 44:49

That's good. That's good. All right, two more questions for you. One mindset, one mindset shift that every athlete can start today.

SPEAKER_00 45:03

I get to instead of I have to. I get to instead of I have to. Do you know we do I know those early mornings waking up for mat drills or for practice or those games, but you don't have to go to those games, you get to. So that's one very big shift that you can make. It changes your perception of what's going on around you. Um, I didn't start thinking that way until I tore my ACL and had everything taken away from me in the snap of a dime. Um, but after I came back from that, it was more not I have to practice today, I get to practice today after having it taken away from me so long. So that's probably the number one thing. You don't have to play the sport. I doubt anybody's holding a gun to your head making you do it. Um, but if you're gonna go out there, go out there with that mindset of I get to, and you're gonna see a lot better outcomes on the other side.

SPEAKER_01 45:48

I get to. All right, man. I get to ask you this last question. Um, you know, wrapping up the show, you think about different intangibles, you think about the things that have made you who you are. You know, we know we have work ethic, we know we have uh vulnerability, um, accountability. Is there anything that we miss um, you know, from an intangible that's that's made Drew who he is today?

SPEAKER_00 46:16

Man, me selflessness. Selflessness is a big thing. Of course, I want to go out there and score the touchdown and have my name in the paper and see myself on ESVN, but at the end of the day, I wanted us to win and I wanted to see us win. And so whether that was me catching the ball or the couple people that were behind me that were my backups, I wanted somebody to catch it. I wasn't the person that, oh, you in there, I hope he drops it. I don't want him to drop it. Okay. Like I wanted everybody to win. I wanted it to be a team effort. Um, and I honestly at the end of the day, I wanted to be in a locker room partying, singing a fight song, and and headed out with the family to eat, feeling really good. So um there's a lot of money out in the world. They're not, they're they're gonna they're gonna print money every day for the for the to the day we passed away. So there's enough money for everybody, there's enough opportunity for everybody. So I always wanted to see people around me win, regardless if it if it made me not look in the greatest light, or if it took away from me a little bit. I was really comfortable in seeing other people succeed. And I think that's why I coach right now because I love it when everybody gets to their goals and they they accomplish what they're trying to, or they they get through this trial and error situation, um, trial and tribulation era. But I love when people win because you the look on their face and knowing the journey they went through and the work they put in, there's nothing like it. So I would say selflessness also is one intangible that's made Drew Davis an unstoppable force.

SPEAKER_01 47:33

Drew, that is character, your selflessness, your vulnerability, your um your work ethic, man. Uh, I appreciate you for what you do. I'm rooting you on. Uh, continue to do what you do, man, at a high elite level. Um, continue to raise in leaders. Um, and especially that last thing you said is like raising uh young gentlemen because there's something that is a soft skill that is very, very important as we navigate through this world as young men. And so uh again, Drew, I really appreciate you joining me on the Tensor Podcast, man. This has been awesome.

SPEAKER_00 48:06

Thank you, Chris. Been my pleasure. Come back anytime.

SPEAKER_01 48:09

Absolutely. I'm gonna hold you to that.