Andre Johnson: From The University of Miami to the NFL Hall of Fame, national champion, heart & soul of Texans franchise, humble roots, family, holiday hope, talks CJ Stroud, Travis Hunter & Antonio Brown

"Once I put those shoulder pads on...it was like I was going to war.” Andre Johnson From The U to NFL Hall of Fame, on this episode of The Pivot Podcast, Ryan, Fred, and Channing sit down with seven-time Pro Bowler, one of the best wide receivers to play the game, the heart and soul of Houston Texans franchise: Andre Johnson. As the Texans chase another AFC South title, Andre, who's still a big part of the organization today, takes us back to the beginning of his journey during expansion years and how he became the face of the franchise. From his early days as a young star at "The U" to dominating the NFL on Sundays, Andre shares what fueled his drive to make the Texans a team people respected. He opens up about his mindset on the field, where putting on those shoulder pads felt like preparing for war, and why he was so determined to make the city of Houston proud every single season. The conversation gets personal as Andre reflects on his upbringing and how his strained relationship with his late father shaped the man-and father- he is today. He gets deep about the difficult choice he made to ultimately walk away from the game of football- a decision the guys understand all too well- but how he knew it was the right time because his mind was not in it anymore. Ryan has some jokes pretending to get a call from an old foe, as the guys reminisce his famous scuffle with Cortland Finnegan, which he says fans bring up to him everywhere he goes. While it's not his favorite topic, Andre shares what was really going through his head that day. Getting his take on the current Texans team, the guys ask what it'll take to bring a championship mentality back to Houston and what kind of receiving yards he would have racked up with a quarterback like CJ Stroud under center. Andre weighs in on some big names, past present and future playmakers of the league like Antonio Brown, whose talent he admired despite the controversies, AJ Brown's frustrations and Travis Hunter, the young college star who's doing things you rarely see in this generation. And what's next for the Hall of Famer? Will we see him on the sidelines coaching? He's not quite there yet, though he admits it'll be on the horizon someday. Andre's story is all about work ethic and legacy. Whether he's talking about the pride he takes in the Texans, the struggles of his short time with the Colts, or the mental toughness he adopted to make his game look effortless, and all his focus on off-the field ventures helping community and how giving back has helped him in more ways then he can share. With the holidays around the corner, never be too busy to take time to help others, you never know how a little help goes a long way. Don't miss our latest conversation, tap in now and don't forget to hit the Subscribe button! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Here's your report.

• 0:01Speaker 01

  Oh, thanks, Jane. I wish I could hire someone just like you.

• 0:04Speaker 00

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• 0:20Speaker 01

  Let's do it. You're irreplaceable, Jane, but another you would be great.

• 0:24Speaker 00

  Hire right the first time. Post your job for free on LinkedIn today at LinkedIn.com/quality.

• 0:30Ryan Clark?

  They wanted us to eat the pink Simpsons cookies. I saw you in the West End. They're like, eat them. We want you to eat them and then like go in the stands and like sign them and give them to people. And I was like, Jay, you got that. Like, you can eat it, Jay, and do whatever, right? And so the guy, this black guy, and he's like, you know, I want y'all to really lean into it, do this, do that. And he's like, I was like, oh, yeah, I'm cool. He's like, are you anti-Simpsons or donuts? I was like, no, I'm anti-doing silly stuff. I saw you doing it. And he goes, that tracks.

• 1:02Fred Taylor?

  That's something I do down in LSU, I guess. The man. Maybe y'all do that down at LSU, right?

• 1:08Ryan Clark?

  Yeah, I saw that when Jamar was walking off the field, he had stuff on his face. Dre would never let that happen.

• 1:16Fred Taylor?

  Nah, not the you. Not the you. This you in this age, maybe, but you his time? Oh, hell, nah. Nah, that you back in the day.

• 1:27Speaker 04

  Somebody chasing Burrow or smashing them donuts. Nah, I ain't doing that.

• 1:51Ryan Clark?

  Well, we got Hall of Famer Andre Johnson here. This is Fred Taylor. This is Channing Crowder. I'm Ryan Clark. Welcome to the Pivot. Pivot fam, thank you for pivoting with us. And also, we want to give a special shout-out to NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV for sponsoring this episode. I'm glad we were talking about Jamar and Joe. I was gonna save this to later, but I ain't gotta save it. Yo Miami team or the 2019 LSU Tigers? Me and Clinton Portis had a whole argument about this.

• 2:23Speaker 04

  It ain't close, man.

• 2:24Ryan Clark?

  LSU, I knew it.

• 2:25Speaker 04

  Nah, Miami. It ain't close.

• 2:28Fred Taylor?

  That 01, right?

• 2:29Speaker 04

  Yeah, the 01 team. I mean, if you look at, I mean, you had 17 first-rounders on that team. You had, I think it was 34 guys get drafted off that team. That's on a herd of, I don't know, no other college team that's had to happen.

• 2:44Fred Taylor?

  How many Hall of Famers so far?

• 2:46Speaker 04

  Two. Well, Devin.

• 2:49Ryan Clark?

  Was after?

• 2:50Speaker 04

  Was after.

• 2:50Ryan Clark?

  Okay.

• 2:51Fred Taylor?

  Okay.

• 2:51Speaker 04

  So it was me, Ed, and so now you got Frank.

• 2:55Fred Taylor?

  Yeah.

• 2:56Speaker 04

  Who was eventually gonna be one. Vince Wilfork, who was a finalist.

• 3:00Fred Taylor?

  Yep.

• 3:00Speaker 04

  So you got possibly the four Hall of Famers on that team.

• 3:04Fred Taylor?

  I missed a, I missed a, so I was recruited by the U to play linebacker. So paying homage to y'all, this is about the closest I can get to the colors. I can't get no closer than that, but I, I can't rep the U either, but I root for the U.

• 3:17Speaker 04

  Nah, I got you.

• 3:17Fred Taylor?

  When y'all playing everybody other than the Gators.

• 3:19Speaker 04

  Yeah, nah, I got you.

• 3:20Ryan Clark?

  I came out of 02, they ran out of scholarships on my ass. That was after all y'all went through?

• 3:25Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 3:26Ryan Clark?

  Man, I visited my junior summer, they told me, "Commit now, we ain't got no more scholarships left."

• 3:31Speaker 04

  Yeah, that's how it was back then, because we had so many guys. You know, we was, we was really getting a lot of the guys, the homegrown guys. So, you know, a lot of the guys back then, they was just, once they was getting offered, they was just committing.

• 3:45Fred Taylor?

  Right.

• 3:45Speaker 04

  And then, you know, they would come down, you know, when they have, you know, you can come down and visit the school and stuff like that. And they just saw the guys that was down there. And the way we used to, because we used to do like 7 on 7 on Saturdays, like Saturday mornings. So sometimes the, the local guys would come down and they would just watch. And they would see how many like former guys would come back and things of that nature. So I think that kind of helped reel them in too.

• 4:10Fred Taylor?

  Right. What was the strength coach's name?

• 4:12Speaker 04

  Andrew Swayze.

• 4:13Fred Taylor?

  Swayze.

• 4:14Ryan Clark?

  Swayze. I heard that name a million times.

• 4:16Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 4:17Fred Taylor?

  Hey, different.

• 4:18Speaker 04

  I was in the pros and I went back to try. I forget who I went to train with, tapped out. Swayze made me tap out.

• 4:25Ryan Clark?

  That's why they good. I'm gonna say this, though. As soon as you leave college, all of that basically goes away, though. Like, when I was in college, I could do all that junk and want to do it. When I would go back to LSU, I had to fight. It's a different thing when you're living in that dorm and doing all that.

• 4:41Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 4:41Ryan Clark?

  To be able to work like those boys work. Drew, I want to go, though, to a little bit further back than you being at the U. You know, as you're coming up and you're beginning to get the recognition that makes you a Parade All-American, makes you a Miami commit. I know your father passed right before, but you were already dealing with some things in that relationship. Like, how difficult was it navigating the relationship of, I guess, not having your father there the way you wanted it to?

• 5:12Speaker 04

  I think, um, I think as, you know, young black men, like, that's something we hold on to. Um, I think we kind of, we don't like to talk about it. Or if we do talk about it, it's always like we speak negative on the situation. For me, I think it was something I just kind of buried, you know. Uh, he, uh, I remember the last time seeing him, um, I was at a store and my mom had pulled up. We pulled up to a store, a corner store, and I went up and said something to him. I think I had asked him about Miami something. He's probably like eight years old.

• 5:53Speaker 04

  And, um, he just, he just kind of went off on me, like, "Go talk to your momma and your grandma," you know. And, um, when I remember walking back to the car and I got in the car and I didn't even say nothing to him. He was just like, "Go talk to your momma and your grandma." I went back and got in the car. My mom was like, "What did he say?" I was like, "He told me to go talk to my momma and my grandma." And, um, I had never seen him again. Yeah, so, um...

• 6:23Speaker 04

  I talked about it in my Hall of Fame speech. So I was 21. Always heard I had a sister. Never had met her before, never seen her a day in my life. And she called me. I'll never forget, she was calling Coach Johnson's office. And she informed me he had passed. So that's how me and my sister built our relationship.

• 6:45Ryan Clark?

  Wow.

• 6:45Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 6:46Ryan Clark?

  Why was it, why was the relationship so tarnished already? When you were, you were eight years old?

• 6:51Speaker 04

  Yeah. Um, I really don't know. Um, I, I really don't know. I don't know if it was some animosity he may have had towards my mom. I don't really know how that relationship was. Because my mom got pregnant when she was in college. So the first time my mom ever had sex, she got pregnant with me.

• 7:09Ryan Clark?

  Thank you.

• 7:12Ryan Clark?

  So for, for you, Dre, and the things that, that you do now, from the foundation and what you do that Scott Van Pelt, the first thing he said when you walked up on the set was, "I do this at Christmas because of the long receipt I would see"

• 7:30Speaker 04

  Right.

• 7:30Ryan Clark?

  "you have," you know, to being the sort of father you want to be. How have your experiences through that shaped the man you are now?

• 7:40Speaker 04

  It's, um, it shaped me a lot because I've always said I didn't want to be him. You know, um, I always said if I was to have a child, I wanted to be very involved in what was going on. And the whole Christmas thing, we was just sitting in the house one day, me and my uncle, watching a Monday night game. And I was sitting there, I was like, "Man, like, I want to do something for Christmas that, you know, to, for some kids." And he was like, "Why you don't let them just run through the store and buy what they want?" And I was like, "Hell, no." Like, because you know, you thinking like kids running through Toys R Us, like, they gonna fill the baskets up so quick.

• 8:19Ryan Clark?

  Right.

• 8:20Speaker 04

  So I'm like, "Man, that's gonna be a hell of a ticket." So. He was like, nah, he was like, you were the number eighty. Give him eighty seconds. So I was like, alright. So we tried it the first year, and the first year it was like, it was amazing, man, like to see those kids, and they wasn't only buying stuff for themselves, they was buying stuff for their brothers, their sisters, you know what I'm saying? One of the girls was even pregnant.

• 8:43Ryan Clark?

  Wow.

• 8:43Speaker 04

  She was fourteen. She was pregnant, she was buying diapers, and we was wondering like, why she was like, getting diapers and all these baby things? So it was, it was a hell of an experience, man, it was something I always look forward to doing.

• 8:56Ryan Clark?

  Like, from, from that experience though, Dre, to have worked your way up to the point where, one, you can provide that for young individuals, but what is it like seeing a young girl at fourteen who gets eighty seconds, right, to go buy what could be gifts for herself, toys, and she's already having to prepare to be a mother, you know, at such a young age?

• 9:24Speaker 04

  I was at a loss for words because my mom, she kept saying, she was like, I was wondering why she was grabbing, but my mom didn't really wanna ask her like, why, you know? And, um, after, you know, they ran through the store, whatever, her and my mom were kinda just sitting there just talking, cuz my mom was the one pushing her basket, and, um, she eventually just came up and told my mom that she was pregnant. That was like, um, cuz I have a daughter that's fifteen, so I couldn't even imagine, like, right now, my daughter coming to me telling me she's pregnant, so that, that was a, that was just a different feeling, man. Like, you had to be there to like, see it.

• 10:05Ryan Clark?

  I can't even imagine.

• 10:06Channing Crowder?

  Just the why to that, cuz we, we all do, you know, philanthropic things, but I lo-, I love to hear people's why. Is it your mom? Is it God? Your grandma? Like, why do you care about kids you don't know? You never met that girl, you never met none of them kids you hear. Why do you care about them?

• 10:21Speaker 04

  Man, I just think like we've all been fortunate, you know, to play a game like I, I, I think for me, I didn't really realize how many people I affected playing a football game until I actually retired. And it's so many kids like right now, I, a kid come up to me and was like, hey, man, you gave me a bite when I was in elementary school.

• 10:45Fred Taylor?

  Wow.

• 10:45Speaker 04

  Like, that's crazy, bro. Like you left something that's gonna stick with not only the community, but you left a legacy that can last forever. It was just something I always said, like, I was like, if I ever made it, I wanna make sure to just give kids hope that no matter what the circumstances they in, that they can make it too.

• 11:04Fred Taylor?

  What was it, eight months before, um, losing your dad, you lost your best friend, Cyril?

• 11:10Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 11:11Fred Taylor?

  And you became the godfather to his son.

• 11:14Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 11:15Fred Taylor?

  Why was it so important for you to step, step up in his absence?

• 11:18Speaker 04

  Cause I ain't grew up without my father. So I didn't want him to feel, even though I wasn't his biological father, he can have somebody he can call on and, you know, wanna check with. And, um, you know, I treated him just like he was my son, you know? Christmas, school clothes, you know, whatever he needed. Um, I was always deaf for him. I was just actually with him a couple of weeks ago in Miami, you know, got a chance to sit down and, you know, talk with him a little bit and pick his brain. So his mom really was the one who came and asked me, cause I think she, you know, she knew our friendship. She called me one day and she was like, will you be his godfather? And I was like, yeah, like, it was a no brainer.

• 12:03Speaker 04

  I mean, I was 19, you know, he got killed when he was 19 years old. And, um, he literally got off the phone with me. We was on the phone for probably about like two and a half hours. And I had never, me and him had never talked on the phone that long before. And, um,

• 12:22Speaker 04

  It's crazy because like when I tell people what we were talking about, we only talked about stuff we did in high school together. So people was like, maybe that was his way of, you know, saying goodbye. But he ended up getting killed right after he got off the phone.

• 12:38Ryan Clark?

  Damn. Hold on one second. Hello? Yeah, he right here. All right, Courtland, I'm gonna talk to you later. That was, um...

• 12:47Fred Taylor?

  That's a hell of a pivot. God damn. That's a hell of a pivot.

• 12:53Ryan Clark?

  Dre, honestly, how many people, as soon as they meet you, is that their first question? Like, about you and Cortland Finnegan?

• 13:01Speaker 04

  I hear that every day of my life.

• 13:04Speaker 04

  Like, every, every day, like, and I'm not, I'm not exaggerating, like, there's nowhere I can, like, I can go anywhere, and people always tell me that's their highlight. Like, especially Texas fans, like, that's all they talk about. It's so bad to where I just get tired of talking about it. Like, it's, it's crazy, but I literally hear it every day of my life.

• 13:28Channing Crowder?

  But do you understand from our standpoint, these that know you, we was like,

• 13:34Channing Crowder?

  "What in the hell, Dre, beating the hell out of you?"

• 13:36Fred Taylor?

  You do look at it that way. You, it's easy to look at it that way because of his demeanor, right? But on the other side, y'all gotta have been on the field with Courtland. Playing the Titans twice a year, he's a little snappy little asshole, and I see why you snapped him up. Like, bro, it made perfect sense to me. And I was sitting there like, "Yeah, get him, Dre." That shit was crazy.

• 13:58Ryan Clark?

  But that actually leads into what my question was going to be. How many people, Dre, do you feel like had sort of a misconception of you? Because you aren't boisterous, or you don't talk a lot, or you didn't necessarily sell yourself as a tough guy, so they sort of had a misconception that you were like this quiet, now you big as hell, but this quiet, sort of meek-mannered person or human that would try you from time to time?

• 14:28Speaker 04

  Well, nobody really bothered me. He probably would be the only one who really just continuously just kept going at it. But like, it's been times and games I've exchanged words with guys. But it was never like to that point of like, you know, getting out of character.

• 14:50Speaker 04

  But I, I don't really, I was always like a person like, like I'm gonna go out here and bust your ass on this field. And I would always tell people, like, I wasn't never afraid to be knocked out. Like, if I'm going across the middle, I'm going to get that ball. And if you knock me out, you knock me out. You know, I'll live to fight another day. Like, you ain't gonna kill me, you know? So that was just always my approach to it.

• 15:15Ryan Clark?

  And Dre, did you, I would say, I've asked you, I take, I think you missed out on a lot of money, being as mild-mannered and quiet as you are. Cause you was a dog. You was one of the best, some, the best receiver in the league. Three tut, three tutty, hundred fifty yards. Yeah, I just go, I go and do my job. Like, if you came out of locker room like, yeah, man, tell, line up in front of me, whatever they want to. Bro, I think you would have had crazy endorsement. I think you could, I think you missed out on a lot of money with how you, how you are.

• 15:44Speaker 04

  Yeah, I was, I was, um, it's funny you bring that up. I was just talking to somebody about that, cause, you know, like, my whole career, I've only ever had one national commercial. And people would be like, what? I'm like, yeah, I was like, I only had one national commercial in my whole career. But I think it's because of that, like, you know, the, you know, just being quiet, laid back, so, you know, people's al, people always be like, he don't talk, he don't, you know, he don't, uh, really say much. But people who know me and people are in my inner circle, they, they think I'm like a clown, so.

• 16:21Ryan Clark?

  There's no way, anyone, Dre, like, I, listen, bro, this the pivot, but we ain't finna let you just come on here and lie.

• 16:27Speaker 04

  Nah, I'm serious.

• 16:28Ryan Clark?

  Dre, you don't have one home, there's none of your homeboys that go, shee, man, we finna go by Dre and cut up. You know Dre funny as hell. Dre is that, Dre, you definitely the homeboy. You like, man, I'm really going through something, man. Like, I need, like, I just need to go talk to Dre, man. Like, he, he got wisdom, my dog did been through here. I know they say this, he's a great listener.

• 16:53Ryan Clark?

  You know what I'm saying? I know what you're saying.

• 16:57Ryan Clark?

  But for you, man, what, you know, your relationships with people though, and those things like that? Because a lot of times, guys who aren't sort of out there or very outspoken or extroverts, they have extremely tight circles. Right? And they're extremely loyal to those circles and they influenced their life. I think you got an uncle named Dre, too, right?

• 17:17Speaker 04

  Yeah, he passed away.

• 17:18Ryan Clark?

  He passed away. What was his influence in your life without having your father around?

• 17:25Speaker 04

  I mean, he was there from, you know, from the get-go.

• 17:32Speaker 04

  I was named after him. You know, so my mom is his older sister. And my mom said, you know, he came to her and was like, will you name him after me? And she was like, yeah. She said, she was just like, yeah, all right. And so she named me Andre.

• 17:50Speaker 04

  He was there from little league all the way through. So, you know, he played a very, very important part in my life and, you know, helped, you know, shape the man I am today.

• 18:07Ryan Clark?

  Talk about that one moment when you were playing flag football and you left your cleats at home and Miss Karen had to see you.

• 18:17Speaker 04

  Yeah, so that was probably one of the most embarrassing moments. So I spent the night, I think I was at my grandmother's house or something. And so I had a game that Saturday morning. We used to play. So I started off playing flag football. And we would play on Saturday mornings. My mom forgot to bring my cleats. So I'm out there playing in tennis shoes. And I'm just sliding like, every time I go to make a cut, I would slip and fall. So, you know, you can't get up and run. Like wherever you land at, that's where the ball at. So now, like, I'm frustrated. I'm crying. And like... I'm like six, seven years old at the time. So halftime comes, I'm walking off the field.

• 19:02Speaker 04

  But I'm, I'm crying because I'm frustrated. Because I can't play the way I want to play because I keep slipping and things of that nature. Bro, I don't know what happened like, I just feel this person just grabbed me. Like she had me by my jersey like jacked up in the middle of the field in front of everybody. And she was like, you better get your ass together like. I'm like, I'm like, it's my mom now. Like she runs out on the field and like jacks me up in front of everybody. And I'm just like, damn, like, so stop that crying, this, that and the other. So I wipe my face, go over. We do whatever we do at halftime, shit. I came back out, you would have thought I had some clique on.

• 19:45Ryan Clark?

  All of a sudden, you weren't slipping no more.

• 19:46Speaker 04

  Yeah, I was slipping no more, yeah.

• 19:48Fred Taylor?

  What was the teachable thing that came from that moment that you were able to carry with you? As you're, you know, you started journeying throughout playing sport?

• 19:57Speaker 04

  It was almost like looking at the same thing you always hear, how you respond to adversity? So that first half was the adversity I was facing. So it was just, how you gonna respond to it? Are you gonna continue to let that adversity, you know, take you down and you not win the game? Or are you gonna figure it out? So that was just, you know, everything has a lesson to it, man, so.

• 20:26Ryan Clark?

  Now Dre ran at college too, though. So I'm talking about just high school, high school Freddie T, high school Dre, who wins in the hundred?

• 20:35Fred Taylor?

  That's crazy, man. Miami and Mark City, huh? Uh, I was, I was six, four and two, twelve. And I went ten, two, nine in, in high school in the hundred. But he might chime in and say, well, Freddie ran on the clock. It probably wasn't, you know, back then.

• 20:53Speaker 04

  Yeah, he gonna get over you.

• 20:54Fred Taylor?

  That's one of my biggest regrets, though, from college, not running track in college, learning how to run.

• 21:01Speaker 04

  Right.

• 21:02Fred Taylor?

  You know, because even on my long runs, like in the NFL, I'm like this, I'm just big. I'm tearing muscles. I never knew how to run relaxed, where I probably could have been a little faster.

• 21:12Speaker 04

  You know, the crazy thing, I never took track serious until I got to college. That was the first time I really, like, took it serious. Like, we did it for fun, you know, to stay in shape in the offseason, because me, Portis, Tanner, Reggie, Roscoe, like, all of us, we ran track.

• 21:31Fred Taylor?

  Right.

• 21:32Speaker 04

  But it was just more of, like, something to do, but we did, you know, when we did it, we took it serious. So, and CJ, he forced us to run. Like, he was like, I don't care if you just go out there and practice, you ain't got to run in the meets.

• 21:45Fred Taylor?

  Right.

• 21:46Speaker 04

  But he was just like, I want you to go out there and practice. So, we was just like, shit, we might as well just compete too, you know, while we at it. So, it was fun, man.

• 21:58Speaker 04

  You know, got a chance, I was the Big East Champ in the 100 and the 60 meter dash, so.

• 22:04Fred Taylor?

  But that extracurricular, like, doing track, that kept you all across, from going across the bridge to South Beach, right? Because all the distractions was across the bridge.

• 22:14Speaker 04

  No, we always found a way to get to South Beach.

• 22:19Ryan Clark?

  Hey, I think too, though, back when Fred was running, you think it's him, Jesse Owens, you know. Fred ran on the hourglass. They turned the sand over and ran the sand out with Fred. He wasn't on, like, the turf with, like, the rubber. He actually ran the joint with, like, the rocks and the sand.

• 22:37Fred Taylor?

  I would segment every episode. It's more like, can we start running the commercial? Like, can we do stem sales process or something?

• 22:45Ryan Clark?

  Dre, man, I remember my first true Andre Johnson experience, and I know, you know, for you, it's probably just one of many, was watching you play against Nebraska. You know, even in, like, looking at your stats. And throughout college, it wasn't that you needed a ton of catches to have a ton of yards, right? I think like 18 yards on average, 21 yards on average. But that night, man, with the entire world watching on a team that was already stacked, what was the feeling to like really have that breakout on the biggest stage?

• 23:17Speaker 04

  Well, you know, the whole week, all I heard was about Kiel Craver, which at the time, they had him ranked as like the top cornerback coming out. So the whole week, everybody's, what you gonna do? What you gonna do when he lines up on you? This, this, that and the other. So like that whole week, like I didn't go nowhere. Like I was in the hotel. I was like, I'm gonna give it to him. Like I'm a, I'm a, you know, I'm a show out. So mentally, I was just trying to get myself in that space, you know, to make sure I was ready to perform. So like that week of practice, man, they was, I mean, we was throwing bombs like the

• 24:01Speaker 04

  whole weekend practice. So I'm like, man, there's no way we gonna go in a game and throw the ball like this. And the game came and they was calling them plays. I was, I was ready because I had already done, did it all week. So, and I knew too, like I had a move I used to do where I used to grab DBs. And I remember the first time I grabbed him, I could tell mentally he was, he was done because I grabbed him and threw him on the ground.

• 24:32Ryan Clark?

  What you mean? Like, like when you block anything, or just?

• 24:34Speaker 04

  Nah, I just like, because you know how DBs try to get aggressive with you? So he tried to jam me and it looks like I'm fighting off the jam, but I really want him to try to put his hands on me. So I know he wasn't stronger than me. So I just grabbed him as if I was fighting through the jam and just grabbed him and slammed him on the ground. The first touchdown I caught, I grabbed him and slammed him on the ground.

• 24:55Ryan Clark?

  Now, you did a lot of like big people stuff. I remember, I remember, man, it's 08, y'all come to, y'all came to Pittsburgh and this was my first game back after being sick, Chan, as you like to famously talk about. You know what I'm saying? So I'm fired up. I'm like, so I'm back out here, a guy that gave me my life. You know what I'm saying? And you know, man, they used to have that that stretch run. It all it all looked like run every single time. I'm trying to go fire on somebody. So I just took off. Man, Drake comes screaming down the field. I had to make a choice, Chan. It was give up this bomb or tackle Andre before they threw the ball.

• 25:35Ryan Clark?

  And you're damn right.

• 25:37Ryan Clark?

  You're damn right I tackled him.

• 25:38Speaker 06

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• 26:08Ryan Clark?

  When you get to the Texans, bro, it's still basically an expansion franchise. But in that draft, so they had drafted David Carr. He was going, he was the quarterback, right? And in that draft, it's you and Charles Rogers, who ends up going second to Detroit. How much time did you end up spending with him before the the actual draft and the pre-draft process? Did y'all come to Houston?

• 26:35Speaker 04

  With Charles Rogers?

• 26:35Ryan Clark?

  Yeah, did y'all come to Houston together?

• 26:37Speaker 04

  None of my visits, none of our visits was together.

• 26:39Ryan Clark?

  Gotcha.

• 26:40Speaker 04

  Yeah, none of our visits were together. I got a chance to hang out with him in Miami for a little bit. That was my first time like ever meeting him. You know, we was getting ready for the draft. He was down like one weekend. We exchanged numbers and we we just kind of said eight, chopped it up a little bit. And but we always had a cool relationship because his agent, they were from, they were located here in Houston. So he would be here, you know, in the offseason and stuff like that. So we always had kept a cool relationship. I always had a feeling they were going to take him because he was a hometown kid. You know, he was a, he was a hell of a player, man.

• 27:23Speaker 04

  He used to do some great things, you know, on the field, so. There was never no animosity about who was gonna go first or who was gonna go second. We just always just kept it cool.

• 27:35Channing Crowder?

  You talk about grown man stuff. You remember the stutter on the mic, the trips?

• 27:40Ryan Clark?

  Yeah.

• 27:40Channing Crowder?

  Does the Z come down? And leading into the Houston game, they were like, Channing, he's not breaking stride. I'm like, no, I'm gonna cut him off. And I'm standing in front of him, and now he got a stutter back out. They said he's not breaking stride confidently. Okay, shit, he gonna stop, he gonna stop when he hit this middle.

• 28:01Channing Crowder?

  God damn.

• 28:04Channing Crowder?

  I don't know what part of you hit me, your elbow, your knee. And my whole body shot back. He caught it, it was a touchdown too, right in the red zone. And I was like, okay, it's a, it's a little difference there, you know? But even, but even playing, y'all, we beat y'all. You go crazy, and you still lost. Was that frustrating? Like RC just said, you came into an expansion franchise. You was a monster, all pro, everything, and y'all was getting y'all butt whooped.

• 28:30Speaker 04

  Yeah, that was, um, that was tough because coming from Miami where you won a lot, and then coming into the league, it's just, it was, it was different. Cause then it almost, and I, I had nothing against my teammates, but it almost kinda made you like question like, are these guys really, you know, are they really, really giving it they all, you know?

• 28:56Speaker 04

  Cause like I said, like, I don't know, my approach was just different. Like, I tell people all the time, like, you know, when you in the locker room and they tell you it's two minutes before you go out? I don't know what it was, like, I could be cool the whole time, but once I put them shoulder pads on, like, I never would put my shoulder pads on until they told me it was two minutes for me to go out. It was like when I put them shoulder pads on, it was like I was putting on like some, like I was going to war. So, that was just like my approach, that was like my mentor approach. So when I was out on the field, man, like... You literally had to take that top and throw it over me to get me off of it. You know, so that was just the way I approached it. And I didn't feel like sometimes everybody approached it that same way.

• 29:40Speaker 04

  But that was just my love I had for the game and the way I approached it.

• 29:44Ryan Clark?

  Dre, what made you stick with it, though? We had Calvin Johnson on the show, right? Just as you were, one of the greatest players at the position, Hall of Famer as you are. And he retired early, right? Barry Sanders retired early in Detroit, which was an organization that had that singular great player, and then that great player never won. So eventually, they were like, okay, this isn't worth it for me. You continue to play. You played 14 years. You have stops with the, what was it? The Titans and Indianapolis late. So you kept that love for the game. What was it that kept you invested, in my opinion, along with J.J.

• 30:26Ryan Clark?

  Watt, two best players to ever play in Texas and in Houston? What kept you invested to keep coming back to that stadium? Keep going back to that practice field every single day until y'all were able to win?

• 30:40Speaker 04

  Well, you can go somewhere and the foundation could pretty much be laid. That foundation had to be built. Like, it wasn't nothing there when we first got there. I remember people used to laugh at us. I remember, I don't know if you was in Pittsburgh then. I remember Pittsburgh coming here, and I remember Joey Porter was like, y'all should be ashamed of y'all fucking self. Like, he was telling our old lineups, because, you know, at the time, like, I think the year before I got there, they gave up the most sacks ever in the history of the NFL. You know, they used to have a commercial where David Carr would line up and there was no line on the field. So it was bad, man. So like...

• 31:27Speaker 04

  I remember standing on the practice field one day and I think I was just having a moment like, damn, like, you know, I made it, like, I made it, you know, I accomplished my goal of playing in NFL. And I remember making my first Pro Bowl. And just listening to like, some of the guys just talk about like, because that's, that's what always mattered to me, like what my peers thought. So just hearing guys talk about, hey, man, I like the way you approach the game, this, that and the other. I was just like, man, you know what, like, I'm a, like, I'm a make people respect the Texans. Like, I want to be the person that make, you know, people, when you talk of the Texans, you're going to talk of Andre.

• 32:10Speaker 04

  Like, that was always my approach. So that's what motivated me and kept me like, coming back every year, like, just wanting it more and more and more. So, uh, that was just my approach to it.

• 32:22Ryan Clark?

  Troy had three sacks that day, Andre. They should have been embarrassed.

• 32:27Fred Taylor?

  Along the same lines, I actually wanted to ask the same questions, RC, but I'll add what Channing was talking about, about making more money.

• 32:35Speaker 04

  Right.

• 32:35Fred Taylor?

  Right? You could have easily chased the money.

• 32:37Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 32:37Fred Taylor?

  You know, you're, you're losing, you still the best player on the team, putting up crazy numbers. Uh, could have went to a whole entirely different market and all that stuff. But you stay here. If you, if you make that decision, you're not the first player in the Texans ring. Well, I don't know if you would be or not.

• 32:54Speaker 04

  Right.

• 32:55Fred Taylor?

  But do you think you would be the first person that they inducted into their Ring of Honor? Or how would that, um, how would your legacy look differently if you had gone?

• 33:05Speaker 04

  You know what, um,

• 33:08Speaker 04

  I tell people that if I had, if I could do it all over, I still would have never left. I just would have never played at Indy in Tennessee.

• 33:20Fred Taylor?

  It was in the South.

• 33:21Speaker 04

  When you've been somewhere for so long and then you have to go to a whole nother city, you gotta figure everything out. You know, here I was routine, you know, it was routine for 12 years. You know, I had, you know, my massages, my doctors I go see, whatever. But when you go to a whole nother city, you gotta try to redo that whole routine and figure it out.

• 33:45Speaker 04

  The year I was in Indy, the first year after I left here, man, that was probably like the most, one of the most miserableest times, you know, in my life, like. I enjoy being around the guys in the locker room, but as far as like outside of that.

• 34:01Fred Taylor?

  Right.

• 34:02Speaker 04

  It was, man, that's the most I probably ever slept.

• 34:06Fred Taylor?

  I feel you.

• 34:06Speaker 04

  You know, so that, that was, those are the things I would say I would change. As far as like leaving here, no, I would have still stayed. They weren't gonna let me leave anyway. I mean, I, I remember Rick Smith telling me, he said, "You retired before I let you leave."

• 34:24Fred Taylor?

  Yeah, and, and with Rick, we all hung out in Vegas during the Super Bowl, and you were getting ready for your, the Hall of Fame induction, and just seeing how ownership treats you, how Rick treats you, and, and what the city thinks of you. None of that would be what it is now, even the Astros.

• 34:44Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 34:44Fred Taylor?

  Right? It wouldn't be what it is if you, you know, left.

• 34:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, that, that's why I say I wouldn't change it, because even right now to this day, like when you walk in that stadium, you probably see more 80 jerseys than you see of any jersey. You know, so, um, you, you, I've definitely created something that, that will last a lifetime. Like, you know, if I'm dadding on, you know, my daughter, she have kids, like, they gonna still see Andre Johnson up in that stadium. So, um, and for me, that's what, that's what it's all about. Like, I, uh, I just never wanted to, I just always wanted to be, I want it to be great.

• 35:32Speaker 04

  I never thought about the Hall of Fame and all that stuff. You know, it just shows like the work and stuff you put into it, man, so.

• 35:39Ryan Clark?

  They're not only gonna see your, your, your name and, and jersey number, they're gonna see you. You know, Chan goes to play for Miami, and Atlanta dude never leaves. Freddie T, Florida boy. Plays in Jacksonville, he has a house there. A lot of the cats that play for Miami who are from there, they end up going back. You decided to make Houston home. What was it about Houston that you said, you know what? I can continue to live here the rest of my life? Even being from a place where people worked their whole lives to get houses in?

• 36:16Speaker 04

  Man, people actually be all the time, they be like, man, you don't want to go back? And I'm like, nah, because the relationships, um, just the love, like, I get here, like, the, the way the city welcomed me. And it's crazy because like, I already had relationships like with Slim Thug them because one of their, uh, close friends, we and him played together, he actually played at Miami. So they used to come to Miami and hang out with us when we was in college. So for me, like, the transition coming here was easy, because I already had people I knew here. But the love and, and the relationships, man, like, shit, sometimes I feel like I get treated better here than when I'm at home, you know?

• 36:58Speaker 04

  So, um, my mom's moved here, my brother's moved here. You know, they, they, they feel the same way about it, so, I mean, why leave?

• 37:08Ryan Clark?

  Well, you talking about love, we talking about making love. The women in Florida, fine as women.

• 37:18Ryan Clark?

  I answered your question on that one, Jay. The, the, the, the ladies here, just as bad as Miami?

• 37:25Speaker 04

  Yeah, they, they, I don't want to get too down too deep.

• 37:31Fred Taylor?

  That was a setup question, they asked CJ that.

• 37:33Ryan Clark?

  When he kept saying love, I'm like, what kind of love we talking about here?

• 37:38Fred Taylor?

  You, you a vet. CJ was a rookie when they asking that, don't fall for Channing trap, bruh.

• 37:42Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 37:43Fred Taylor?

  It's setup, bro.

• 37:44Ryan Clark?

  I don't want to set them up, you know? I like Onyx, I been to Onyx too.

• 37:51Ryan Clark?

  Speaking of CJ, you know, this is a point in Houston Texans history where they're sort of, you know, they had to make a transition after DeSean left and you never really know how that's going to go in finding a quarterback. I feel like they have, right? And they found a franchise leader. You get D'Amico, but you come into this year, Dre, and they're like, okay, this is it. It's about to be Kansas City and Baltimore and the Houston Texans all in that same conversation. And they've hit some bumps with, with injuries, with different things that have happened with this team. How do you see the current iteration of the Houston Texans? And do you believe that something is building here that brings a championship?

• 38:36Speaker 04

  I definitely think it's something building. I think for me, just, you know, looking at everything, I kind of think they let that outside noise kind of get in because once the, you know, the Stephon trade and everything happened, it was like, oh, we going to Super Bowl, you know? And they, when you look at the team, they're fairly young. And man, I don't think those guys really, really understand how hard it is to win, just win a game, let

• 39:17Speaker 04

  alone win a Super Bowl. I think that, and what D'Amico was, you know, preaching to them, you know, he says that a lot, like, we got to block out this outside noise. And I think, you know, it's about to like getting harder at the right time. I think, you know, with these last few games coming up is, you know, if they can just find a rhythm, you know, and get back to playing the style of football that they're used to playing. I personally think they need to run Joe a little more, you know, run the ball a little more. But I definitely think it's something building though, heading in the right direction.

• 39:51Speaker 06

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• 40:20Fred Taylor?

  How many yards would you put up with CJ? Because you ain't had no quarterback. I mean, I'm gonna keep it one thousand.

• 40:28Ryan Clark?

  Bro, that's honestly, I don't want to cut Freddie off. I know I want you to finish your conversation and finish your question, but to me, that was my Andre Johnson's a first ballot Hall of Famer argument. And no disrespect to Matt Shaw, I was like, that's the best quarterback he had. And he put up, like, you were quarterback independent. And that's hard, bro.

• 40:50Fred Taylor?

  Obviously, I seen you up close, and I know what the game plan was when we played you guys. And I mean, it was an intense rivalry along with the Titans. So with that, you mentioned seven 1,000-yard receiving seasons. You got five 100-reception seasons, number two all time with five, over 100-yard receptions. So, you know, that's why I asked the question, because CJ is amazing. His this year isn't as dynamic as his rookie year had been, but we see, he has all the tools. And he would easily have been the best quarterback that would have been throwing you the ball. And again, no disrespect to your former teammates, but you did all of that shit with CJ?

• 41:34Speaker 04

  Probably, I think I'll probably get by 17, 1800.

• 41:38Fred Taylor?

  In 17 games now? They play extra games, so you...

• 41:41Speaker 04

  Not 17 games, I'll probably get close to 2,000.

• 41:44Fred Taylor?

  The rules changed, they can't hit you. Nobody don't want to hit your big ass. Anyway, they can't hit you. I think you'd do 2,000, keep it real with you. But that's just me. That's just me as a fan.

• 41:55Ryan Clark?

  Somewhere around in there. Yeah, we know. You...

• 41:59Ryan Clark?

  Like, there has to be frustrations with quarterbacks and wide receivers. You weren't boisterous about yourself, much less your teammates. There was a loyalty you had that even in your frustrations that you just mentioned here, I never heard those during your playing time.

• 42:16Speaker 04

  Right.

• 42:17Ryan Clark?

  Recently, this week, they asked A.J. Brown about Jalen, about the game. They said, "Hey, A.J., what y'all need to be better at?" Passing.

• 42:28Ryan Clark?

  Now, Dre, don't be one person pass the ball, Dre. It ain't a lot of... Freddie T wasn't gonna pass it, Chan wasn't gonna pass it, I wasn't gonna pass it. The quarterback was gonna pass the ball. When you see the A.J. Brown and Jalen Hurts and that frustration, what do or how do you view a situation like that in the way you feel like it should be handled if you're a superstar wide receiver with a superstar quarterback?

• 42:55Speaker 04

  So, I would've just talked about the offense as a whole. I wouldn't have just spoke specifically about just the passing game. Even though, you know, Saquon is running the hell out the ball, but I just would've said there are things we all need to do as a whole, you know, to be better as an offense. The whole thing with him and Jalen, that's something you go talk about behind closed doors. Like, I don't think you air your quarterback out like that, you know? But, you know, times are different now too, man, so...

• 43:27Ryan Clark?

  Way different.

• 43:28Speaker 04

  It's, I didn't actually get to hear it, but I saw they kept replaying it on ESPN. And I was like, "He must've said something crazy," you know, for them to keep talking about that. But, yeah, if it was, that's the way I would've approached it, you know?

• 43:44Ryan Clark?

  But, Dre, did you oversnap?

• 43:46Channing Crowder?

  Yeah.

• 43:46Speaker 04

  Yeah, man, you know what's crazy? Me and Sharp actually got into it one time on the sideline. And I literally just walked off the field. It was the QBX last year. We went 2 and 14. I think everybody was just frustrated. You know, Sharp, that was the year he threw like... Five or six pick sixes or something like that. And, uh, and I understood he was frustrated and we were playing against the Raiders. It was the last play of the game. And we had run the same play four times in a row. And I'm just like, bro, like we keep running the same play and you throwing me the ball every time. Like they know the ball is coming to me.

• 44:25Speaker 04

  And so I go in, I break in, he throws the ball, but I didn't break in, I guess, the way he thought I was. Cause I'm like, I done ran this play three times in a row, the fourth time, he gonna be right there waiting on me. So I'm thinking he gonna improvise a little bit. It didn't work out. And, um, he was like following me down the side like, you broke your rod off. And I was like, he just talking, talking, talking. So in my head, I'm just kinda like, alright, he's having a tough year. Like I'm gonna let him vent, you know, get whatever he had to get off his chest. And he just kept following me, he kept talking. And it just got to the point, I just turned around and I just snapped.

• 45:07Speaker 04

  So the, um, strength coach, he grabbed me and he was like, nah, nah, nah, nah, like, nah, you, you not about to do that. And I wouldn't, I, I don't think it had got to the point of where like we would have put our hands on each other. But in the heat of the battle and like the way the season had went, it was just a lot of frustration that had built up. Like he had built up frustration, I had built up frustration because we just had had a great year that year before. And we were so excited about the upcoming season and then we go 2-14. Like we won our first two games and then lost 14 straight.

• 45:40Ryan Clark?

  Golly. Was that the, was that the most difficult time for you in the NFL?

• 45:46Speaker 04

  Yeah, that was hard. Like that was, that was real hard because, cause I even felt like, even though like me and Sharp got into it that game, like as soon as the game was over, we got into it. As soon as we got in our cars, like we got on the phone and like we was apologizing to each other, you know? Um, cause you know, I always looked at Sharp like a brother. You know, we spent a lot of time in the off season working out together and stuff like that. So that, that'd be the things like people don't get to see like the, the behind the scenes stuff. So, um, you know, that, that was a very, very frustrating time. And I was hurting for him because of like, you know, what he was going through. Cause he was playing, he wasn't playing well.

• 46:27Speaker 04

  And I can, you know, he coming out there, people booing him and, you know, things of that nature. So that, that, that wasn't a good feeling. Yeah.

• 46:35Fred Taylor?

  You talked about walking off the field. Another Miami native who's on the top of that list I was just talking about, Antonio Brown. He's number one with the most 100-yard receiving seasons. When A B. walked off the field, he didn't look back. It broke my heart.

• 46:52Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 46:53Fred Taylor?

  And we've talked about whether he was a Hall of Famer.

• 46:56Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 46:56Fred Taylor?

  Certainly Hall of Fame potential up until that point. What do you think about, I guess, that, that decision he made? And do you think A B. is a, is a Hall of Famer?

• 47:08Speaker 04

  I love A B. Man, I, I got a chance to train with A B. When he first came in as a rookie, we were all training back home together. And I ain't gonna lie, like, I remember watching him and I'm watching him work out. And I came back, like, we was all, I'm like, Coach, we got this kid that's, you know, at Central Michigan, but he, you know, he's from Miami. And I was telling my receiver coach, I'm like, bro, I think we need to, you know, look at this kid, man, like, and, is he, like, what A B. done in those years when he was being A B.? Yeah, he was Hall of Fame.

• 47:53Fred Taylor?

  Right.

• 47:54Speaker 04

  I definitely agree that, you know, he, I mean, for what he done.

• 48:01Fred Taylor?

  Right.

• 48:01Speaker 04

  In the time he was playing.

• 48:03Fred Taylor?

  Correct.

• 48:03Speaker 04

  Yeah, definitely.

• 48:04Fred Taylor?

  Heck, yeah.

• 48:05Speaker 04

  The part where he walked off the field, I ain't gonna lie, man, that hurt.

• 48:10Fred Taylor?

  Right, yeah.

• 48:11Speaker 04

  That, that, that, that hurt, man, because, you know, like, you see a guy that has so much potential and is a hell of a football player. And then when you saw that, it was just kind of like, damn, A B. Like, it's almost like you want to jump through the screen and just grab him, like, just, no, A B., don't do that, you know? So, I mean, that's the love I have for him. And, you know, I hated to, I hated to see that, but. You know, I got a chance to see him a couple of times he's been in town here, you know, and chop it up with him and stuff, so. But yeah, I got a lot of love for AB, man. Me too.

• 48:50Ryan Clark?

  Dre, how often, how often do you see that video pop up? Whether it was you, Tanner Mann, Chad, AB? And this is just my opinion. That was before everybody was a wide receiver coach and everybody did this stuff training in the offseason. To me, y'all were the godfathers of the training we see now. At the time, did y'all see it like that? That y'all were starting this whole new thing?

• 49:20Speaker 04

  Nah, we, we didn't, I don't, man, to be honest, we were just out there working out. Chad was the first person I ever seen do that, them cone drills and stuff like that. He used to train with a guy named Coach C.

• 49:34Speaker 04

  And Chad was the first person, he had told me about it, so me and him went out to,

• 49:40Speaker 04

  we were on the beach at that stadium right there on South Beach. And that was my first time ever doing it, you know, training with Chad and doing those cone drills. And, you know, it's crazy how like, you know, you go out there, so me, Tanner, you know, all us AB, we get together one night and we just like, we gonna go work out. So we go out there, we do the cone drills or whatever, but not thinking that that would go viral. You know, we was just looking at it more as just like a workout, you know? So it's crazy, man, because it pops up a lot. It pops up a lot. And then it's crazy to hear like a Devonte Adams say, you know, that was something that he watched coming up and hear some of the guys that's playing out to say that.

• 50:24Speaker 04

  So that's kind of crazy, man.

• 50:26Ryan Clark?

  Here's my question for you. All right, let's say it's a. Middle fourth quarter, right? Close game. Andre Johnson walks out on the field. The corner that stands in front of him just went on a 14-play drive where they caught two footballs, a bomb, and now he gotta stick you. And I'm asking you this because tomorrow, there's a guy that may win the Heisman Trophy, who's gonna try to do that.

• 50:54Speaker 04

  Mm-hmm.

• 50:55Ryan Clark?

  Right? He's gonna try to be the best wide receiver on the team, and then after that, he's gonna attempt to cover the best wide receiver on the team. Channing or Fred, I can't remember, asked him a question and said, "If you're playing Miami, that's Tyreek Hill and Jalen Ramsey. If he's playing the Texans now, that's Nico Collins and Derrick Stingley."

• 51:18Speaker 04

  Right.

• 51:19Ryan Clark?

  In Travis Hunter's future, do you believe it's possible for someone to be a majority player on both sides of the football at that position or those positions in the NFL?

• 51:33Speaker 04

  Majority?

• 51:35Ryan Clark?

  He plays every snap.

• 51:36Speaker 04

  No, I get it in college, but I just, I don't see that happening in the NFL. I can see where they may come in, you know, depending on what position he plays, if he's a wide receiver or a defensive back, but I can see where, if he's a full-time defensive back, I can see where they may have six, seven plays drew up for him, you know, offense a week or whatnot. But as far as like playing 130-something plays or whatever it is that he play, I just don't see that happening in the NFL.

• 52:13Speaker 04

  But I will say this, man, like, to see what he has done, like, bro, he had me locked in. Like, I was, I was, I wanna see what Travis Hunter doing this week. Like, he really, really had me locked in, and man, like... What he has done, man, has truly been amazing. I think it was great for the game of college football. Because you don't see talent like that. Like, that type of talent comes once in a lifetime. You know, to see what he has done, I really think, like Coach Prime said, like, they need to just go sit the Heisman on his dresser. He was definitely the best player in college football this year.

• 52:57Channing Crowder?

  I agree 100%. And he made it look easy.

• 53:00Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 53:00Channing Crowder?

  And I bring it back to you. Was that shit easy for you? I'm just thinking about, to be honest, because he said, "I ran track for fun, and I won the Big East." Yeah. You go out there, bro, and I ain't saying you ain't work hard, but you really just go out there and eat people up in routes. Big as you are, you want to throw a jump ball, let's go. Like you said, cross in the middle, let's go. Don't grab nobody. Blocking, you choking the hell out of corners. Like, was that shit easy for you?

• 53:27Speaker 04

  I wouldn't necessarily say it was easy. It was just a lot of work that went into it. Like, so like, the thing with Sharp, like, we used to go to U of H, and it'd just be me and him on the field, and we would just go route after route after route, just like, over and over and over. And we would like, alright, we got this situation. You know, I'm gonna do this, you know, if this situation happened. So it became, like, I ripped it so much to where it became like second nature. So like, when I got on the field, because I've had guys say like, "Man, you make it look easy." But I think for me, it was that I've already prepared myself from being in those situations. So yeah, it made it look easy, but it was a lot of work that went into it.

• 54:11Fred Taylor?

  He didn't want to be reminded by Miss Karen. He got some shit, he gonna jack him up.

• 54:17Ryan Clark?

  I tell you what, if she get his feet off, if she done got his feet off of the ground in the league, she was bad. I was paid to do it, and it was a fight.

• 54:27Channing Crowder?

  I don't want to call the dude's name out, but we were playing Dre one time, and they went to trips away from him. And we tried to roll the coverage, and Dakota looked at his safety and said, "Mm-mm." They were like, "No, roll left," he said, "Mm-mm."

• 54:42Fred Taylor?

  That's crazy.

• 54:43Channing Crowder?

  I said, "Yeah, we in trouble today."

• 54:45Fred Taylor?

  So Dre, you finally got that gold jacket. Saw the tears, man. I love this beach, connected here in Houston. What's next for you? What's on the deck?

• 54:55Speaker 04

  I don't know, man. I'm still doing a little stuff with the team now. I have a lot of people who ask me about coaching. I actually interviewed for the TSU job when it was open. I don't think I'm in that space yet to actually want to be coaching like full time.

• 55:17Speaker 04

  But I do think that's something I will eventually like get to. I like, I kind of like where I'm at right now because you know, I do a lot of more things on the corporate side with the team. It's a lot less stress, you know. So, but I, I, I just like being around the game. You know, I definitely think, you know, at some point I'll switch over to like that football upside.

• 55:42Fred Taylor?

  Right now, keeping the stress free is always the key, man, but you've earned every bit of it. So I want to ask you, you know, along your entire journey, everything we've talked about. With that, what, what's been your biggest pivot?

• 55:55Speaker 04

  Biggest pivot?

• 55:59Speaker 04

  Damn, I ain't never thought about that for it. I was probably about fourteen, fifteen.

• 56:10Speaker 04

  And I think this is what kind of woke me up.

• 56:15Speaker 04

  You know, as a kid. So one of my closest friends, well, my best friend.

• 56:24Speaker 04

  You know how you have that like your mom tell you not to be hanging around the wrong crowd? And so there was a point in time and she was just like, he was kind of hanging around some people we probably shouldn't have been around. And my mom, she, I remember her coming to me and she was like,

• 56:42Speaker 04

  I don't want you hanging around him no more, but this is my best friend. We grew up together from like five years old. So you know, as a young, you know, teenager, you just like, eh, like, what are you talking about? So you have a lot of questions and.

• 56:58Speaker 04

  He get in the car with somebody and they supposedly are supposed to go get something to eat. And they go in a place, the guy he goes with robs the place. Gun goes off, kills the girl at the cash register. So now my best friend is gone.

• 57:19Ryan Clark?

  Accessory?

• 57:20Speaker 04

  Yeah, and I would probably say that was when I was like, damn, like, what if I would have got in the car? Or what if I would have been in that car? And the, you know, so from that happening to sending me out of district to go to high school and things of that nature, I talked about that in my Hall of Fame speech also. It put me around a different environment, like, I never had been around

• 57:53Speaker 04

  young black men who supported each other and encouraged each other to go to college and be successful. So that was, I would probably say that was like my biggest pivot because it really put things in like perspective then, you know?

• 58:06Ryan Clark?

  Just before we go, because Channing made me think about it. Football was never easy for me, and I'm pretty sure no one ever watched me play it and went, "God, RC, you made that look so easy." They were probably like, "Mother F of you is straining every single play. He looks stressed out." Because I am, right? And so, like, you know, I got to play with Troy, I played with Sean, and like, all these people who I was like, man, to have that much talent, to be able to do those sort of things, I was just like, man, that must be just a great feeling to walk on the field and feel like, man, I got stuff that other people don't. You had that. Channing mentioned, "I'm gonna go be, I'm gonna go run track." And we just did it because we were supposed to, and then I won the Big East.

• 58:52Ryan Clark?

  When it started to go away, though, right? When the yards weren't as easy, when waking up to train wasn't as easy, when the stuff that made you a Hall of Famer was no longer there. How did you deal with that?

• 59:09Speaker 04

  That was kind of like a rude awakening for me, like, because I remember my 12th year, it was my 11th or 12th year, and I could kind of feel like, I'm like, man, my body not responding the same, like, so...

• 59:27Speaker 04

  I'm like, well, hey, maybe, you know, it's dwindling down like it's coming to an end. And I remember my last year, you know, when I was in Tennessee. I remember just being out there, just like running routes and, you know, you could feel it like you just like, nah, I can't, I can't do that like I used to, you know? So I think for me, what made me retire too. Man, I was sitting in the meeting room, because I retired like after our eighth game that year. And I was sitting in the meeting room and I always said, if I mentally wasn't into it no more, I said, I would never like waste a day. Like that day I was mentally out of it, I was going to tell the coach, I'm done.

• 1:00:10Speaker 04

  Like, and I remember sitting in the meeting room and they say the coach called me three times and I never responded. They said I was just sitting there just looking at the wall. And I knew then I was mentally checked out.

• 1:00:26Ryan Clark?

  Wow.

• 1:00:26Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:00:27Ryan Clark?

  Did you just walk in after that and say, I'm done?

• 1:00:31Speaker 04

  Well, the crazy thing, it was the day before the game. And we had like a Thursday night game. So we played Jacksonville that Thursday night. I go, I come back to Houston and to see my daughter. And I'll never forget, because I already said, when I get back for that Monday meeting, I was going to tell them, because I had already called them. And my daughter, before I got on the plane, my daughter was like, why you got to go back? But she knew I was playing football, but she was just like, why you got to go back? And when she said that, that just even more confirmed, like, you know what? You gave it all you had, just, you know, let it go, so.

• 1:01:15Ryan Clark?

  Wow. Man, that's a rap, we let this go, dang. What's funny about that, Dre, is I, like, I tell the story. In, in my mind, I retired in like, November of my last year, my 13th year. I was sitting on the sofa and I used to have people come in, do treatment or whatever. And man, like, I just remember how hard it was, like, to get up and answer the door.

• 1:01:39Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:01:39Ryan Clark?

  Or, the pain of being on the table and dealing with that, it wasn't worth it to me no more, dawg. Like, I, and I was sitting on the sofa and I was like, this is it. And I was like, I'm gonna try to get this last run and, and not make myself look like a fool. And I, I didn't wanna cheat it, so I still tried to stay tapped in, still tried to stay mentally there. When I knew it was over, it was because the bad stuff didn't affect me the same.

• 1:02:05Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:02:06Ryan Clark?

  Right, you know what I'm saying? Like, like, it was, it wasn't about the highs.

• 1:02:08Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:02:08Ryan Clark?

  Right? It was like, when something bad happened, I was like, mm.

• 1:02:12Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:02:12Ryan Clark?

  And 'cause the, the reason was, is like, I knew it was nothing I could do about it. When you in your prime and something bad happen, be like, dang, I gotta, I gotta be better, I gotta work on that.

• 1:02:20Speaker 04

  But see, that's the crazy thing, because that year in, um, Tennessee,

• 1:02:26Speaker 04

  I don't know if we get, we was playing Detroit, I think it was like, the second game of the season. So, they trying, um, every time they put me in, I'm running a hitch or a slant, it's third down. So, I'm just like, man, to hell with this. So, I literally go sit on the other end of the bench. The whole team's on this side of the field, and it's game-winning drive. So, everybody's like, Dre, Dre, Dre. So, I'm like, man, I ain't going in the game. Like, I ain't played the whole fourth quarter. So, one of the, uh, the assistant receiver coach come up to me, he like, Dre, please, man, just go in the game. I go in the game, catch the game, win the touchdown, but it didn't feel the same. Like, it just was like, you just made another play.

• 1:03:04Ryan Clark?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:05Speaker 04

  So, that's when I knew, I was just like, yeah.

• 1:03:07Fred Taylor?

  It's a gift and a curse, man, to be able to get, get to that point, where you can make that decision, even though you kinda can look along the landscape and say, fuck. And just start playing back your whole career. I was like that in practice in New England. It's like, alright, this, this a wrap.

• 1:03:22Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:03:23Fred Taylor?

  And when you start questioning it, you gotta, you gotta shut it down.

• 1:03:25Ryan Clark?

  Also, I also think it helps, just my opinion, to not be in the place that made you who you were professionally. You know what I'm saying? Like, I needed to go to Washington that last year to be like, oh wait, I'm okay going home. Right. You know what I'm saying? Because when you with all the people, or still have people around that you actually fought with, you grew with, you had that level of respect for, it's like, man, he's still here, man, I want to be here. And it was like, when I left, that same year, Troy retired, Ike retired, and so I didn't have to sit home and watch them play in black and gold. You know, so it made it a little easier, but I couldn't imagine if I was with them, I knew we'd have been bucking each other up. Nah, dawg, like, we can do it one more. Right, right.

• 1:04:10Ryan Clark?

  Out there getting burnt up. Makes sense. Out there getting cooked. Makes sense.

• 1:04:15Channing Crowder?

  Y'all niggas love football.

• 1:04:16Ryan Clark?

  See you guys later, have a good one.