April 23, 2024
Randy Starks: You’ve Got to Invest in Yourself
Randy Starks dives in to discuss his Miami Dolphins tenure, playing at a Pro Bowl level at two different positions, life as Channing Crowder’s neighbor, and his new role as the Head Coach of the Eureka College Red Devils. Contributors to this episode include Sevach Melton and Dolphins Productions. Theme song created and performed by The Honorable SoLo D.
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Transcript
00:00:00
Speaker 1: You're now diving.
00:00:07
Speaker 2: I'm gonna have been that pix who then.
00:00:13
Speaker 3: Setting down with Seth Living Oh Jay ju ju, And this is strictly for them.
00:00:18
Speaker 2: True fans number one of course, y'all, this ain't the other nearest bots to Welcome back.
00:00:24
Speaker 4: To the fish Tank presented by iHeartRadio right here on the Miami Dolphins Podcast Network, Seth Lovitt and the man with the best hands in the podcast business, O J McDuffie. Juice, I know you like the offensive side of the ball. I know how you feel about the defensive side of the ball. But be careful now when you answer this one. How are you feeling about today's guest exactly?
00:00:46
Speaker 2: You know how I feel about the defense side of the ball. You know, of course I love the offensive side, but when it comes to the defensive side, I'm looking for guys like this and I know I cond vibe with got it, you know what I mean. I'm an offensive guy that was defensive mind at heart, you know what I mean.
00:01:03
Speaker 5: Love it.
00:01:04
Speaker 2: We've talked about this big set we have. You know, I'm really a defensive guy that had the play offense right right?
00:01:09
Speaker 5: Is that what it was?
00:01:10
Speaker 1: So?
00:01:11
Speaker 4: No, you told me you were cool with the defensive players. I didn't know you were a defensive guy. Defensive all we'll go with that. So without further ado, our guest today is the head coach of the Eureka.
00:01:24
Speaker 5: College Red Devils.
00:01:25
Speaker 4: There's still the Red Devils, right, I want to make sure I'm using right terms, the Red Devils, and also happens to be an all time Miami Dolphins great. He is Randy Starks. Randy, welcome to the fish Tank.
00:01:36
Speaker 1: Appreciate thanks for having on the fish ta.
00:01:39
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:01:39
Speaker 2: Man, ready. You know what I think people lose sight of how impressive You're Miami Dolphins career was when you were here. You know, seven seasons, two Pro Bowls, thirty and a half sacks, four interceptions. I didn't know you had hands, big fella, but I think that proves it right there, right that you have hands. I mean, you did your thing in Aquan Orange and we have so much to talk about, but through all of our research, we have to start off with this. We have to start off with the fact and we can't ignore this big seth you were neighbors with Channing crowded, Yes, I was. There's no way to start this thing off without talking about channing crowded you as neighbors. I mean, that's that's gotta be the best storyline ever to get things started with.
00:02:21
Speaker 1: Right.
00:02:22
Speaker 3: He wasn't the same person as he was in the locker room like you see on his podcasts all different shows. He's on a family man, great guy in the neighborhood. But all the stories I had was in the locker room.
00:02:34
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, that's all you want to talk about. Don't give me that, Randy. Don't give me that shit, man, because I know neighbors like you two next to each other, had me something a little bit more entertaining than just a locker Tell you.
00:02:45
Speaker 1: Man, he wasn't that type of person.
00:02:47
Speaker 3: Man. He was a family man. It was good I see him right now. And then I think at that time I was still playing ball. He was doing this thing, his little radio show. So we crawled past a little bit. But you want to hear some story that is the locker room. I'm pretty sure knowing him, you already heard all the stories.
00:03:02
Speaker 2: I'm gonna tell you this, Marny. He says he had a problem with your dogs in his yard. And that's what we that's what we heard from him. Tell us about your dogs in his yard and that making it that their personal basketball.
00:03:14
Speaker 3: I need receipts on that, all right, I can't believe everything saying, you know, you'd like to talk trash he receives. Pull the cameras out. You know, I had old English bulldogs in every time of time. You know, they might get out the gate. You know, they're not aggressive dogs. They probably smell his dog. You know they're trying to play. You know, you don't want to let him in hide and floorida, Hey take.
00:03:33
Speaker 1: A crap, you know.
00:03:37
Speaker 2: Facts, I love love it. That's too good.
00:03:42
Speaker 4: Well, I definitely want to get at some point to these the starks and crowded stories, which juice. It almost sounds like one of those old TV cop shows, right, Starks and Crowded. I can only imagine what that was like. But there's something else there. You go see, there's Hey, that guy's doing everything. He's doing stamp of comedy, he's selling his crowder powder. He might be ready for a TV show as well, so that that could be good stuff. But there's something else that I couldn't wait to ask you about. Because in the beginning stage of this show, we not only talked about the Dolphins. But we used to talk about these epic basketball games at OJ's house because Juice his former house had this full court basketball court was actually it felt like it was longer than NBA lank Juice, because I go up and down one time, and I know I wasn't in great shape to begin with, but.
00:04:32
Speaker 5: I was gassed.
00:04:33
Speaker 4: So so point is, we love talking hoops, and you grew up in Waldorf, Maryland, where you attended Westlake High. Shout out to the Wolverines right, which, by the way, were there colors orange and aquaad?
00:04:46
Speaker 2: Did I see that? You know?
00:04:49
Speaker 1: Saying once?
00:04:49
Speaker 4: I man, like, you don't see that much in high school and in Maryland, So that was really cool. Right, That's my point. But I'm not surprised that that when you were in high school you were a super prep All American defensive tackle. I expect that you played at the highest level in the NFL. I expect that. But what did catch me off guard was the fact that you were a serious hooper, Juice. Like, I'm not just saying, oh, he lettered in basketball. You tell me all all football players think they're basketball players, and I've seen that, but I'm talking about a dude who scored more than a thousand career points in high school more almost seven hundred rebounds. You led your team to a twenty three and three record as a senior, and you were the Southern Maryland basketball player of the Year according to The Washington Post. Tell us about this hoop game, Randy.
00:05:40
Speaker 2: Wow.
00:05:41
Speaker 3: First of all, everybody think they's gonna be a basketball player, right, everybody think and so say about ninth grade, you know the same height. And when my football coach was like, you say, you're going what you think you about to be sixteen? He was like, you're done growing. You're a football player that happens to play basketball. Thinking that and so, but you know, I was right. Now I have unlimited right as far as Pop Worner football stuff like that. When I was growing up, they didn't have that. It was everything was one to wait. So I couldn't play. So one thing I could play with basketball, And you know, using the agility and athleticism playing basketball just carried over to the football field. And a lot of guys I tell him, like, man, I used to play basketball, They're like you, I used to play it. Like I just went on to win team like I was the best player on the team, like I was doing the thing now, you know.
00:06:29
Speaker 4: So right, But but really the best player on the you know, he was player of the year, like player of the year.
00:06:37
Speaker 2: Right, it's better better than the best best player in the area.
00:06:40
Speaker 4: And that wasn't voted on by like the community news. That's the Washington boat.
00:06:45
Speaker 3: I mean, I know I was good at it, right, I know what I can do, and I know I'm not gonna out jump somebody that's sixty six, you know.
00:06:53
Speaker 1: Now, I'm gonna body you up.
00:06:54
Speaker 3: Then you put a big guy on me, I'm gonna take him out outside the paint and take him to the whole. Like I just know what to do, and my whole what my team was. It wasn't just My nickname was bread Truck at the time, so it wasn't just It wasn't just giving the ball now like you play your game, you know, because in the day you're gonna shoot. I'm going to get that boyd I'm going to put it back up. Once I get that boy You're not getting the back. That's all me, you know what.
00:07:16
Speaker 2: Big stuff. It reminds us of, of course, Mark Dixon, the guy that we know that played in the trenches, that inside outside game like that also obviously reminds me of a lot of football players who feel like they could have played basketball if they would have been a little bit taller, you know, And that's just a fact. But here's the thing about it, though. You got a guy right here, and I want to ask you this, Randy, because I played basketball right after football. Did your football program leak into your basketball season and your team struggled because you weren't there yet? Because like, did you guys go what far in the playoffs in high school? Because my team always start off like h and five because the football players are still playing basketball, players are still playing football at that point.
00:07:56
Speaker 1: We never really made a deep run in football.
00:07:59
Speaker 3: So I used to come straight in like coaches telling me, y'all give you a week or two, you know the one now. I was like, nah, I'm going basketball. I wait for this anyway. I was raised with football to be off time. I'm trying to go ahead with less physical you know what I'm saying. I'm trying to beat the bully out here. I'm good, But I tell you right now, that first week was the hardest part.
00:08:17
Speaker 2: You guys talking.
00:08:18
Speaker 1: About all that and shape you played football, Na, things different.
00:08:22
Speaker 3: That thing is different, like my shots all or running out of the up and down the court tired, and the coach was like, don't worry about You'll get it back.
00:08:29
Speaker 1: But that first week was tough. I'll tell you that.
00:08:32
Speaker 2: It gets so crazy. Man. Could you think you played a whole football and off season of football and then next thing, you know, all right, let's go to basketball, and that first week your gassed. It doesn't matter what kind of shape you were in football, because basketball is a different animal.
00:08:48
Speaker 4: So were you you know you're describing your game. Were you like power forward? Was that the position? I mean, if you were taking guys outside?
00:08:54
Speaker 1: Well, my senior year I went to I was powered.
00:08:57
Speaker 3: For my junior year, I was center play with four guards, and so I was on the big.
00:09:02
Speaker 5: Four guards and dumping in the bread drug.
00:09:05
Speaker 3: Jumping the big chuck. Dude, you even do I give you I guarantee you I wake up twenty and twelve. You know what I'm saying. I just wake up like I'm coming to the gym. Give you twenty and twelve. Anything else?
00:09:15
Speaker 1: Plus, you know, this.
00:09:16
Speaker 2: Is my game.
00:09:18
Speaker 3: You know when I was playing with young guys and then my sophomore year I was playing varsity. We had a guy six eight sixty nine, and so you know it's play power forward with a bunch of guards. I was the only underclassmen playing everybody else with singers, and this grew my game from there.
00:09:31
Speaker 5: Love it.
00:09:32
Speaker 2: So my question is living in the paint like that or possibly outside they had a big guy on you where you use your quickness? How were you from the foul line game? The game. I'm not gonna lie like heard it.
00:09:44
Speaker 3: I might give you eight for nine one game. I might come back two for seven. You know, okay, I'm okay, okay, but I put a shot. I hit it when it matter, you know what I'm saying. The matter, man, I'm giving those two, you.
00:09:58
Speaker 2: Know, just too good.
00:10:02
Speaker 3: But the good the beauty, giving a lot of and one so I'll give you to sure. So they weren't football players, Lebron, you know, yeah, less stuff slide if I hit him.
00:10:14
Speaker 2: Too hard, good fall.
00:10:16
Speaker 3: You know, I was taking football and bringing them the basketball court. That was my game, Like, I know what I need to do, make it physically right right.
00:10:24
Speaker 2: I couldn't imagine going in the paint with big star and all that stuff. I I just do the pull up. I'm just gonna do the pull up jumper and hope it goes man.
00:10:33
Speaker 1: And I'll tell you on the floor too. I died on the floor.
00:10:36
Speaker 2: I do all that. Oh, it's so funny you say that, because I was just thinking about that the other day. It might be one of the dumbest drills in basketball when they do that loose ball drill. I mean, that makes no sense. But your guy that was willing to do.
00:10:47
Speaker 1: That football I'm used to falling. I'm not gonna come up with a.
00:10:50
Speaker 2: Cherry, not on that, not on that.
00:10:54
Speaker 1: I'm good.
00:10:55
Speaker 4: But see this tells me right here you try to talk about this defensive mindset that you had to there's a difference the defensive guys.
00:11:02
Speaker 2: There's some point guards that ain't getting on the ground either though, Big Seth get on the ground, getting on that I'm gonna try to score, Randy, I'm not. I'm not trying to get on the ground. And you know it's a travel anyways nowadays. Anyways, let's go back to this Maryland thing, because Big Seth I give you a hard time all the time. And Randy, we just had Nolan Carroll on the show, and I was giving Big Seth a hard time about, you know, Nolan choosing Maryland over Florida Gators, and that was fun. I was. I was laughing a lot about that until I see you chose University of Maryland over my Penn State. NT me lying how that happened though?
00:11:48
Speaker 3: Okay, So, like I told you, I was a big basketball I thought I was gonna do both in college. Or I had Syracuse on my list and Syracuse at time they was good at football and basketball. That's my dream. I always want to go to Syracuse. Of course, I probably around this time I know I'm not gonna do both. But he was in nice school Penn State because Larry Johnson, great guy, great person overall. Definitely parents won't love him. So that was on my list. And then Maryland. I'm going to Maryland.
00:12:15
Speaker 1: I know right now.
00:12:16
Speaker 3: I'm going to Maryland. I'm going to play, you know what I'm saying. So I'm just thinking myset of playing and close to home. My family and my mom should get to come and see me. Played pretty much every weekend. So that was the decision I had to make, and I chose Maryland.
00:12:31
Speaker 2: Man, you could have came to Penn State have been a football and basketball star. It didn't take much to be a basketball.
00:12:37
Speaker 1: Start at the time.
00:12:39
Speaker 3: You guys playing freshman, I think it's mandatory guy, every guy's shirt right the time.
00:12:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, ress Shire was a big no no depends, man, you big start and you're trying to still recruit him.
00:12:53
Speaker 5: I don't think he has any eligibility, man.
00:12:55
Speaker 2: I think he might have a year, big set. I'm looking for one year. That's all I'm asking for. Man, that's funny. That is funny.
00:13:02
Speaker 4: Well, look, he made a good choice, right and going to Maryland and the fact that he was one of the most dominant defensive players in the ACC during your time there. However, you decide to forego your senior season and you enter the draft, right, So then next thing you know, you're only a twenty year old guy, which is crazy when you think about it now.
00:13:21
Speaker 5: In the moment, you probably just live in life.
00:13:23
Speaker 4: But you're twenty years old, you're in the NFL, you're playing for the Tennessee Titans. I just in researching for this, I heard you on another interview say that when you look back now being in the position that you're in in life, that you wish you had invested more in yourself during that time, Like obviously you were a talented guy, you don't get drafted in the National Football League and then you're starting by your second year if you can't play, and you said you were around veteran leadership, but you maybe didn't take as much in you didn't invest in yourself. And so now as a head coach that is trying to show young men the way. Do you you know, are you in a position where you kind of realize, Hey, I didn't do all the things that I could have done. I could have trained differently, I could have prepared differently. Do you have that reflection?
00:14:10
Speaker 1: I definitely do.
00:14:12
Speaker 3: Sitting back and looking at everything, I think what makes me a good coach is my rap sheet is not perfect, you know what I'm saying. I had some bumps in the road, you know what I'm saying, But in the day, I was like to come out of that, and so I just try to use those life lessons, the good and the bad, to help these other guys come up, to the student athletes coming up, so they don't make the same mistake.
00:14:33
Speaker 2: You know.
00:14:33
Speaker 3: My whole thing is that makes some new ones. So when the next guy's behind you come, we make sure they don't make those mistakes right, And so that's the whole thing to me. I was just living in a moment, just enjoying myself at twenty. He I was twenty years old. I couldn't get into the bars. I couldn't buy alcohol.
00:14:49
Speaker 2: You know.
00:14:50
Speaker 3: I remember some of the guys maybe get someone on the plane, stuff like that. It was a good experience. But in the day, it's almost like you gotta invest in yourself. I wasn't investing with myself. I know some guys like man at this time, Oh man, I'm not paying five to ten grand for a chef or personal training. But looking back, that's investing yourself. That's putting it back into yourself, you know, longevity, taking care of your body.
00:15:11
Speaker 1: I wasn't looking at that.
00:15:12
Speaker 3: But yet I'll go spend that five to ten on a trip and not going to get that back. Good memories, you know, I'm saying, I spend in the club. You know what I'm saying, good memory. But today I'm not investing that in myself. And that's something I try to tell these guys. You know, even here at D three, I toell this guy's been education, investing yourself. You spending all this money, make sure you do the right thing. That's one thing I would tell guys, like investing yourself, spend that money in yourself. I think I see someone Lebron James spend over a million dollars on his body.
00:15:38
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, That's an investment, That's what it is.
00:15:40
Speaker 2: Well, he can you know what I'm saying.
00:15:42
Speaker 3: Oh, absolutely, But any professional athlete can do that. Guys, it might have been a million dollars, not that much. You spend ten twenty grand and get it on the back end when it's time to reap the contract. You know what I'm saying, add extra five ten years, I mean actually year to you to say a year to your playing career.
00:16:01
Speaker 1: You're going to get that twenty grand back, you know.
00:16:05
Speaker 5: No, it makes sense.
00:16:06
Speaker 4: The other thing just that he said in this interview, which I thought would be really interesting because you did live this, was that Randy said he was very happy now looking back that he didn't get drafted and have to be twenty years old in Miami, that he got to have at least a four year buffer in Tennessee before he made it.
00:16:26
Speaker 5: Down to Miami. Now, Randy, my partner.
00:16:30
Speaker 4: Here got drafted in the first round at twenty something years old and comes down to South Florida.
00:16:36
Speaker 2: Randy, Here we go, Randy, we go through this episode.
00:16:41
Speaker 4: My point is that you had to navigate that thing that Randy says, Man, I'm just glad because it still was a lot, right. Your point was it was still a lot, even for a guy that had four years in the league and had grown up a little bit. If at twenty you had been dumped into South Florida as having money for the first time and all these other things that that might have been a bit munch man.
00:17:03
Speaker 3: You can just see guys now or the NBA Rappers whatever, you get some of this money at twenty years old, you do dumb stuff. And so even coming in Miami, I'm twenty four. Some guys Miami come in the league at twenty four. I would say I was blessed to have betters in Tennessee, whether it's our hands were Keith Bullok, Kevin Carter, smart bro so I had young guys that kind of show me what to do, you know what I'm saying.
00:17:26
Speaker 1: So then when I got to Miami, I still had Jason.
00:17:29
Speaker 5: Crowner showed you what to do.
00:17:32
Speaker 2: Nah, it took it.
00:17:34
Speaker 1: Took me my year to want up to.
00:17:39
Speaker 3: I might have made it, but I was blessed to have veteran guys to kind of help me and show me the way. Still come to Miami twenty four years old, still young. So, like I said, if I would have came straight to Miami, Nah, I would have finished that first time track for sure, knowing myself.
00:17:56
Speaker 2: No, yeah, you know what, I get it, bro I still haven't grown up and I've been living here since I was forever ago. Anyhow, Miami's tough deal. You know what, this is a this is a Dolphins show. Let's let's talk a little more Dolphins right here. So Randy two thousand and eight rolls around, and you're an unrestricted free agent for the first time in your career, and you choose to sign with the Miami Dolphins, a team that's coming off of one and fifteen season and featuring the first year head coach in Tony's Ferano. Why Miami at that point.
00:18:29
Speaker 1: It broke me off. That's why.
00:18:33
Speaker 2: What you mean?
00:18:33
Speaker 5: Shot, That's is an easy answer.
00:18:40
Speaker 1: No, I wass I'm not the realist.
00:18:43
Speaker 2: Sit that's the realist.
00:18:46
Speaker 3: You're giving up some bread South Florida, Miami. I see what looked like on TV. Let me go check it out myself. I might have went for a weekend or something and I get lived there.
00:18:54
Speaker 1: What do I sign?
00:18:56
Speaker 2: That's so real? Oh that's funny. Oh yeah, you did right? And not feel you man? I mean for me. I mean, unfortunately, when I was coming out, I wanted to go closer to home. This iss Cleveland or Pennsylvania or warm and Warm might have been the worst thing ever happened to me down in Miami, you know what I mean? No, it was, honestly, man, I feel what you're talking about. A lot of guys vacation here. A lot of guys have a house here and then actually be able to do both, to work and play here. Pretty easy decision most of the time.
00:19:28
Speaker 3: Right, great experience fishing more often that I use it. I mean, this is a great experience over all. You know, I'm glad. I don't know how things are now, but I'm glad the facility was out the way of where everything is.
00:19:44
Speaker 2: I say that it's a little closer. It's getting closer to where everything is now.
00:19:50
Speaker 5: It's right by the stadium like the it's if.
00:19:53
Speaker 4: You go out on the practice property, the stadium is right there on the other side of the goal posts.
00:19:58
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yes, your the Miami a lot closer to Miami. Guys like us, though especially myself. Man, I wasn't mature enough at times to handle Miami. But I think these guys now they get a little bit different in terms of you know, because I would be with the money they make Randy right now. I don't know if they could keep me off South Beach at a young age man. But these guys do a great job of doing so.
00:20:25
Speaker 3: I mean it's different programs, meeting seminars, stuff like that. I think NFL, the NFLPA, they're doing a good job with them. And I think educating these guys is helping. And you know, I think that stuff started when I first came in to league, and so I was kind of hearing some of it. But for me, the main thing was the guys in the marker room. That's where I got my guys from. And I think that's changed and starting to help as far as saving your money and doing the right thing, because the end of the day, you can't do anything wrong without being posted on social media, So I think that's everybody's starting to keep the those when they normally would.
00:21:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, ran another thing though while you were here. That was interesting to me as well. You know, I've always thought of he was a tackle. You were actually labeled as a defensive end, you know, for I think the first three years here with the Dolphins. Talk about the move from the three four front and what that the impact it had on your game at that point.
00:21:17
Speaker 3: All right, So Tennessee, I was four to three. I'll played nose and tackle. So when I got to Miami, I didn't know anything about three four nothing, So all right, whatever, so I'm playing. I didn't know anything in four to three. You can pretty much your gap. You hit it three four, you needed a two gaps. I didn't know anything about two gap. But all I know is where you line me up, that's my gap where Noah, you want to squeeze the backside gap and still make that play. So that whole transition was bad to where when they first brought me in, I was.
00:21:48
Speaker 1: Basically a nickel guy, you know what I'm saying.
00:21:51
Speaker 3: So I was pretty much fod that's four to two, and that's when they put me but as the season went on, I started learning, I started making more plans, I start gaining the trust. So that's when I came in my second year and that's what pretty much loss of my career kind of took off from there. But it was a part transition. That's what the defense I like to run here in general, the three four, because you also you still make it like a four to three, but that transition, I mean, if you got the stuzz to do it, I think that's a great defense to do. But for the most part, once song's in Miami, I mean, you can put me anywhere. You put me in a you put me three, you can put me in one. Somebody go down, boom, they stick me inside. I can pretty much do it all because the end of the day, I have to be three hundred and thirty three hundred and forty pounds to play those you know what I'm saying. I was already way really strong. I have strong legs, I can hold a point. I play with great pad level. You know that was my strength. I know my strength word is playing pad level and using my hand. Now, am I gonna beat something on the edge on the end, No, I'm not. I collapse that pocket, so I pretty much knew how to use my abilities to my advantage.
00:22:52
Speaker 5: Interesting stuff.
00:22:53
Speaker 2: It's man, that's a that's a teaching tool right there. Big seven coach got this coaching right there. Man, Yeah, you got to clip that right there and sell it to these high schools for sure.
00:23:03
Speaker 4: And Travis Wingfield because he's gonna go nuts over it, for sure. Travis also does a podcast for the Dolphins. He's kind of the main does the daily podcast. But he's a big x's and o's guy, so he's gonna he's gonna love hearing this. So another thing that happened on the other side of the ball that to me was very interesting in that first year goes back to week three. So, as Jews said, when you got here, the Dolphins were coming off a one to fifteen season. You start zing two, you lose the first two games of the season, then week three you gotta go New England. New England's two and oher. But they also won sixteen straight the previous year, so it just looked like it was not gonna be a great situation. But what none of us knew. You guys apparently knew what was going on behind the scenes was that the Dolphins were drawing up a little bit of a They had a plan to try and do something different and get their best players on the field on the offensive side of the ball.
00:23:56
Speaker 2: So the game.
00:23:56
Speaker 4: Starts the way we'd probably expected juice New England. Early in the first core, they're marching down the field, but then those hands come up, like you're talking about Matt Castle tries to throw those things and you see the smile there. You go, dust it off, so you get a pick, you get the ball back, you thwart that drive right and the Dolphins start to march down the field. And then that first drive as they get close to the end zone, all of a sudden, Ronnie Brown, he's not lined up as a tailback. He's lined up as a quarterback in the shotgun. Talk to us about the wildcat because Channing has talked about what he saw in practice and he said the defensive players were like laughing at this thing up until the point they finally pulled it out in that New England game.
00:24:37
Speaker 1: Well, at this time, I think we had three good running backs.
00:24:42
Speaker 3: Maybe just trying to figure out a way to get everybody on the field, get your best players in the field, and do I think that this would be like a red zone play, fourth and one type play, of course, but I don't think it'll be a staple, you know, saying something that our offense is using.
00:24:56
Speaker 1: Deal like that was our thing.
00:24:58
Speaker 3: Like when it came to an offensive still we could really move about Folcat and that's what we did.
00:25:03
Speaker 1: That's what we went to.
00:25:04
Speaker 3: And I think Ronnie Brown made pro bo off that because nobody can stop it. It's a trend, right, So once we did it, everybody started doing it. And so it's one of those things like we first wanted to do it, nobody could stop it, and you couldn't have an answer for because in the day, nobody really when you're doing a run box, nobody's counting counting the quarterback. He's not counterflul So now you got him as the running backs. And then we start throwing a little pass off of that. I mean, we just changed the game. And you don't know when we're going to do it, because championis Is still was on the field.
00:25:33
Speaker 1: You got your check to it.
00:25:34
Speaker 3: But ind of the day, we start throwing power, start throwing counter zone jet sweets, we start throwing everything on there. You know, everything is what NFL breakdowns every four games, so every four we're doing something new.
00:25:46
Speaker 5: What was that like for you?
00:25:47
Speaker 4: Because again, you know, a couple other guys, defensive guys, have talked about how you guys were just killing it in practice. It looked like it had no shot. And when you saw them for the first time, you're standing there on the sidelines and you see the hem alone up in that and then they just start gashing the Patriots and there's no answer for it. What was that like for you to be on the sideline watching that happen.
00:26:07
Speaker 1: I mean, it felt really good.
00:26:09
Speaker 3: You know, it's the Patriots, so it's one of those things like all right, they're gonna make a run to go and make a run, but the defense couldn't got the field. Ronnie just kept going. Rickies just kept going. I want to say one of them had part two in the yard that game. Maybe's some big numbers.
00:26:24
Speaker 5: Ronnie had four touchdowns out there.
00:26:26
Speaker 1: Ye couldn't stop through on defense.
00:26:30
Speaker 2: But there's also a short field though, Randy, because you guys that also provided I think some tumble short fields.
00:26:35
Speaker 1: Right.
00:26:35
Speaker 5: The defense was tough that day too. They couldn't get anything going for sure.
00:26:39
Speaker 3: Sure, offense made it easier, right, they're holding the ball. Clock management.
00:26:43
Speaker 1: Now we up. Now you have to throw the ball, go get them right.
00:26:48
Speaker 2: I always love it when the offense can hold up their end of the bargain man. When the offense is doing their thing, it always seems to work out better for the defense. Sometimes when the defense isn't doing their thing, the offense has to do them. But usually the defense is doing their thing, and in my experience, especially late in my career, the offense was not holding up there into the bargain man. So it's nice to see that happen, you know, when you're sitting on the bench and getting getting a breather right there.
00:27:12
Speaker 3: It's a difference with the offense doing their thing. It makes the other team one dimensional, right versus du is doing the thing. It's kind of like they can still go through their game plan, they can still go through the chart type of thing, you know.
00:27:23
Speaker 1: So once the offense do the thing, it throws everything out of the way.
00:27:26
Speaker 2: That's right, playing catch up. That's why I knew England was so good all the time. They were doing both. In the first quarter, up ten nothing, up fourteen nothing. Next thing, you know, the team that they're playing against, playing catch up to go off.
00:27:37
Speaker 3: Scripts, start grabbing stuff. They haven't ran five weeks, right, do you remember what you know?
00:27:44
Speaker 1: We put this in?
00:27:48
Speaker 2: They got to draw it up on the board and stuff. You can't even you can't even pull it up in the game plan. You gotta draw it up again, Like, yeah, I hear what you're saying. Funny, Raddy. Let's talk about you know, some of the guys that you play with here Miami. I mean, what an incredible list. Of course we've already talked about chanting being on defense, but you also play with everyone from j T, Joey Porter, Finnie Holiday, Matt Roth and everyone. Everyone has had a Matt Roth's story, so I know you have to have We got Matt Roth story. Everybody's had one cam wake of course, Paul Solio, Jared Rodric and Ov. The list goes on and on. Man, talk about that group of guys, and if you do have a Matt Roth anything, please hear it, because everybody's been heard them all Man, well not maybe not personally with you though it's all it all, it's all one on one thing. They have a problem, not a problem, not a problem, definitely not a problem talk about those guys.
00:28:42
Speaker 3: Man, We just had a different group, Like I said, when I came in that was in twenty four, had Joey Porter, Jason Ferguson, Will Allen, So I had a lot of veteran guys, and so I just kind of father lead for the most part. It's kind of like remember looking at me, like what in the hold up for? Like he had reminded of like, yeah, I've been playing a long time, but nah, he's still young. There was no money, you still quiet. I like you had to sit back. I like to observe, see what's going on, you know what I'm saying. Later in my career, that's when Ov, Paul Sola, all these other guys I'm starting to come in, had to take them under my wing. Yeah, Jordan, different guys and the room started changing to it Now instead of me watching everybody else and following, it's like, nah, they look to me now and say, hey, what should we do? How should we handle this situation? And that is use all the material, all the information that was given to me throughout the year, having a veteran group, and use that and passed it down.
00:29:39
Speaker 1: What is that?
00:29:39
Speaker 4: Like we just talked Xavion Howard was on the show earlier in the season, and I think he was going into his eighth year, right Juice, and he was the longest tenured guy, and he talked about that. Number One, you're bridging gaps between different eras of Dolphins football, which is interesting in and of itself, but this idea that it's almost like overnight, you go from being the young guy to the guy people are turning to, and it's kind of jarring in a way.
00:30:06
Speaker 3: Yeah, forced me to be more vocal born to my attention that guys are watching everything that I'm doing. They want to make sure I see if I'm doing so I have to make sure I'm doing everything right. I remember one time when my coaches told me my whole thing was I come in the later in the morning, I start complaining, you know, start talking trash. But at the end of the day, they know that's how I get going, and they know that's how I get my motive going and I start doing the work and won't how to put me aside.
00:30:36
Speaker 1: I was like, hey, man, we noticed.
00:30:38
Speaker 3: What you do, Like, we know you're gonna work hard, You're gonna show We know this, man, Please be careful because some of these young guys don't know that you're just joking and they're paying attention and they think they can do that.
00:30:47
Speaker 1: It's like all right, So that kind of opened my eyes right there.
00:30:51
Speaker 2: So I mean that that begs the question right now. And I know we're going to script here, but think about it now. The kids that you're coaching now just a little different than the way you came up and the way you you know, are used to handling your business. When you have to deal with these young guys, it's a whole different world. Now. How does coach starts handled something like these new school kids.
00:31:14
Speaker 3: I mean, I tell you, it's difficult. You have to be careful how you come at them. Stuff you say, you know me, who's playing ball? Somebody mf me, that's nothing. That's you know what I'm saying, Like, that's not a big deal to me. To now you say something. They going to the president, they going to the plays directly, Like you know what I'm saying, it's a big deal.
00:31:34
Speaker 1: Some of these kids feeling.
00:31:35
Speaker 3: Titled, like they just feel like they could do what they want to do this because of who I am. It's totally different, you know, It's totally different. You just long as you go. You know, I take every situation unique. I try to cheat treat every student athlete different because they are different. You know, like I might have to jump on one kid, I can't do that to the other one. You know, he might take his tills over you, losy.
00:32:02
Speaker 1: So it's just different, you know. I just try to learn and take each season as a killing.
00:32:07
Speaker 2: You know what, Saith, I'm sorry. I know we're all school script period a little bit. But thinking about coaching in general, how you even got to this point of being the head man at Eureka College? You know what I mean? I mean, I'm looking at your coaching regime in a short period of time has been quite a wild ride. I mean, you know a high school program that dissolved the team in Bakersfield, California, or even in England coaching, how does coach start to get to this point right now? As a coach?
00:32:33
Speaker 1: Grinding man, grinded.
00:32:34
Speaker 3: I've been trying to get in the coaching business for a while now. What happened once I moved overseas to the Ministement Republic and I start coaching the basketball team over there, and I'm talking about guys never played before. Nothing. I'm talking about my first game. We're getting whacked, like seventy to ten. And so for two to two and a half years, you skept getting better and better than I like to grind, like progress to the point now seventy and ten, sixty to twenty, you know, fifty to thirty. I always ask a compet the game all fifty forty five, like okay. So I started liking the coaching. I started loving it, you know, so I realized I missed it, miss Kipti. I mean, he's been involved in sports. So I came back around COVID, got my bachelor's from the University of Maryland, finished that up, and then I just walked through and get my masters from George Twning Universities.
00:33:25
Speaker 1: And just during that process, I've been trying to grind.
00:33:27
Speaker 3: Trying to get coaching gigs, high school, La Grange's College, another D three and George. That's been grinding. And you probably know how it is. At the Plan. It's kind of like everybody say they got you. You know what I'm saying, I gonna look out for you. But ind of the day, anybody who got you with yourself, you know, So I just been grinding, grinding, grinding, and now I guess other coaches, other people starting to see but oh, I guess he is sire. Now it's kind of like, hey, what you're doing, Like I just took a gig at his other spot. I'm off for this bounce like that. You know what I'm saying, Like I came for you, I reached out to you. You know what I'm saying. Everybody say, tap your sources, but you know, at the end of the day, everybody's not gonna look out for you like that. I'm deaferent, you know what I mean. I'm gonna do what I can. You know what I'm saying. But other guys kind of like, nah, they might see as a threat. They might think they might lose the room because of your resident. A lot of different things. You know, it goes into that. But we definitely know that, you know what I'm saying. One thing I say about him, my dad told me this. He told me he's proud of me because the end the day, I did this myself. I'm talking about I'm online for the application even this gig. Now people talking about who you know, there no one. I just grind took a lot of nose before I get it. Yes, you know what I'm saying. It took no call backs before I start getting called back. I just keep pushing.
00:34:35
Speaker 2: It worked out.
00:34:35
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's awesome.
00:34:36
Speaker 4: Man. To have a head coaches title is a pretty cool thing, regardless of level. So yeah, that's very cool. I do want to go back to something you kind of had mentioned. One of the things that makes you a good head coach and relatable to your guys is that you had some mistakes. You went through different things throughout your career. So I'm gonna go back to something that happened during your Dolph time as an on field thing, but was still something that probably made more headlines than it needed to. But so after twenty ten, you're selected to your first Pro Bowl right of your career. Then a few years later, following the twenty twelve season, again you're a Pro Bowler. And now you're going into another opportunity to be an unrestricted free agent and you don't work something out with the team. You guys can't come to an agreement on a long term deal, they franchise you, you elect not to attend OTAs Okay, cool, regular season starts up first games at Cleveland, and if I look at the if I go look at the box score, you're not listed as the starter, right, You're not listed as the starter in that first game, but you still deliver a Randy Starks performance. You split a sack with Cam Wake earlier, you're balling out, and then in the fourth quarter you sack Brandon Wheden by yourself. It's like the sixth time we've gotten to him that day, and you kind of let the sidelines know about it. You let him know that you made a play. There might have been a gesture towards the sidelines. We don't know necessarily who the gesture was towards. Coach Philman thought perhaps it was directed towards him. You said, no, no, no, no, that was playing me and my teammates. We were just having some fun. Tell us what happened in that moment. And then I'm curious as too, And I guess it depends on how you answer it, but I'm curious as to how coach Randy Starks would handle a player that maybe did something similar on his team.
00:36:31
Speaker 3: Okay, so football is an emotional game, right, Jenner. Emotional game? So at this time I set out came back. I wasn't a starter. I think we brought a nose tackle. But what happened was is that Olivi a Bernard. He had a good camp. I think he started coming to his own. So it's almost like, all right, we can't punish if I'm doing this thing. Who's next in line?
00:36:52
Speaker 1: All right? You think it's me? Cool?
00:36:54
Speaker 3: So I'm training, I'm working and working, and then the defensive line coach, Casey Robber, he said something to me that even Cam Wait caught it. He was like, yeah, you played better, pissed off. So I kind of looking like, is he trying to say that He's trying to okay cool? He's like yeah, I kind of caught that too.
00:37:12
Speaker 1: Cool. So we're going through now. I'm not even worrying about it at this time.
00:37:15
Speaker 3: I think I'm coming up one hundred straight starts type of thing I'm.
00:37:19
Speaker 1: Not worried about. So now I'm in it. I'm in the zone. I'm locked in.
00:37:22
Speaker 3: I think even the game, Uh, Casey coach, case He's trying to talk to me like, Na, this is this is the guy you want. Cool, Like, I'm in the zone right now. And so we kind of got into blah blah blah, stoot out went. That got my sack, and it just came to me like take that, like you know what I'm saying, Wait.
00:37:41
Speaker 2: Man, take that explaining explaining that, take.
00:37:44
Speaker 5: That you remember.
00:37:47
Speaker 2: I do remember it, I know exactly, but I want I wanted to like, you know, we lived at that experiment. Of course I remember that. It was iconic. Really, he just take that. That's not That's not the way it came out off when I saw.
00:38:00
Speaker 3: That's what I'm saying. I mean, that's how I felt, you know. I mean, it's crazy. He ain't taken it. He didn't feel disrespectful about it. You know what I'm saying.
00:38:09
Speaker 1: Who's cool? After that? I mean a lot of people didn't know what it came from.
00:38:13
Speaker 3: Like I didn't realize how big it was until I came to the locker room and one of the reporters came to me. Ohmark, he was like, hey, man, you know they caught that. Everybody's already buzzing. Twitter just started going through it was already buzzing. I'm like, oh, I went for like five hundred follus like fifty thousand. Oh that's how people get Okay, Yeah, take.
00:38:34
Speaker 2: It up a little.
00:38:36
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, if a student athletes did that, right now, I probably make a run or something like that. It's motion because in the day I don't want to You want to have control of you guys or your.
00:38:49
Speaker 1: Team in some way. You don't want to let a guy in hand.
00:38:52
Speaker 3: But at the same time, you don't want to take away who they are as a person who drives them. So it's kind of one of those balances you have to do. It's something that happened every game. That's a problem, right if it's something that doesn't normally happen, kind of shocking out the characters kind of all right, talk to him, see what's up. You know, it's football, man. We don't have it all there. You know what I'm saying.
00:39:12
Speaker 2: We all kind of look off.
00:39:15
Speaker 1: You gotta be all want to get hit in the head.
00:39:18
Speaker 2: If you ain't off, you can't play football.
00:39:21
Speaker 5: I love.
00:39:21
Speaker 2: But let me ask you this real quick, Randy though too. Now we talk about if it were to happen the coach starts, is there a total poll of guys that might be able to get away with a little bit more than some other guys.
00:39:33
Speaker 1: You treat everyone fair but not equal. You don't have that.
00:39:37
Speaker 3: It works right, right, some people in the dog house, you know what I'm saying. Some people are always it's always something right. You see them. Some guys run that's nice, don't do everything right, do everything's supposed to and they have that own slip up. Well, you're not gonna treat them guys the same, you know, just like I have an all pro like you take care of business.
00:39:58
Speaker 1: I got somebody on practice squad.
00:39:59
Speaker 3: I'm I'm not going this is what it is.
00:40:04
Speaker 2: Is real.
00:40:05
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh man, you just did that because he's all pro.
00:40:09
Speaker 1: You're right, I did.
00:40:11
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're right. This this person come being all pro. Right, it's first pro bowler.
00:40:17
Speaker 1: It's perch franchise. But this person come to it. This is what it is.
00:40:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. So good he learned that.
00:40:23
Speaker 1: At least I fearn that. Right.
00:40:25
Speaker 2: Hey, that's all that matters is how you feel he showed.
00:40:28
Speaker 1: He showed him on Sunday.
00:40:30
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, to your to your point, you know, your perspective as a guy who played twelve seasons in the NFL, it's a unique perspective to have for these young men, and sometimes it probably works in their favor, and sometimes it probably doesn't because you know what it's supposed to look like. But it is really interesting. Juice is one of the first times we've talked to a guy. We've talked to a few guys have gone into coaching, but this is one of the first time we've talked to a guy who's an active head coach who played. So it's it's just a unique perspective. Joy for sure, love it cool.
00:41:02
Speaker 2: It's a great perspective. Remember're talking about young and old and your old school kind of coach new school kids. I love that whole conversation right now.
00:41:09
Speaker 3: You know, I think that's one of the places in my career that probably took me from just being good to being great. Is I played to level my competition, and so I have. I was one of those guys the competitions up here. I'm up here. If we're playing, somebody's down here. Starting from high school, I played down here. That's a bad characteristic they have. So for me to get pissed off somebody, I felt like they blocked me boom gets me going there. I was like, damn, why ain't doing from the beginning, And so I think also that comes from being young as well.
00:41:39
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know getting away with doing things like that.
00:41:41
Speaker 4: Very interesting stuff, no doubt. Well, I know you've got a lot that you got to figure out. I speaking of Twitter, if I went on his Twitter, juice, it's all everything's now is he's telling me why Eureka College is a great place to be. He's out there, he's hustling your recruit and I know that you've got those responsibilities, so I won't We won't keep you much a long longer. But we end every episode the same way. And while I know that defensive tackles, although you played some end here as well, that you guys aren't necessarily.
00:42:08
Speaker 2: An he has some third down he has some third down opportunities. I love it.
00:42:14
Speaker 5: I love it well.
00:42:15
Speaker 4: Typically a defensive tackle is not known for their two minute drill prowess, but as you said, you can play anywhere on the line. And as a head coach, we know that you're gonna be prepare prepared for any scenario. So we're gonna let you get back to doing your thing. But right now we're gonna put you through the fish tank two minute drill. We're gonna throw some quick hitting questions for you. Look at the eyes. The eyes always get big. We're gonna some quick questions for you. You answer them however you want. We'll kind of have two minutes rolling and then we'll be good to go. Okay, so Juice, you can kick it off. Two minute drill starts now.
00:42:46
Speaker 2: All right, you ready, Randy, no choice? All right? All right, he's in too d Yeah, I know that's right. He's in. He's too deep in the tank right now, all right. Your first ever NFL game was against the Miami Dolphins. In your first NFL tackle was a sack. Do you remember which Miami Dolphins quarterback you took down?
00:43:05
Speaker 4: Phej Feely peely there it is all right, good, good, I love it.
00:43:11
Speaker 2: Okay.
00:43:12
Speaker 4: We know that when you played, especially when you were here with the Dolphins, you were a sneaker head man. You had a collection. We know you were a big Jordan brand guy for sure. What were your favorite pair of shoes that you ever owned.
00:43:24
Speaker 1: At that time? Red bottles?
00:43:27
Speaker 2: Oh wear red bottles?
00:43:32
Speaker 1: Miami had looked.
00:43:35
Speaker 5: It's the Maryland. It's that Maryland turns.
00:43:37
Speaker 2: That's what it was up man. All right, all right, okay, we spoke about your neighbor earlier, who is the coolest Randolph junior to ever played for the Miami dolphinst me repeat that. Who was the coolest Randolph junior to ever play for the Miami Dolphins. Is it Randolph Channing Crowder junior or Randolph Starks Junior?
00:43:58
Speaker 1: Randolph Starts Junior?
00:44:00
Speaker 2: I have a question, right question.
00:44:06
Speaker 4: If you had said him first, there's a reason why your name was second, because too funny to interrupt the whole day. All right, Well, he's moving this thing right down the field, which is a good thing because this one might take a little bit more time. Uh, well, you got your feet wet in the coaching world with your son's basketball team.
00:44:21
Speaker 5: We know you were a hooper in high school.
00:44:23
Speaker 4: If you had to put together the best squad that you could ever put together, but you can only draft guys who are your former Miami Dolphins teammates. So the best basketball squad I want to know who you're starting five is? They have to be pulled from your former Miami Dolphins teammates.
00:44:40
Speaker 1: Jordan mm Sean Smith, Jason Ferguson, big third, Jason Taylor.
00:44:49
Speaker 5: It's four and it's a big squad.
00:44:51
Speaker 2: It's four. Are you on the squad? Randy?
00:44:54
Speaker 1: I'm on a squad.
00:44:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm on a squad. Squad, man, that's the drill. I was like GM or something.
00:45:04
Speaker 3: I don't know.
00:45:05
Speaker 4: You're a player, coach, GM. You're doing it all man. I want to get twenty and twelve. I want to wake up with twenty twelve. I'm looking at the squad. This is a tall, long, athletic squad. I know, big Ferg is playing in the paint. Who's I guess Sean's going to be running point?
00:45:19
Speaker 1: Sean?
00:45:20
Speaker 4: Yeah, Shawn Smith's running point. Although you know, good luck. JT might try to do it too, Jukes. We've seen that move.
00:45:26
Speaker 2: Yay man, JT. He's wishy washing the game.
00:45:29
Speaker 4: Man.
00:45:29
Speaker 2: You know how he is. Bro. You know, I didn't want to get into him. They might kick the kick the basketball into the neighbors already.
00:45:35
Speaker 5: Again, Randy didn't see all that stuff.
00:45:39
Speaker 2: The passion is there.
00:45:40
Speaker 5: The passion is there.
00:45:42
Speaker 2: Man.
00:45:42
Speaker 5: This was so much fun.
00:45:43
Speaker 3: Man.
00:45:43
Speaker 4: I truly appreciate it. We wish you nothing but success at Eureka College. Can't wait to see how you do there and developing young man, and just how your coaching career continues to progress.
00:45:53
Speaker 2: Appreciate Thank you for having me, Man, Thanks for diving in Randy. It was awesome. I have fun.
00:45:58
Speaker 4: Thanks YOUK. Just like Jew said, thanks for diving into the Fish Tank presented by iHeartRadio. Be sure to follow us on whatever streaming platform you're using, and don't be afraid to rate the show or leave us a comment. We love your feedback, and remember you can find us, as well as Drive Time with Travis Wingsfield and all of our international partners on Miami Dolphins dot com at this time
Speaker 1: You're now diving.
00:00:07
Speaker 2: I'm gonna have been that pix who then.
00:00:13
Speaker 3: Setting down with Seth Living Oh Jay ju ju, And this is strictly for them.
00:00:18
Speaker 2: True fans number one of course, y'all, this ain't the other nearest bots to Welcome back.
00:00:24
Speaker 4: To the fish Tank presented by iHeartRadio right here on the Miami Dolphins Podcast Network, Seth Lovitt and the man with the best hands in the podcast business, O J McDuffie. Juice, I know you like the offensive side of the ball. I know how you feel about the defensive side of the ball. But be careful now when you answer this one. How are you feeling about today's guest exactly?
00:00:46
Speaker 2: You know how I feel about the defense side of the ball. You know, of course I love the offensive side, but when it comes to the defensive side, I'm looking for guys like this and I know I cond vibe with got it, you know what I mean. I'm an offensive guy that was defensive mind at heart, you know what I mean.
00:01:03
Speaker 5: Love it.
00:01:04
Speaker 2: We've talked about this big set we have. You know, I'm really a defensive guy that had the play offense right right?
00:01:09
Speaker 5: Is that what it was?
00:01:10
Speaker 1: So?
00:01:11
Speaker 4: No, you told me you were cool with the defensive players. I didn't know you were a defensive guy. Defensive all we'll go with that. So without further ado, our guest today is the head coach of the Eureka.
00:01:24
Speaker 5: College Red Devils.
00:01:25
Speaker 4: There's still the Red Devils, right, I want to make sure I'm using right terms, the Red Devils, and also happens to be an all time Miami Dolphins great. He is Randy Starks. Randy, welcome to the fish Tank.
00:01:36
Speaker 1: Appreciate thanks for having on the fish ta.
00:01:39
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:01:39
Speaker 2: Man, ready. You know what I think people lose sight of how impressive You're Miami Dolphins career was when you were here. You know, seven seasons, two Pro Bowls, thirty and a half sacks, four interceptions. I didn't know you had hands, big fella, but I think that proves it right there, right that you have hands. I mean, you did your thing in Aquan Orange and we have so much to talk about, but through all of our research, we have to start off with this. We have to start off with the fact and we can't ignore this big seth you were neighbors with Channing crowded, Yes, I was. There's no way to start this thing off without talking about channing crowded you as neighbors. I mean, that's that's gotta be the best storyline ever to get things started with.
00:02:21
Speaker 1: Right.
00:02:22
Speaker 3: He wasn't the same person as he was in the locker room like you see on his podcasts all different shows. He's on a family man, great guy in the neighborhood. But all the stories I had was in the locker room.
00:02:34
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, that's all you want to talk about. Don't give me that, Randy. Don't give me that shit, man, because I know neighbors like you two next to each other, had me something a little bit more entertaining than just a locker Tell you.
00:02:45
Speaker 1: Man, he wasn't that type of person.
00:02:47
Speaker 3: Man. He was a family man. It was good I see him right now. And then I think at that time I was still playing ball. He was doing this thing, his little radio show. So we crawled past a little bit. But you want to hear some story that is the locker room. I'm pretty sure knowing him, you already heard all the stories.
00:03:02
Speaker 2: I'm gonna tell you this, Marny. He says he had a problem with your dogs in his yard. And that's what we that's what we heard from him. Tell us about your dogs in his yard and that making it that their personal basketball.
00:03:14
Speaker 3: I need receipts on that, all right, I can't believe everything saying, you know, you'd like to talk trash he receives. Pull the cameras out. You know, I had old English bulldogs in every time of time. You know, they might get out the gate. You know, they're not aggressive dogs. They probably smell his dog. You know they're trying to play. You know, you don't want to let him in hide and floorida, Hey take.
00:03:33
Speaker 1: A crap, you know.
00:03:37
Speaker 2: Facts, I love love it. That's too good.
00:03:42
Speaker 4: Well, I definitely want to get at some point to these the starks and crowded stories, which juice. It almost sounds like one of those old TV cop shows, right, Starks and Crowded. I can only imagine what that was like. But there's something else there. You go see, there's Hey, that guy's doing everything. He's doing stamp of comedy, he's selling his crowder powder. He might be ready for a TV show as well, so that that could be good stuff. But there's something else that I couldn't wait to ask you about. Because in the beginning stage of this show, we not only talked about the Dolphins. But we used to talk about these epic basketball games at OJ's house because Juice his former house had this full court basketball court was actually it felt like it was longer than NBA lank Juice, because I go up and down one time, and I know I wasn't in great shape to begin with, but.
00:04:32
Speaker 5: I was gassed.
00:04:33
Speaker 4: So so point is, we love talking hoops, and you grew up in Waldorf, Maryland, where you attended Westlake High. Shout out to the Wolverines right, which, by the way, were there colors orange and aquaad?
00:04:46
Speaker 2: Did I see that? You know?
00:04:49
Speaker 1: Saying once?
00:04:49
Speaker 4: I man, like, you don't see that much in high school and in Maryland, So that was really cool. Right, That's my point. But I'm not surprised that that when you were in high school you were a super prep All American defensive tackle. I expect that you played at the highest level in the NFL. I expect that. But what did catch me off guard was the fact that you were a serious hooper, Juice. Like, I'm not just saying, oh, he lettered in basketball. You tell me all all football players think they're basketball players, and I've seen that, but I'm talking about a dude who scored more than a thousand career points in high school more almost seven hundred rebounds. You led your team to a twenty three and three record as a senior, and you were the Southern Maryland basketball player of the Year according to The Washington Post. Tell us about this hoop game, Randy.
00:05:40
Speaker 2: Wow.
00:05:41
Speaker 3: First of all, everybody think they's gonna be a basketball player, right, everybody think and so say about ninth grade, you know the same height. And when my football coach was like, you say, you're going what you think you about to be sixteen? He was like, you're done growing. You're a football player that happens to play basketball. Thinking that and so, but you know, I was right. Now I have unlimited right as far as Pop Worner football stuff like that. When I was growing up, they didn't have that. It was everything was one to wait. So I couldn't play. So one thing I could play with basketball, And you know, using the agility and athleticism playing basketball just carried over to the football field. And a lot of guys I tell him, like, man, I used to play basketball, They're like you, I used to play it. Like I just went on to win team like I was the best player on the team, like I was doing the thing now, you know.
00:06:29
Speaker 4: So right, But but really the best player on the you know, he was player of the year, like player of the year.
00:06:37
Speaker 2: Right, it's better better than the best best player in the area.
00:06:40
Speaker 4: And that wasn't voted on by like the community news. That's the Washington boat.
00:06:45
Speaker 3: I mean, I know I was good at it, right, I know what I can do, and I know I'm not gonna out jump somebody that's sixty six, you know.
00:06:53
Speaker 1: Now, I'm gonna body you up.
00:06:54
Speaker 3: Then you put a big guy on me, I'm gonna take him out outside the paint and take him to the whole. Like I just know what to do, and my whole what my team was. It wasn't just My nickname was bread Truck at the time, so it wasn't just It wasn't just giving the ball now like you play your game, you know, because in the day you're gonna shoot. I'm going to get that boyd I'm going to put it back up. Once I get that boy You're not getting the back. That's all me, you know what.
00:07:16
Speaker 2: Big stuff. It reminds us of, of course, Mark Dixon, the guy that we know that played in the trenches, that inside outside game like that also obviously reminds me of a lot of football players who feel like they could have played basketball if they would have been a little bit taller, you know, And that's just a fact. But here's the thing about it, though. You got a guy right here, and I want to ask you this, Randy, because I played basketball right after football. Did your football program leak into your basketball season and your team struggled because you weren't there yet? Because like, did you guys go what far in the playoffs in high school? Because my team always start off like h and five because the football players are still playing basketball, players are still playing football at that point.
00:07:56
Speaker 1: We never really made a deep run in football.
00:07:59
Speaker 3: So I used to come straight in like coaches telling me, y'all give you a week or two, you know the one now. I was like, nah, I'm going basketball. I wait for this anyway. I was raised with football to be off time. I'm trying to go ahead with less physical you know what I'm saying. I'm trying to beat the bully out here. I'm good, But I tell you right now, that first week was the hardest part.
00:08:17
Speaker 2: You guys talking.
00:08:18
Speaker 1: About all that and shape you played football, Na, things different.
00:08:22
Speaker 3: That thing is different, like my shots all or running out of the up and down the court tired, and the coach was like, don't worry about You'll get it back.
00:08:29
Speaker 1: But that first week was tough. I'll tell you that.
00:08:32
Speaker 2: It gets so crazy. Man. Could you think you played a whole football and off season of football and then next thing, you know, all right, let's go to basketball, and that first week your gassed. It doesn't matter what kind of shape you were in football, because basketball is a different animal.
00:08:48
Speaker 4: So were you you know you're describing your game. Were you like power forward? Was that the position? I mean, if you were taking guys outside?
00:08:54
Speaker 1: Well, my senior year I went to I was powered.
00:08:57
Speaker 3: For my junior year, I was center play with four guards, and so I was on the big.
00:09:02
Speaker 5: Four guards and dumping in the bread drug.
00:09:05
Speaker 3: Jumping the big chuck. Dude, you even do I give you I guarantee you I wake up twenty and twelve. You know what I'm saying. I just wake up like I'm coming to the gym. Give you twenty and twelve. Anything else?
00:09:15
Speaker 1: Plus, you know, this.
00:09:16
Speaker 2: Is my game.
00:09:18
Speaker 3: You know when I was playing with young guys and then my sophomore year I was playing varsity. We had a guy six eight sixty nine, and so you know it's play power forward with a bunch of guards. I was the only underclassmen playing everybody else with singers, and this grew my game from there.
00:09:31
Speaker 5: Love it.
00:09:32
Speaker 2: So my question is living in the paint like that or possibly outside they had a big guy on you where you use your quickness? How were you from the foul line game? The game. I'm not gonna lie like heard it.
00:09:44
Speaker 3: I might give you eight for nine one game. I might come back two for seven. You know, okay, I'm okay, okay, but I put a shot. I hit it when it matter, you know what I'm saying. The matter, man, I'm giving those two, you.
00:09:58
Speaker 2: Know, just too good.
00:10:02
Speaker 3: But the good the beauty, giving a lot of and one so I'll give you to sure. So they weren't football players, Lebron, you know, yeah, less stuff slide if I hit him.
00:10:14
Speaker 2: Too hard, good fall.
00:10:16
Speaker 3: You know, I was taking football and bringing them the basketball court. That was my game, Like, I know what I need to do, make it physically right right.
00:10:24
Speaker 2: I couldn't imagine going in the paint with big star and all that stuff. I I just do the pull up. I'm just gonna do the pull up jumper and hope it goes man.
00:10:33
Speaker 1: And I'll tell you on the floor too. I died on the floor.
00:10:36
Speaker 2: I do all that. Oh, it's so funny you say that, because I was just thinking about that the other day. It might be one of the dumbest drills in basketball when they do that loose ball drill. I mean, that makes no sense. But your guy that was willing to do.
00:10:47
Speaker 1: That football I'm used to falling. I'm not gonna come up with a.
00:10:50
Speaker 2: Cherry, not on that, not on that.
00:10:54
Speaker 1: I'm good.
00:10:55
Speaker 4: But see this tells me right here you try to talk about this defensive mindset that you had to there's a difference the defensive guys.
00:11:02
Speaker 2: There's some point guards that ain't getting on the ground either though, Big Seth get on the ground, getting on that I'm gonna try to score, Randy, I'm not. I'm not trying to get on the ground. And you know it's a travel anyways nowadays. Anyways, let's go back to this Maryland thing, because Big Seth I give you a hard time all the time. And Randy, we just had Nolan Carroll on the show, and I was giving Big Seth a hard time about, you know, Nolan choosing Maryland over Florida Gators, and that was fun. I was. I was laughing a lot about that until I see you chose University of Maryland over my Penn State. NT me lying how that happened though?
00:11:48
Speaker 3: Okay, So, like I told you, I was a big basketball I thought I was gonna do both in college. Or I had Syracuse on my list and Syracuse at time they was good at football and basketball. That's my dream. I always want to go to Syracuse. Of course, I probably around this time I know I'm not gonna do both. But he was in nice school Penn State because Larry Johnson, great guy, great person overall. Definitely parents won't love him. So that was on my list. And then Maryland. I'm going to Maryland.
00:12:15
Speaker 1: I know right now.
00:12:16
Speaker 3: I'm going to Maryland. I'm going to play, you know what I'm saying. So I'm just thinking myset of playing and close to home. My family and my mom should get to come and see me. Played pretty much every weekend. So that was the decision I had to make, and I chose Maryland.
00:12:31
Speaker 2: Man, you could have came to Penn State have been a football and basketball star. It didn't take much to be a basketball.
00:12:37
Speaker 1: Start at the time.
00:12:39
Speaker 3: You guys playing freshman, I think it's mandatory guy, every guy's shirt right the time.
00:12:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, ress Shire was a big no no depends, man, you big start and you're trying to still recruit him.
00:12:53
Speaker 5: I don't think he has any eligibility, man.
00:12:55
Speaker 2: I think he might have a year, big set. I'm looking for one year. That's all I'm asking for. Man, that's funny. That is funny.
00:13:02
Speaker 4: Well, look, he made a good choice, right and going to Maryland and the fact that he was one of the most dominant defensive players in the ACC during your time there. However, you decide to forego your senior season and you enter the draft, right, So then next thing you know, you're only a twenty year old guy, which is crazy when you think about it now.
00:13:21
Speaker 5: In the moment, you probably just live in life.
00:13:23
Speaker 4: But you're twenty years old, you're in the NFL, you're playing for the Tennessee Titans. I just in researching for this, I heard you on another interview say that when you look back now being in the position that you're in in life, that you wish you had invested more in yourself during that time, Like obviously you were a talented guy, you don't get drafted in the National Football League and then you're starting by your second year if you can't play, and you said you were around veteran leadership, but you maybe didn't take as much in you didn't invest in yourself. And so now as a head coach that is trying to show young men the way. Do you you know, are you in a position where you kind of realize, Hey, I didn't do all the things that I could have done. I could have trained differently, I could have prepared differently. Do you have that reflection?
00:14:10
Speaker 1: I definitely do.
00:14:12
Speaker 3: Sitting back and looking at everything, I think what makes me a good coach is my rap sheet is not perfect, you know what I'm saying. I had some bumps in the road, you know what I'm saying, But in the day, I was like to come out of that, and so I just try to use those life lessons, the good and the bad, to help these other guys come up, to the student athletes coming up, so they don't make the same mistake.
00:14:33
Speaker 2: You know.
00:14:33
Speaker 3: My whole thing is that makes some new ones. So when the next guy's behind you come, we make sure they don't make those mistakes right, And so that's the whole thing to me. I was just living in a moment, just enjoying myself at twenty. He I was twenty years old. I couldn't get into the bars. I couldn't buy alcohol.
00:14:49
Speaker 2: You know.
00:14:50
Speaker 3: I remember some of the guys maybe get someone on the plane, stuff like that. It was a good experience. But in the day, it's almost like you gotta invest in yourself. I wasn't investing with myself. I know some guys like man at this time, Oh man, I'm not paying five to ten grand for a chef or personal training. But looking back, that's investing yourself. That's putting it back into yourself, you know, longevity, taking care of your body.
00:15:11
Speaker 1: I wasn't looking at that.
00:15:12
Speaker 3: But yet I'll go spend that five to ten on a trip and not going to get that back. Good memories, you know, I'm saying, I spend in the club. You know what I'm saying, good memory. But today I'm not investing that in myself. And that's something I try to tell these guys. You know, even here at D three, I toell this guy's been education, investing yourself. You spending all this money, make sure you do the right thing. That's one thing I would tell guys, like investing yourself, spend that money in yourself. I think I see someone Lebron James spend over a million dollars on his body.
00:15:38
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, That's an investment, That's what it is.
00:15:40
Speaker 2: Well, he can you know what I'm saying.
00:15:42
Speaker 3: Oh, absolutely, But any professional athlete can do that. Guys, it might have been a million dollars, not that much. You spend ten twenty grand and get it on the back end when it's time to reap the contract. You know what I'm saying, add extra five ten years, I mean actually year to you to say a year to your playing career.
00:16:01
Speaker 1: You're going to get that twenty grand back, you know.
00:16:05
Speaker 5: No, it makes sense.
00:16:06
Speaker 4: The other thing just that he said in this interview, which I thought would be really interesting because you did live this, was that Randy said he was very happy now looking back that he didn't get drafted and have to be twenty years old in Miami, that he got to have at least a four year buffer in Tennessee before he made it.
00:16:26
Speaker 5: Down to Miami. Now, Randy, my partner.
00:16:30
Speaker 4: Here got drafted in the first round at twenty something years old and comes down to South Florida.
00:16:36
Speaker 2: Randy, Here we go, Randy, we go through this episode.
00:16:41
Speaker 4: My point is that you had to navigate that thing that Randy says, Man, I'm just glad because it still was a lot, right. Your point was it was still a lot, even for a guy that had four years in the league and had grown up a little bit. If at twenty you had been dumped into South Florida as having money for the first time and all these other things that that might have been a bit munch man.
00:17:03
Speaker 3: You can just see guys now or the NBA Rappers whatever, you get some of this money at twenty years old, you do dumb stuff. And so even coming in Miami, I'm twenty four. Some guys Miami come in the league at twenty four. I would say I was blessed to have betters in Tennessee, whether it's our hands were Keith Bullok, Kevin Carter, smart bro so I had young guys that kind of show me what to do, you know what I'm saying.
00:17:26
Speaker 1: So then when I got to Miami, I still had Jason.
00:17:29
Speaker 5: Crowner showed you what to do.
00:17:32
Speaker 2: Nah, it took it.
00:17:34
Speaker 1: Took me my year to want up to.
00:17:39
Speaker 3: I might have made it, but I was blessed to have veteran guys to kind of help me and show me the way. Still come to Miami twenty four years old, still young. So, like I said, if I would have came straight to Miami, Nah, I would have finished that first time track for sure, knowing myself.
00:17:56
Speaker 2: No, yeah, you know what, I get it, bro I still haven't grown up and I've been living here since I was forever ago. Anyhow, Miami's tough deal. You know what, this is a this is a Dolphins show. Let's let's talk a little more Dolphins right here. So Randy two thousand and eight rolls around, and you're an unrestricted free agent for the first time in your career, and you choose to sign with the Miami Dolphins, a team that's coming off of one and fifteen season and featuring the first year head coach in Tony's Ferano. Why Miami at that point.
00:18:29
Speaker 1: It broke me off. That's why.
00:18:33
Speaker 2: What you mean?
00:18:33
Speaker 5: Shot, That's is an easy answer.
00:18:40
Speaker 1: No, I wass I'm not the realist.
00:18:43
Speaker 2: Sit that's the realist.
00:18:46
Speaker 3: You're giving up some bread South Florida, Miami. I see what looked like on TV. Let me go check it out myself. I might have went for a weekend or something and I get lived there.
00:18:54
Speaker 1: What do I sign?
00:18:56
Speaker 2: That's so real? Oh that's funny. Oh yeah, you did right? And not feel you man? I mean for me. I mean, unfortunately, when I was coming out, I wanted to go closer to home. This iss Cleveland or Pennsylvania or warm and Warm might have been the worst thing ever happened to me down in Miami, you know what I mean? No, it was, honestly, man, I feel what you're talking about. A lot of guys vacation here. A lot of guys have a house here and then actually be able to do both, to work and play here. Pretty easy decision most of the time.
00:19:28
Speaker 3: Right, great experience fishing more often that I use it. I mean, this is a great experience over all. You know, I'm glad. I don't know how things are now, but I'm glad the facility was out the way of where everything is.
00:19:44
Speaker 2: I say that it's a little closer. It's getting closer to where everything is now.
00:19:50
Speaker 5: It's right by the stadium like the it's if.
00:19:53
Speaker 4: You go out on the practice property, the stadium is right there on the other side of the goal posts.
00:19:58
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yes, your the Miami a lot closer to Miami. Guys like us, though especially myself. Man, I wasn't mature enough at times to handle Miami. But I think these guys now they get a little bit different in terms of you know, because I would be with the money they make Randy right now. I don't know if they could keep me off South Beach at a young age man. But these guys do a great job of doing so.
00:20:25
Speaker 3: I mean it's different programs, meeting seminars, stuff like that. I think NFL, the NFLPA, they're doing a good job with them. And I think educating these guys is helping. And you know, I think that stuff started when I first came in to league, and so I was kind of hearing some of it. But for me, the main thing was the guys in the marker room. That's where I got my guys from. And I think that's changed and starting to help as far as saving your money and doing the right thing, because the end of the day, you can't do anything wrong without being posted on social media, So I think that's everybody's starting to keep the those when they normally would.
00:21:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, ran another thing though while you were here. That was interesting to me as well. You know, I've always thought of he was a tackle. You were actually labeled as a defensive end, you know, for I think the first three years here with the Dolphins. Talk about the move from the three four front and what that the impact it had on your game at that point.
00:21:17
Speaker 3: All right, So Tennessee, I was four to three. I'll played nose and tackle. So when I got to Miami, I didn't know anything about three four nothing, So all right, whatever, so I'm playing. I didn't know anything in four to three. You can pretty much your gap. You hit it three four, you needed a two gaps. I didn't know anything about two gap. But all I know is where you line me up, that's my gap where Noah, you want to squeeze the backside gap and still make that play. So that whole transition was bad to where when they first brought me in, I was.
00:21:48
Speaker 1: Basically a nickel guy, you know what I'm saying.
00:21:51
Speaker 3: So I was pretty much fod that's four to two, and that's when they put me but as the season went on, I started learning, I started making more plans, I start gaining the trust. So that's when I came in my second year and that's what pretty much loss of my career kind of took off from there. But it was a part transition. That's what the defense I like to run here in general, the three four, because you also you still make it like a four to three, but that transition, I mean, if you got the stuzz to do it, I think that's a great defense to do. But for the most part, once song's in Miami, I mean, you can put me anywhere. You put me in a you put me three, you can put me in one. Somebody go down, boom, they stick me inside. I can pretty much do it all because the end of the day, I have to be three hundred and thirty three hundred and forty pounds to play those you know what I'm saying. I was already way really strong. I have strong legs, I can hold a point. I play with great pad level. You know that was my strength. I know my strength word is playing pad level and using my hand. Now, am I gonna beat something on the edge on the end, No, I'm not. I collapse that pocket, so I pretty much knew how to use my abilities to my advantage.
00:22:52
Speaker 5: Interesting stuff.
00:22:53
Speaker 2: It's man, that's a that's a teaching tool right there. Big seven coach got this coaching right there. Man, Yeah, you got to clip that right there and sell it to these high schools for sure.
00:23:03
Speaker 4: And Travis Wingfield because he's gonna go nuts over it, for sure. Travis also does a podcast for the Dolphins. He's kind of the main does the daily podcast. But he's a big x's and o's guy, so he's gonna he's gonna love hearing this. So another thing that happened on the other side of the ball that to me was very interesting in that first year goes back to week three. So, as Jews said, when you got here, the Dolphins were coming off a one to fifteen season. You start zing two, you lose the first two games of the season, then week three you gotta go New England. New England's two and oher. But they also won sixteen straight the previous year, so it just looked like it was not gonna be a great situation. But what none of us knew. You guys apparently knew what was going on behind the scenes was that the Dolphins were drawing up a little bit of a They had a plan to try and do something different and get their best players on the field on the offensive side of the ball.
00:23:56
Speaker 2: So the game.
00:23:56
Speaker 4: Starts the way we'd probably expected juice New England. Early in the first core, they're marching down the field, but then those hands come up, like you're talking about Matt Castle tries to throw those things and you see the smile there. You go, dust it off, so you get a pick, you get the ball back, you thwart that drive right and the Dolphins start to march down the field. And then that first drive as they get close to the end zone, all of a sudden, Ronnie Brown, he's not lined up as a tailback. He's lined up as a quarterback in the shotgun. Talk to us about the wildcat because Channing has talked about what he saw in practice and he said the defensive players were like laughing at this thing up until the point they finally pulled it out in that New England game.
00:24:37
Speaker 1: Well, at this time, I think we had three good running backs.
00:24:42
Speaker 3: Maybe just trying to figure out a way to get everybody on the field, get your best players in the field, and do I think that this would be like a red zone play, fourth and one type play, of course, but I don't think it'll be a staple, you know, saying something that our offense is using.
00:24:56
Speaker 1: Deal like that was our thing.
00:24:58
Speaker 3: Like when it came to an offensive still we could really move about Folcat and that's what we did.
00:25:03
Speaker 1: That's what we went to.
00:25:04
Speaker 3: And I think Ronnie Brown made pro bo off that because nobody can stop it. It's a trend, right, So once we did it, everybody started doing it. And so it's one of those things like we first wanted to do it, nobody could stop it, and you couldn't have an answer for because in the day, nobody really when you're doing a run box, nobody's counting counting the quarterback. He's not counterflul So now you got him as the running backs. And then we start throwing a little pass off of that. I mean, we just changed the game. And you don't know when we're going to do it, because championis Is still was on the field.
00:25:33
Speaker 1: You got your check to it.
00:25:34
Speaker 3: But ind of the day, we start throwing power, start throwing counter zone jet sweets, we start throwing everything on there. You know, everything is what NFL breakdowns every four games, so every four we're doing something new.
00:25:46
Speaker 5: What was that like for you?
00:25:47
Speaker 4: Because again, you know, a couple other guys, defensive guys, have talked about how you guys were just killing it in practice. It looked like it had no shot. And when you saw them for the first time, you're standing there on the sidelines and you see the hem alone up in that and then they just start gashing the Patriots and there's no answer for it. What was that like for you to be on the sideline watching that happen.
00:26:07
Speaker 1: I mean, it felt really good.
00:26:09
Speaker 3: You know, it's the Patriots, so it's one of those things like all right, they're gonna make a run to go and make a run, but the defense couldn't got the field. Ronnie just kept going. Rickies just kept going. I want to say one of them had part two in the yard that game. Maybe's some big numbers.
00:26:24
Speaker 5: Ronnie had four touchdowns out there.
00:26:26
Speaker 1: Ye couldn't stop through on defense.
00:26:30
Speaker 2: But there's also a short field though, Randy, because you guys that also provided I think some tumble short fields.
00:26:35
Speaker 1: Right.
00:26:35
Speaker 5: The defense was tough that day too. They couldn't get anything going for sure.
00:26:39
Speaker 3: Sure, offense made it easier, right, they're holding the ball. Clock management.
00:26:43
Speaker 1: Now we up. Now you have to throw the ball, go get them right.
00:26:48
Speaker 2: I always love it when the offense can hold up their end of the bargain man. When the offense is doing their thing, it always seems to work out better for the defense. Sometimes when the defense isn't doing their thing, the offense has to do them. But usually the defense is doing their thing, and in my experience, especially late in my career, the offense was not holding up there into the bargain man. So it's nice to see that happen, you know, when you're sitting on the bench and getting getting a breather right there.
00:27:12
Speaker 3: It's a difference with the offense doing their thing. It makes the other team one dimensional, right versus du is doing the thing. It's kind of like they can still go through their game plan, they can still go through the chart type of thing, you know.
00:27:23
Speaker 1: So once the offense do the thing, it throws everything out of the way.
00:27:26
Speaker 2: That's right, playing catch up. That's why I knew England was so good all the time. They were doing both. In the first quarter, up ten nothing, up fourteen nothing. Next thing, you know, the team that they're playing against, playing catch up to go off.
00:27:37
Speaker 3: Scripts, start grabbing stuff. They haven't ran five weeks, right, do you remember what you know?
00:27:44
Speaker 1: We put this in?
00:27:48
Speaker 2: They got to draw it up on the board and stuff. You can't even you can't even pull it up in the game plan. You gotta draw it up again, Like, yeah, I hear what you're saying. Funny, Raddy. Let's talk about you know, some of the guys that you play with here Miami. I mean, what an incredible list. Of course we've already talked about chanting being on defense, but you also play with everyone from j T, Joey Porter, Finnie Holiday, Matt Roth and everyone. Everyone has had a Matt Roth's story, so I know you have to have We got Matt Roth story. Everybody's had one cam wake of course, Paul Solio, Jared Rodric and Ov. The list goes on and on. Man, talk about that group of guys, and if you do have a Matt Roth anything, please hear it, because everybody's been heard them all Man, well not maybe not personally with you though it's all it all, it's all one on one thing. They have a problem, not a problem, not a problem, definitely not a problem talk about those guys.
00:28:42
Speaker 3: Man, We just had a different group, Like I said, when I came in that was in twenty four, had Joey Porter, Jason Ferguson, Will Allen, So I had a lot of veteran guys, and so I just kind of father lead for the most part. It's kind of like remember looking at me, like what in the hold up for? Like he had reminded of like, yeah, I've been playing a long time, but nah, he's still young. There was no money, you still quiet. I like you had to sit back. I like to observe, see what's going on, you know what I'm saying. Later in my career, that's when Ov, Paul Sola, all these other guys I'm starting to come in, had to take them under my wing. Yeah, Jordan, different guys and the room started changing to it Now instead of me watching everybody else and following, it's like, nah, they look to me now and say, hey, what should we do? How should we handle this situation? And that is use all the material, all the information that was given to me throughout the year, having a veteran group, and use that and passed it down.
00:29:39
Speaker 1: What is that?
00:29:39
Speaker 4: Like we just talked Xavion Howard was on the show earlier in the season, and I think he was going into his eighth year, right Juice, and he was the longest tenured guy, and he talked about that. Number One, you're bridging gaps between different eras of Dolphins football, which is interesting in and of itself, but this idea that it's almost like overnight, you go from being the young guy to the guy people are turning to, and it's kind of jarring in a way.
00:30:06
Speaker 3: Yeah, forced me to be more vocal born to my attention that guys are watching everything that I'm doing. They want to make sure I see if I'm doing so I have to make sure I'm doing everything right. I remember one time when my coaches told me my whole thing was I come in the later in the morning, I start complaining, you know, start talking trash. But at the end of the day, they know that's how I get going, and they know that's how I get my motive going and I start doing the work and won't how to put me aside.
00:30:36
Speaker 1: I was like, hey, man, we noticed.
00:30:38
Speaker 3: What you do, Like, we know you're gonna work hard, You're gonna show We know this, man, Please be careful because some of these young guys don't know that you're just joking and they're paying attention and they think they can do that.
00:30:47
Speaker 1: It's like all right, So that kind of opened my eyes right there.
00:30:51
Speaker 2: So I mean that that begs the question right now. And I know we're going to script here, but think about it now. The kids that you're coaching now just a little different than the way you came up and the way you you know, are used to handling your business. When you have to deal with these young guys, it's a whole different world. Now. How does coach starts handled something like these new school kids.
00:31:14
Speaker 3: I mean, I tell you, it's difficult. You have to be careful how you come at them. Stuff you say, you know me, who's playing ball? Somebody mf me, that's nothing. That's you know what I'm saying, Like, that's not a big deal to me. To now you say something. They going to the president, they going to the plays directly, Like you know what I'm saying, it's a big deal.
00:31:34
Speaker 1: Some of these kids feeling.
00:31:35
Speaker 3: Titled, like they just feel like they could do what they want to do this because of who I am. It's totally different, you know, It's totally different. You just long as you go. You know, I take every situation unique. I try to cheat treat every student athlete different because they are different. You know, like I might have to jump on one kid, I can't do that to the other one. You know, he might take his tills over you, losy.
00:32:02
Speaker 1: So it's just different, you know. I just try to learn and take each season as a killing.
00:32:07
Speaker 2: You know what, Saith, I'm sorry. I know we're all school script period a little bit. But thinking about coaching in general, how you even got to this point of being the head man at Eureka College? You know what I mean? I mean, I'm looking at your coaching regime in a short period of time has been quite a wild ride. I mean, you know a high school program that dissolved the team in Bakersfield, California, or even in England coaching, how does coach start to get to this point right now? As a coach?
00:32:33
Speaker 1: Grinding man, grinded.
00:32:34
Speaker 3: I've been trying to get in the coaching business for a while now. What happened once I moved overseas to the Ministement Republic and I start coaching the basketball team over there, and I'm talking about guys never played before. Nothing. I'm talking about my first game. We're getting whacked, like seventy to ten. And so for two to two and a half years, you skept getting better and better than I like to grind, like progress to the point now seventy and ten, sixty to twenty, you know, fifty to thirty. I always ask a compet the game all fifty forty five, like okay. So I started liking the coaching. I started loving it, you know, so I realized I missed it, miss Kipti. I mean, he's been involved in sports. So I came back around COVID, got my bachelor's from the University of Maryland, finished that up, and then I just walked through and get my masters from George Twning Universities.
00:33:25
Speaker 1: And just during that process, I've been trying to grind.
00:33:27
Speaker 3: Trying to get coaching gigs, high school, La Grange's College, another D three and George. That's been grinding. And you probably know how it is. At the Plan. It's kind of like everybody say they got you. You know what I'm saying, I gonna look out for you. But ind of the day, anybody who got you with yourself, you know, So I just been grinding, grinding, grinding, and now I guess other coaches, other people starting to see but oh, I guess he is sire. Now it's kind of like, hey, what you're doing, Like I just took a gig at his other spot. I'm off for this bounce like that. You know what I'm saying, Like I came for you, I reached out to you. You know what I'm saying. Everybody say, tap your sources, but you know, at the end of the day, everybody's not gonna look out for you like that. I'm deaferent, you know what I mean. I'm gonna do what I can. You know what I'm saying. But other guys kind of like, nah, they might see as a threat. They might think they might lose the room because of your resident. A lot of different things. You know, it goes into that. But we definitely know that, you know what I'm saying. One thing I say about him, my dad told me this. He told me he's proud of me because the end the day, I did this myself. I'm talking about I'm online for the application even this gig. Now people talking about who you know, there no one. I just grind took a lot of nose before I get it. Yes, you know what I'm saying. It took no call backs before I start getting called back. I just keep pushing.
00:34:35
Speaker 2: It worked out.
00:34:35
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's awesome.
00:34:36
Speaker 4: Man. To have a head coaches title is a pretty cool thing, regardless of level. So yeah, that's very cool. I do want to go back to something you kind of had mentioned. One of the things that makes you a good head coach and relatable to your guys is that you had some mistakes. You went through different things throughout your career. So I'm gonna go back to something that happened during your Dolph time as an on field thing, but was still something that probably made more headlines than it needed to. But so after twenty ten, you're selected to your first Pro Bowl right of your career. Then a few years later, following the twenty twelve season, again you're a Pro Bowler. And now you're going into another opportunity to be an unrestricted free agent and you don't work something out with the team. You guys can't come to an agreement on a long term deal, they franchise you, you elect not to attend OTAs Okay, cool, regular season starts up first games at Cleveland, and if I look at the if I go look at the box score, you're not listed as the starter, right, You're not listed as the starter in that first game, but you still deliver a Randy Starks performance. You split a sack with Cam Wake earlier, you're balling out, and then in the fourth quarter you sack Brandon Wheden by yourself. It's like the sixth time we've gotten to him that day, and you kind of let the sidelines know about it. You let him know that you made a play. There might have been a gesture towards the sidelines. We don't know necessarily who the gesture was towards. Coach Philman thought perhaps it was directed towards him. You said, no, no, no, no, that was playing me and my teammates. We were just having some fun. Tell us what happened in that moment. And then I'm curious as too, And I guess it depends on how you answer it, but I'm curious as to how coach Randy Starks would handle a player that maybe did something similar on his team.
00:36:31
Speaker 3: Okay, so football is an emotional game, right, Jenner. Emotional game? So at this time I set out came back. I wasn't a starter. I think we brought a nose tackle. But what happened was is that Olivi a Bernard. He had a good camp. I think he started coming to his own. So it's almost like, all right, we can't punish if I'm doing this thing. Who's next in line?
00:36:52
Speaker 1: All right? You think it's me? Cool?
00:36:54
Speaker 3: So I'm training, I'm working and working, and then the defensive line coach, Casey Robber, he said something to me that even Cam Wait caught it. He was like, yeah, you played better, pissed off. So I kind of looking like, is he trying to say that He's trying to okay cool? He's like yeah, I kind of caught that too.
00:37:12
Speaker 1: Cool. So we're going through now. I'm not even worrying about it at this time.
00:37:15
Speaker 3: I think I'm coming up one hundred straight starts type of thing I'm.
00:37:19
Speaker 1: Not worried about. So now I'm in it. I'm in the zone. I'm locked in.
00:37:22
Speaker 3: I think even the game, Uh, Casey coach, case He's trying to talk to me like, Na, this is this is the guy you want. Cool, Like, I'm in the zone right now. And so we kind of got into blah blah blah, stoot out went. That got my sack, and it just came to me like take that, like you know what I'm saying, Wait.
00:37:41
Speaker 2: Man, take that explaining explaining that, take.
00:37:44
Speaker 5: That you remember.
00:37:47
Speaker 2: I do remember it, I know exactly, but I want I wanted to like, you know, we lived at that experiment. Of course I remember that. It was iconic. Really, he just take that. That's not That's not the way it came out off when I saw.
00:38:00
Speaker 3: That's what I'm saying. I mean, that's how I felt, you know. I mean, it's crazy. He ain't taken it. He didn't feel disrespectful about it. You know what I'm saying.
00:38:09
Speaker 1: Who's cool? After that? I mean a lot of people didn't know what it came from.
00:38:13
Speaker 3: Like I didn't realize how big it was until I came to the locker room and one of the reporters came to me. Ohmark, he was like, hey, man, you know they caught that. Everybody's already buzzing. Twitter just started going through it was already buzzing. I'm like, oh, I went for like five hundred follus like fifty thousand. Oh that's how people get Okay, Yeah, take.
00:38:34
Speaker 2: It up a little.
00:38:36
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, if a student athletes did that, right now, I probably make a run or something like that. It's motion because in the day I don't want to You want to have control of you guys or your.
00:38:49
Speaker 1: Team in some way. You don't want to let a guy in hand.
00:38:52
Speaker 3: But at the same time, you don't want to take away who they are as a person who drives them. So it's kind of one of those balances you have to do. It's something that happened every game. That's a problem, right if it's something that doesn't normally happen, kind of shocking out the characters kind of all right, talk to him, see what's up. You know, it's football, man. We don't have it all there. You know what I'm saying.
00:39:12
Speaker 2: We all kind of look off.
00:39:15
Speaker 1: You gotta be all want to get hit in the head.
00:39:18
Speaker 2: If you ain't off, you can't play football.
00:39:21
Speaker 5: I love.
00:39:21
Speaker 2: But let me ask you this real quick, Randy though too. Now we talk about if it were to happen the coach starts, is there a total poll of guys that might be able to get away with a little bit more than some other guys.
00:39:33
Speaker 1: You treat everyone fair but not equal. You don't have that.
00:39:37
Speaker 3: It works right, right, some people in the dog house, you know what I'm saying. Some people are always it's always something right. You see them. Some guys run that's nice, don't do everything right, do everything's supposed to and they have that own slip up. Well, you're not gonna treat them guys the same, you know, just like I have an all pro like you take care of business.
00:39:58
Speaker 1: I got somebody on practice squad.
00:39:59
Speaker 3: I'm I'm not going this is what it is.
00:40:04
Speaker 2: Is real.
00:40:05
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh man, you just did that because he's all pro.
00:40:09
Speaker 1: You're right, I did.
00:40:11
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're right. This this person come being all pro. Right, it's first pro bowler.
00:40:17
Speaker 1: It's perch franchise. But this person come to it. This is what it is.
00:40:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. So good he learned that.
00:40:23
Speaker 1: At least I fearn that. Right.
00:40:25
Speaker 2: Hey, that's all that matters is how you feel he showed.
00:40:28
Speaker 1: He showed him on Sunday.
00:40:30
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, to your to your point, you know, your perspective as a guy who played twelve seasons in the NFL, it's a unique perspective to have for these young men, and sometimes it probably works in their favor, and sometimes it probably doesn't because you know what it's supposed to look like. But it is really interesting. Juice is one of the first times we've talked to a guy. We've talked to a few guys have gone into coaching, but this is one of the first time we've talked to a guy who's an active head coach who played. So it's it's just a unique perspective. Joy for sure, love it cool.
00:41:02
Speaker 2: It's a great perspective. Remember're talking about young and old and your old school kind of coach new school kids. I love that whole conversation right now.
00:41:09
Speaker 3: You know, I think that's one of the places in my career that probably took me from just being good to being great. Is I played to level my competition, and so I have. I was one of those guys the competitions up here. I'm up here. If we're playing, somebody's down here. Starting from high school, I played down here. That's a bad characteristic they have. So for me to get pissed off somebody, I felt like they blocked me boom gets me going there. I was like, damn, why ain't doing from the beginning, And so I think also that comes from being young as well.
00:41:39
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know getting away with doing things like that.
00:41:41
Speaker 4: Very interesting stuff, no doubt. Well, I know you've got a lot that you got to figure out. I speaking of Twitter, if I went on his Twitter, juice, it's all everything's now is he's telling me why Eureka College is a great place to be. He's out there, he's hustling your recruit and I know that you've got those responsibilities, so I won't We won't keep you much a long longer. But we end every episode the same way. And while I know that defensive tackles, although you played some end here as well, that you guys aren't necessarily.
00:42:08
Speaker 2: An he has some third down he has some third down opportunities. I love it.
00:42:14
Speaker 5: I love it well.
00:42:15
Speaker 4: Typically a defensive tackle is not known for their two minute drill prowess, but as you said, you can play anywhere on the line. And as a head coach, we know that you're gonna be prepare prepared for any scenario. So we're gonna let you get back to doing your thing. But right now we're gonna put you through the fish tank two minute drill. We're gonna throw some quick hitting questions for you. Look at the eyes. The eyes always get big. We're gonna some quick questions for you. You answer them however you want. We'll kind of have two minutes rolling and then we'll be good to go. Okay, so Juice, you can kick it off. Two minute drill starts now.
00:42:46
Speaker 2: All right, you ready, Randy, no choice? All right? All right, he's in too d Yeah, I know that's right. He's in. He's too deep in the tank right now, all right. Your first ever NFL game was against the Miami Dolphins. In your first NFL tackle was a sack. Do you remember which Miami Dolphins quarterback you took down?
00:43:05
Speaker 4: Phej Feely peely there it is all right, good, good, I love it.
00:43:11
Speaker 2: Okay.
00:43:12
Speaker 4: We know that when you played, especially when you were here with the Dolphins, you were a sneaker head man. You had a collection. We know you were a big Jordan brand guy for sure. What were your favorite pair of shoes that you ever owned.
00:43:24
Speaker 1: At that time? Red bottles?
00:43:27
Speaker 2: Oh wear red bottles?
00:43:32
Speaker 1: Miami had looked.
00:43:35
Speaker 5: It's the Maryland. It's that Maryland turns.
00:43:37
Speaker 2: That's what it was up man. All right, all right, okay, we spoke about your neighbor earlier, who is the coolest Randolph junior to ever played for the Miami dolphinst me repeat that. Who was the coolest Randolph junior to ever play for the Miami Dolphins. Is it Randolph Channing Crowder junior or Randolph Starks Junior?
00:43:58
Speaker 1: Randolph Starts Junior?
00:44:00
Speaker 2: I have a question, right question.
00:44:06
Speaker 4: If you had said him first, there's a reason why your name was second, because too funny to interrupt the whole day. All right, Well, he's moving this thing right down the field, which is a good thing because this one might take a little bit more time. Uh, well, you got your feet wet in the coaching world with your son's basketball team.
00:44:21
Speaker 5: We know you were a hooper in high school.
00:44:23
Speaker 4: If you had to put together the best squad that you could ever put together, but you can only draft guys who are your former Miami Dolphins teammates. So the best basketball squad I want to know who you're starting five is? They have to be pulled from your former Miami Dolphins teammates.
00:44:40
Speaker 1: Jordan mm Sean Smith, Jason Ferguson, big third, Jason Taylor.
00:44:49
Speaker 5: It's four and it's a big squad.
00:44:51
Speaker 2: It's four. Are you on the squad? Randy?
00:44:54
Speaker 1: I'm on a squad.
00:44:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm on a squad. Squad, man, that's the drill. I was like GM or something.
00:45:04
Speaker 3: I don't know.
00:45:05
Speaker 4: You're a player, coach, GM. You're doing it all man. I want to get twenty and twelve. I want to wake up with twenty twelve. I'm looking at the squad. This is a tall, long, athletic squad. I know, big Ferg is playing in the paint. Who's I guess Sean's going to be running point?
00:45:19
Speaker 1: Sean?
00:45:20
Speaker 4: Yeah, Shawn Smith's running point. Although you know, good luck. JT might try to do it too, Jukes. We've seen that move.
00:45:26
Speaker 2: Yay man, JT. He's wishy washing the game.
00:45:29
Speaker 4: Man.
00:45:29
Speaker 2: You know how he is. Bro. You know, I didn't want to get into him. They might kick the kick the basketball into the neighbors already.
00:45:35
Speaker 5: Again, Randy didn't see all that stuff.
00:45:39
Speaker 2: The passion is there.
00:45:40
Speaker 5: The passion is there.
00:45:42
Speaker 2: Man.
00:45:42
Speaker 5: This was so much fun.
00:45:43
Speaker 3: Man.
00:45:43
Speaker 4: I truly appreciate it. We wish you nothing but success at Eureka College. Can't wait to see how you do there and developing young man, and just how your coaching career continues to progress.
00:45:53
Speaker 2: Appreciate Thank you for having me, Man, Thanks for diving in Randy. It was awesome. I have fun.
00:45:58
Speaker 4: Thanks YOUK. Just like Jew said, thanks for diving into the Fish Tank presented by iHeartRadio. Be sure to follow us on whatever streaming platform you're using, and don't be afraid to rate the show or leave us a comment. We love your feedback, and remember you can find us, as well as Drive Time with Travis Wingsfield and all of our international partners on Miami Dolphins dot com at this time
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