Netflix and Scout
March 14, 2019
By Jay Evans
The hyper-competitive incestual family lineages and personal connections of the NFL are the perspective talent pool for teams. Rather than combing the vast innerwebs of LinkedIn profiles, NFL franchises source familial bonds. Identifying young talent to infuse into organizations can quite literally be drawn through family trees.
The current Redskins leadership is no exception. George Allen’s youngest son is the current team president. The head coach, Jay Gruden, has a brother, Jon Gruden, coaching on the other coast. Their father, Jim Gruden, paved the path for multiple family members to work in the league. The former offensive coordinator, the 33-year-old prodigy Sean McVay, is the son a former coach and general manager.
The Mara family of the New York Giants and the Rooneys of the Pittsburgh Steelers have literally wed the two families together. The tales of the Rooney-Mara, “The First Families of Football,” relationship dates back to a “tip” on a horse race, naming children after rival patriarchs, and a former Maryland Terrapin and Redskin draftee turned backup quarterback Richard “Dick” Shiner (cheers to you Ma and Pa Shiner). Waters run “blood” deep in NFL circles.
Nine years ago, Bruce Allen hired a fresh faced 23-year-old former Youngstown State football player as an assistant video editor. More importantly, the new hire, Kyle Smith, is the son of former San Diego General Manager A.J. Smith. The elder Smith worked within the Buffalo Bills organization for 14 years, and has been credited as the architect of the 2000’s Chargers. During Smith’s tenure, the Buffalo Bills won four consecutive AFC Championships. In the pre-free agency era, those same San Diego Charger teams, with mostly homegrown talent, went to five AFC West division titles and had eight consecutive seasons without a losing record.
Though neither franchise hoisted the Lombardi trophy, A.J. Smith passed down film study habits as family heirlooms. Kyle was raised in Buffalo on a steady diet of AFC Advanced Reports and found his father’s passion for scouting at an early age. Today, Kyle enjoys watching movies, working out, and scouting talent.
As Kyle rose through the Redskins ranks, his responsibilities have revolved around scouting the Southeast since 2012. In that time, the Redskins have drafted 60 players (including supplemental picks). Thirty-three of those picks have come from the south region over the course of the past seven drafts. Fifty-five percent of the picks can be at least partially attributed to Kyle’s opinion in the “War Room” where draft decisions are made. That number grows to nearly 62% if you include Texas and Oklahoma in the south region where the Redskins send their head scout. Kyle’s opinion is clearly valuable and carries weight at Redskins park.
The Redskins’ confidence in Kyle’s scouting prowess shows it’s not a coincidence as to why the team has dipped into the Alabama talent pool. The Nick Saban-led juggernaut churns out first round talent with regularity. The Redskins also have had personal ties with Virginia Tech, explaining the school’s second largest presence in Ashburn. Take a guess at which university has the third-most players drafted by the Redskins since Kyle took control of the region in 2012. That’s right! Arkansas.
Deep scouting is not about discovering the next Calvin Johnson or Andrew Luck. The talent of a superstar is obvious to most, but the hunt for a hidden gem is intensive and pivotal. Building out the roster with an unfinished ascending prospect is as important as hitting on first rounder. Arkansas products Martell Spaight, Tevin Mitchel, and Jeremy Sprinkle don’t get a lot of people excited because they aren’t superstars, but they do strengthen the core of rosters.
The Redskins have unearthed many valued prospects out of Kyle’s territory in recent years: Alfred Morris, Jordan Reed, Chris Thompson, Jamison Crowder, and Kendall Fuller to name a few. None of the aforementioned had much pre-draft buzz, and the highest of these “southerners” drafted was Fuller at pick 84.
However, all have been significant to recent Redskins team play or team building, possibly no more than Morris at pick 173, who came into pre-draft workouts as a fullback but who earned the starting tailback job and ended up running for 1613 yards in his rookie season. Kyle Smith’s direction has impacted the Redskins roster and the Redskins have benefited.
As Director of College Personnel, Kyle enters his second draft as arguably the most stable voice in a volatile room of NFL veterans including president and public enemy #1 Bruce Allen, Jay Gruden, who is about to enter a lame duck season with an ensuing Colt vs. Case quarterback battle, and Director of Player Personnel Doug Williams, whose job duties entail human shield and company apologist.
Kyle, at the ripe age of 32, has become the most important person in the organization, and his next move in the draft will determine the immediate future of the Redskins. His next promotion governs the fate of the Redskins.
If the Redskins are to rise out of mediocrity it will be because of Kyle Smith. Kyle is a homegrown talent that has worked his way up from the video intern, to an area scout, to the Director of Scouting. The Redskins denied other teams from interviewing Kyle for similar positions, which led to his most recent promotion. If the fanbase has hope for this promising young phenom to be promoted to General Manager, then the fans should collectively be rooting for Smith to put his name on another good draft.
As he most likely swoons over southern prospects, come draft day Kyle Smith will have the firmest base to stand on in a room filled with quicksand. He’ll continue to do what he always has: Netflix and scout.