Q&A: Martin Rucker, TE, Cleveland Browns

Interview with Martin Rucker, Cleveland Browns tight end on the All Access Football Friday Show by Ralph Mancini, Daniel Mogollon, and Rodney Towe on March 13, 2009.

Now that Kellen Winslow is gone, who do you think has the inside track on that starting (TE) job?

Rucker: I think with a new coaching staff coming in it’s open competition and it’s anybody’s game.

That was a good, modest answer. As a guy who went in the fourth round last year you've gotta be licking your chops. I point this out Martin, you are the son of a politician, is that correct?

Rucker: (Laughing) Yes sir, that is correct. As far as the licking my chops, I definitely am. I feel that I will get a fair shot at this job. That is all I am looking for, a fair shot. A chance for me to go out there and showcase my talents and if I’m better than the next guy, then I feel I’ll play.

You have a new coach coming in. Have you met the coach, have you met the coaching staff yet?

Rucker: I met the offensive coordinator and the tight ends coach, but I have not yet met Coach Mangini. (Note: Rucker has informed us that he has met the headman since this interview)

We won’t ask you if he said hi or anything (Laughs). You brought up the offensive coordinator, Brian Daboll. Have you had a chance to sit down with him and has he given you a clear idea of what type of offense he’s looking for? Has he told you what kind of changes he’s trying to implement?

Rucker: Not yet. I met him briefly in the weight room yesterday. Everybody is still kind of in and out. A lot of the players aren’t back yet because we don’t officially have to be there until Monday, so I’ve just been in and out getting workouts there and also working out at Mizzou (University of Missouri), trying to get refreshed and get ready for the upcoming season.

The Browns were coming off of a pretty successful 2007 season but in 2008, the wheels fell off. There was a lot of criticism of this team regarding their lack of discipline and lack of heart. Did you see that, or are reporters blowing the whole thing out of proportion? What went wrong last year?

Rucker: I wouldn’t say lack of heart. I can’t speak for everybody, but I think that discipline definitely will help our team out. I have been a part of disciplinarian-style football teams my entire life, so I respond to that well and I think that was probably the biggest thing we needed last year was discipline. Also, one thing that people overlook is we had a lot of injuries last year. We’re a young team but even the young guys were getting hurt that were playing. It was just kind of one of those things where we were down to a quarterback that we had signed four weeks prior who was starting the game. I was a rookie coming off of knee surgery and played in about five games and started the last game, and there were a lot of unfortunate things that didn’t go our way. It could happen to anybody.

We're big on the Draft here, so take us a back a year ago. How different is your mentality and your mindset today as opposed to last year, when there was so much uncertainty?

Rucker: I am so glad I am not going through that right now (Laughs). That process was pretty strenuous. You live in a couple of different states over a three-month period. You’re running through the ringer with The Senior Bowl, the (NFL Scouting) Combine and going to visit teams. By the time you get to the end of it you’re just like, “man, just pick me” and let me know where I go. You just want to sleep and have someone wake you up whenever the phone rings, but now I'm just focused on building on last year. Taking what you did last year, what you learned last year, and applying it this year so you don’t make the same mistakes twice.

You weren’t that cool customer you portrayed to us when you came on with us last year?

Rucker: I was a cool customer, but at the same time you just want it to get over by then.

I hear that. Let’s stay with the Draft for a couple of questions. Tell us a little bit about your former partner in crime, Mister Chase Coffman at tight end. Unfortunately for Chase he’s been injured and hasn’t gotten a chance to show what he could do. Once he does, tell us what the NFL scouts are going to see.

Rucker: They're going to see a tough kid who can catch the ball really well. He takes coaching really well, whatever they tell him to do, whatever they ask him to do he’s going to do it and he’s going to do it well. He’s a smart kid. He knows how to play football and he’s good at it. I hope that he’s healthy enough to go at the second Pro Day at Mizzou, so they can actually see what he’s got instead of just projecting him and maybe projecting him a little lower than he deserves. He’s a great tight end and I think he deserves to be taken pretty high.

How about the quarterback position? You had two Chases there, each very different— Chase Daniel, unbelievably productive but people are knocking his measurables in terms of his arm strength and size. Then you've got Chase Patton, who’s big and has that gun, but no one’s really seen him play. Tell us about those two guys.

Rucker: Chase Daniel is a great quarterback. Like you guys were saying, he’s got “it”. The kid’s a winner. He may not be tall and he may not have the most arm strength, but he’s got enough and he’s smart with the ball, so he knows how to get it to the guys and when to get it to them. Chase Patton, I think, is a guy who’s kind of like Joe Flacco. He’s got a big arm, he's a big kid and he’s smart as well. I think he’s already graduated. He’s going to be a dentist so he’s in dentistry school already. Being on the practice field with him and Chase Daniel at the same time, the only real difference is Chase Patton’s arm is a little stronger and he’s taller. They’re both great quarterbacks.

Jumping from college back to the pros again, what was it like working alongside a real NFL star like Kellen Winslow, Jr.? How did you get along with him and did he give you any pointers as to how to play your position better?

Rucker: I got along with him great, he‘s a good guy. I think he may get a bad rap in the media, but as a teammate he’s a good guy, he’s a hard worker. He loves playing football. Every day he comes to work to play football. The things that I got from him were ways to run my routes a little bit different than I had in the past. I had a speed cut, just play fast, he made mistakes, but whenever he made mistakes he just made them fast. So he said, “Whatever you do, always do it fast”.

I am interested in that dynamic. You’ve got Kellen Winslow, Jr. who’s known as a pass-catching tight end and then they draft you, a very good pass-catching tight end coming out of college. There was never any friction? You never felt as though he saw you as a threat down the line for his job? You never felt that from him?

Rucker: No, I didn’t and if he felt that way, he never showed it. There was never any tension or anything like that. Anything I needed help with, he gave me help. We had conversations, hung out a couple of times. He’s a very cool and pretty down to earth guy.

Was that a difficult adjustment for you? It’s kind of interesting—you went from being the upperclassman with Chase Coffman in a talented two tight end team to being a rookie. All of a sudden, you’re the understudy.

Rucker: It was a little different but at the same time I just took it back to my red-shirt year in college, because I didn’t play, I red-shirted. You just try to learn everything you can from the guys ahead of you and then bring everything you learned to the table and apply it so you can go out and succeed.

Time for three-and-out: Fist down: What is your favorite horror movie?

Rucker: Classic, Friday the 13th

Second down: Being that we are in the middle of spring training, give me your favorite baseball player of all time?

Rucker: Ken Griffey, Jr. He had the smoothest swing in baseball, he’s been playing for a long time and I used to play the video game.

Third down: After you got the first rookie paycheck, what was the first thing you went out and bought?

Rucker: I went out and bought a car. I got a Cadillac Escalade.