POSTED: Thursday April 29th 2010
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Interview with Director of College Scouting Marc Ross

Post Draft Interview April 24, 2010

Q: Talk about Dillard…
A: Phillip is a high energy, fast kind of player. He is a little
on the short side but the guy is 245 pounds. He’s thick, and we expect
him to play in the middle and compete for that job there. He’s a smart
kid and he’s really been a tough worker there
at Nebraska so we are excited about him.
Q: Did he play middle, weakside?
A: He played middle and WIL. He played both.
Q: He’s an interesting guy. We asked him how much he was helped
by having Suh in front of him and he said that his coach was telling
scouts that he helped Suh out as well:
Any time you have Suh in front, you know. He did, he did help the
kid. I’m glad Phil tried to take some but he was lining things up and
made a lot of the calls. I’m sure that’s what he was really referring
to because he set the defense, called the fronts,
and all that stuff.
Q: If he has to step in, is he capable of doing that here?
A: We have spoken to the defensive coordinator and everything.
He’s another kid we had on the visit and we put on the board. He did a
great job with that.
Q: The punter…strong leg, weak leg? Obviously you guys think he has a strong leg:
A: Yeah, strong leg. When you see him, he’s not a typical punter
looking guy. He’s muscular and 224 pounds. You’ll think he’s a safety
when you see him walk up because he’s real jacked up. He loves to lift
with his other teammates and stuff, and he’s an
intense kid. He has a strong leg and we like those big guys. We don’t
want those scrawny punters that can’t last a whole season so he has a
lot of developmental qualities to him.
Q: Those reports that say he didn’t have a strong leg?
A: He didn’t have any of those. We didn’t have any, maybe some other ones in the league. We thought the kid had a strong leg.
Q: It also said he doesn’t mind going downfield and trying to make a tackle…
A: Yes. That’s what I’m saying. It’s the way the kid looks. He
wants to be a football player. He kicks off and punts. So we love that.
He wants to be a football player as either a kicker or punter.
Q: Where are you on this Tracy kid as far as how quickly you think he can adjust?
A: We are real excited because he is a smart kid, obviously, going
to William and Mary. Another guy we had in here. We researched
extensively down there and he was probably the best note taker we had
when we put him on the board of all the guys we had
up in our visit. Very conscientious kid. When we interviewed him, the
guy shows he is very bright and we have no problems with that
whatsoever. We think he’ll pick it up really fast.
Q: How many of these guys would you say are more upside and raw
than ready to come in right now? I hate to use the word project…  
A: A lot of the guys who we took are very good players who still
have upside. I think sometimes that gets misconstrued when we say
people have upside is that they aren’t very good players and we are
hoping that they have good players with upside. These
are guys we think are good or even outstanding players who still are
going to get better where there is a different kind of player where
they are going to be what they are, which could be very good still in
the NFL. Take a guy like Petrus who, I think, is going
to be the same guy now as he is 10 years from now: a tough, nasty,
feisty, competitive guy. That’s who he is going to be and that is going
to be his calling card whereas a person like Tracy, who we are
expecting a whole lot more, him moving positions and growing
and learning and developing. So there is a difference there.
Q:  Regarding Petrus jumping around – tight end, fullback – how much did that hurt his development?
A:  It may have helped some, just having some versatility and
having a different mindset with the different positions on the field. 
But he is a guy that is going to attack it from day one.  When we
called him he was excited.  He is ready to go right now. 
If we told him to walk up here right now, he would be here ready to
practice.  So that is the kind of guy that he is.
Q: You mentioned yesterday that there is a gap from the top linebackers from the next group, was Dillard in the next group?
A: Yeah, we had him in that next group. We actually talked about
him at three (third round) and there was some good discussion about it.
We thought there was a chance that he’d be available and that Chad
wouldn’t be, so we decided to go that route and
hold our breath, and we got him. It was a restless night’s sleep but it
was worth it.
Q: Was there then another guy? You were getting to the point
where everyone thought you needed to take a middle linebacker at some
point:
A: We had some other guys later, but not really at that range
where we took him. We weren’t going to force anything. We don’t do that
and I know we come down here and say it, but we’re not going to force
it. When you force players and you think it’s a
need and then you get burned, and then don’t play anyway, then you have
a bad pick. We were going to wait for the right person at the right
time and we feel strongly that Phillip is that guy.
Q: Do you think that was the plan if you didn’t get McClain, that Dillard was the next plan?
A: Yeah, he was in that group when we would meet and talk about
those things and set up scenarios. He was part of that scenario where
if we don’t get a guy here in the top tier group then this guy will
look good in that third and fourth round range. 

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Keywords · Marc Ross · NFL · New York Giants · Phillip Dillard

Name: Avis Roper
Organization: New York Giants
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Phone: +1. 201-935-8111
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