Scott Fitterer Talks No. 1 Pick, Free Agents Signings + More
Process for getting top pick:
"Yeah, so that started at the combine. Ryan Poles and I got together and we talked to a few teams about getting up somewhere in the draft where you can get a quarterback. Ryan is a guy I've known for a while. I met him at the combine. Met in a hotel room the first time. Met in the lobby of the stadium a couple times and just talked about it, 'hey, what would it take? What would it look like?' And it was going to be expensive. It was going to be expensive anywhere in those upper spots in the draft because there are so many quarterbacks that are in this draft, teams that need quarterbacks, and also the price of quarterbacks in free agency. These guys are getting 35 and 40 million now. So the demand for these rookies is going up. So what we wanted to do was stay with it. We continued to talk, Ryan and I. Came back to Charlotte and had several more conversations over about three or four days just over different scenarios, what would it take? And we found a spot that worked for both of us. They wanted a certain amount of compensation, certain things we didn't want to do so we had to work through that, but we got the deal done. We wanted to put ourselves in a position to get a quarterback, so those were the conversations we had. You never want to, especially a player like DJ. You do your best not to, but the price of this number one pick was too expensive to give up all of these picks and get there. So unfortunately we had to give up DJ who was a great member of our team. He did a tremendous job for us, great locker room guy. It hurt but we had to do what we had to do to get in this position."
Did you trade up because you had one quarterback you wanted:
"At the combine, we said if you wanted to move up then you better have conviction and we had conviction on players at that top that we feel good about. Not going to go into it but we feel good in this position. We're still going through the process right now. Obviously, we have our ideas. You're not going to make a move like that without having that pretty much cemented. Now we're going through the process of talking to the players and really getting to know them. You know them as players going back a couple years as scouts have been watching these guys and evaluating them. We had a snapshot at the combine where you get 18 minutes talking to them, but really we want to get to know them, what drives them, who is supporting them in their family. So this is an important time going through this process, but we do feel good about the group up top."
How moving up changes everything:
"It changes because it narrows down the field that you're going to take. At nine you have to be ready for every different scenario. I don't know if you guys have seen those videos of Matt and myself going through all of these different things. You're sitting at one. Now you get to decide who you want. We have a lot of options up there, but you also take out the unknown factor. You get to pick the player you want to choose."
Reich never coaching shorter quarterbacks, like Bryce Young:
"He has never put that label out to me, like hey I need this, this, and this. He needs to be this tall, he needs to be this big, he has never put that out to us. It's like who plays the position the best, who is going to give us the best opportunity to win."
Why did you sign Andy Dalton:
"His leadership, just the expertise and the person that he is. He was a guy who had to play as a rookie so he can help if it is a rookie quarterback who is going to be playing, he can share his experiences with him. Josh [McCown] can share his experiences. Everything that we've done is basically to support that position. We've added receivers, tight ends, running backs, all these positions to give whoever that is at quarterback the best opportunity at success."
Any concern with Thielen's age and signing him for three years:
"No, he actually wants to be here for three years, that was part of the whole deal. He wants to be here through this process of building and winning so that was important to him. Having him in the building, like when you watch his tape, the type of player he is, he is so much about technique, separation, and route running. That doesn't bother me as much. If he loses a step it's not the biggest factor for a player with his style of play. If he was just a straight-line burner, yeah at 32 that makes a difference. A guy that's so savvy like that who knows how to separate that wasn't much of a factor. Now, we also want his influence in the locker room. He's such a leader. We had him in the building last week and I was really impressed with the guy. He has so much command and respect, he is what our team needs right now."
Restructuring Shaq Thompson to keep him in Carolina
"Shaq is a team leader. One of the most unselfish people I've ever been around. He wanted to be here. It's important for him to be here. He loves Charlotte, he loves the Panthers. It came down to, we had a conversation and sat down in the stadium and we just talked man to man. I just said what do you need, this is what we need, we worked through it. I know he slept on it. He called me back and said hey listen this is what I would like to do and we can't thank him enough. It's such a team-first move that he did and a ton of respect for Shaq and he wanted to be here and we made it work."
Did you consider Lamar Jackson:
"Like anything, you always have a conversation. He is a good option, a really expensive option, but we are focused more on the draft picks at this point."
Have you talked about extending Burns:
"I just talked to Brian's agent, not so much about him but that's something that we will probably look at after the draft."
What role do you envision Adam Thielen playing:
"That's the unique thing about him, he can do both. He can play three spots for you. He's probably best in the slot, the instant separation, the route running. But he is interchangeable and has the intelligence to move around quickly."
Opinion on playing rookie quarterbacks:
"As you go through the process, we'll rely on Frank and our coaches to know when is the right time. So we're not going to put a benchmark out there that he's going to start week one or he's not going to play at all this year. It's like when the time is right, when he's ready, when he has grasped the offense and we can put him out there and have success, that's when he will go out there."
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