HEAD COACH LIAM COEN AND GENERAL MANAGER JAMES GLADSTONE
PRE-DRAFT MEDIA AVAILABILITY
THURSDAY, APRIL 9, 2026
Q. How different is the process leading up to the draft this year compared to last year?
LIAM COEN: A little less frantic I guess you could call it in terms of how fast everything
happened last year, getting not just scouting staff onboarded, but the coaches then
onboarded to new procedures and modes of operation. I think some of the familiarity has
helped the flow in the way that we operate on a day-to-day basis, the schedule, the routine,
what the coaches expect. That’s been very clear and concise throughout the process. I
think it’s just allowed us to maybe get to different or deeper dialogue maybe a little bit
quicker on some of the guys that we’re really honing in on.
Q. How different is it actually knowing your roster now compared to last year?
JAMES GLADSTONE: That’s the most helpful piece, being able to accelerate a lot of the
conversations where at this point in time last year we were in true discovery mode. We were
learning on the fly. Now we get to leverage all the information and experiences we’ve had
with everybody on our football team up to this point as part of our decision making. It
allows those conversations, like Liam said, to be a bit deeper, get a little bit further into it in
a more efficient manner.
Q. DE Travon Walker signed an extension last week. How important was it to get that
buttoned up?
JAMES GLADSTONE: I think it was a pretty important piece. He’s somebody that I think by
season’s end, I shared with the majority of you in the room, that we wanted to align
ourselves with beyond just the contract that we had at the time. His commitment to our
football team, his commitment to his teammates, it seeps out of his soul. It was very easy
to see what his piece to our puzzle meant. The scheme fit, the priorities we have on our
defense, it just all really matches up in a real way.
Glad he was able to earn himself that opportunity and know he’s going to take advantage of
it. He doesn’t take it for granted. He’s the type of human being that you feel comfortable
making a decision like that about. Really excited for really the evolution we’ll see moving
forward with not only his usage, but that entire defensive front and those guys behind him
as we get into year two of the system.
Q. Liam, at tight end, obviously you have TE Brenton Strange established. As you look
at the draft, how much do you have to project whether a guy knows how to block?
LIAM COEN: It’s a tough one. It’s what you’re projecting with both Y and F. What Y has
enough athletic movements and athleticism and hands and ball skills and feel to be able to
run the route tree? And then what F essentially, with so much of the spread offense, some
of those guys not being in a lot of those situations that you’re projecting a little bit, can they
do it? Can they block maybe at the second level, linebackers, safeties, what do those
matchups look like for the player that we’re talking about?
Yeah, there’s a little bit of a projection, especially at that position because you’re seeing so
many different ways they’re being used. Then you look at how much the tight ends were
used or the extra O-linemen were used in the NFL this year at the Y position, but also what
the F or the U could be in some of those multiple tight end personnel groupings.
Q. It seems like you are operating from a position of strength in terms of the health of
the roster, but you still have 11 picks. Are you happy with the positions you have put
yourselves in?
JAMES GLADSTONE: Yeah, really excited about it. Those slots that you’re thinking about
are more contributing slots. When you’re talking about first-year players, typically that’s the
expectation, finding a way to contribute and offer a positive impact. It can be a little bit
more challenging on the early end of a season as a rookie or even towards mid-season to
really feel that come to life. In the instances that it does, that’s great. That’s usually above
the expectation, especially when you’re talking about pick 50 and beyond, which is where
we find ourselves at this point.
Excited about building off of last year’s crop knowing it was just south of 11 picks. A couple
undrafted college free agents that were able to find their place. Look forward to sort of
being in familiar territory this go around and being able to leverage prior experience with
navigating the waters here in about two weeks’ time, and have some fun with it.
Q. The best available player approach, do you limit that? Is it best available player, but
if this happened or this guy is around…
JAMES GLADSTONE: I think you’d like to say it’s going to best player available. It’s always
going to come with a little nuance. You’re going to compare across positions. Where there’s
a clear visual for contributions and a vision from our coaching staff to see that player’s skill
set come to life. You would typically appreciate that fact that could come to life sooner
than later. All that stuff has to be weighed against each other.
When you have two like players and one position allows maybe an earlier runway, you lean
towards that direction. But it’s not so black and white all the time. That’s the type of
dynamic you would want to be able to walk in at each pick point with, the idea that we’re
not pigeonholed to one or two positions, but we have all of them where we feel comfortable
taking a shot if the right or best player presents themselves.
Q. How hard is it to balance getting a guy for immediate impact that doesn’t have as
much upside with looking at another position where there’s positional value, where
your roster is pretty set, but you have to look down the road a little bit and he has more
blue sky as a player?
JAMES GLADSTONE: Right, it’s hard to say it’s some black-and-white answer. It’s typically
going to come with a lot of layers to it. Ultimately you have to make what you feel like is in
the best interest of our team in the now and for the team for the future. But we’re ready to
go win some football games. Whoever can help us do that, we’re going to try to add to the
fold.
Q. As far as WR/DB Travis Hunter, without getting too far into it, is he tracking to be
ready to go for whatever timeline you guys have established?
JAMES GLADSTONE: Yeah, for all intents and purpose, he’ll be a limited participant
through the offseason program with eyes on return to play at full tick in training camp.
Q. Liam, how much do you enjoy evaluating defensive players?
LIAM COEN: Good question (smiling).
JAMES GLADSTONE: Almost as good as your tight end question (laughter).
LIAM COEN: I’ve always enjoyed watching tape. I’ve watched a lot of evaluations when my
dad was recruiting D-III players in New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Massachusetts,
Connecticut, watching all positions. You gain an appreciation for the game as much as
anything. So, you gain an appreciation for all that comes with it.
Now, is it easier or more fun to watch some other positions at times that have a ball?
Usually, I tend to lean that way (smiling). But I think it’s cool to see the impact and effect
that the other side of the ball has, what that player can maybe do to help truly our team, not
just on defense but also on teams, special teams, what that looks like. Trying to have an
open mind to some of those nuances that a defensive player could possess a little bit more
or different value than a tight end, right, or a different position that we’re talking about on
offense.
I’ve actually come to enjoy it. I’ve found that there’s a lot of ways obviously that you can
impact the game without touching the football and having an impact on every single play –
as boring as it is (laughter).
JAMES GLADSTONE: The most fun thing about watching film with Liam, when I’m just
doing it by myself, I’m focused in on typically a single player going from one play to the next
in large part evaluating what that guy’s doing.
When you start bringing a coach’s lens into the conversation, they start diagnosing scheme
across all 11 on offense, how does that match up against what we’re getting in the look
from the defense. Three minutes later we’re moving onto the next play (laughter). It is a
classic. You get a Ph.D. every offseason of trends schematically when you start diving in
with our coaching staff on a lot of the draft work and free agent work. That’s always a level
up for our scouting staff, analytics staff, that are in on those conversations and get an idea
of some of those layers you might not otherwise keep top of mind unless you’re focused on
the schematics.
Q. Does that make your job harder?
LIAM COEN: Of course it does (laughter).
JAMES GLADSTONE: Absolutely not. I get to process at a slower tick. I don’t have to be so
rapid fire. No, it’s good, I get to take a pause a little bit and think about it differently. It opens
my mind.
LIAM COEN: It gets drawn out. It just gets a little drawn out.
Q. How important is the discourse and connection between the assistant coaches in
the draft process?
JAMES GLADSTONE: That’s a critical piece. As I think back to our opening dialogue as to
taking the position, me sitting at the podium with Tony [Executive Vice President of Football
Operations Tony Boselli] and Liam, Shad [Jaguars Owner Shad Khan], Mark [Jaguars
President Mark Lamping] and T.K. [Chief Football Strategy Officer Tony Khan], pure
collaboration is what came to mind in our decision making. Without it, it becomes very
challenging to showcase a clear visual for how a player’s going to fit our environment, how
a player is going to fit into our team or a position group.
So, I think in order to come to that conclusion, we’ve got to have a lot of back and forth, a
lot of insights being brought to the table and see where it is that we have alignment and
where we don’t.
In the instances that we don’t, we keep watching more. If we’re unable to find a common
space, which we are in some instances, you’ve got to move on to the ones that you can and
be okay with whether or not the players that you’re not go find success elsewhere knowing
it wasn’t going to be a match with us or it wasn’t going to come with clarity. When it isn’t, it’s
hard to try to say, Let’s force this.
You feel me on that?
Q. What are the challenges of having to wait till [pick] 56? Are there challenges that
come with it? Will it be an excruciating first round to sit through knowing you don’t
have that option?
JAMES GLADSTONE: Liam has been through it before.
LIAM COEN: Waited a lot longer before.
JAMES GLADSTONE: There is no doubt about it. We have waited longer.
LIAM COEN: We were having a blast hanging out at the beach house.
JAMES GLADSTONE: 104 was our first pick. We get to cut that in half a little bit. We have
two weeks, one day, till our pick from now? That kind of thing.
You’re always going to stay agile. You’re never bored. You’re always thinking through what
we might be able to do. I think that mental gymnastics certainly is an engaging element
regardless of where your first pick point is.
Q. Do you not do mocks when you’re that late?
JAMES GLADSTONE: No, we do scenarios. We walk through, hey, if this pot of players is
there, which one do we feel most comfortable targeting, knowing that at our next pinpoint
or few pick points, these are the players we feel like may be in scope, how do we feel about
the combination of these different players together, so on and so forth.
Yeah, we’re working through that a little bit. Obviously that stuff on draft night, there’s no
telling. All it takes is one team to take a player you want, and you’re moving on to the next
you were eyeing up.
That may, in fact, alter what we do on the pick point behind it, and the pick point behind
that. We’re trying to chop through that as best we can.
Q. How do you track tendencies of other teams, the perceived needs of those teams?
Do you do more of that when you have a pick this late?
JAMES GLADSTONE: Yeah, all teams, just like offenses and defenses throughout the year,
have typical tendencies that they lean into. They break those tendencies, which is always
fun. We try to do the same and be aware of our own so that they can’t totally be leveraged
against us.
I think that is a very, very important piece to our mapping of where we might need to get
ahead of somebody or be able to jump in the draft or feel comfortable if we were able to
move back a certain amount that we’re not at risk for losing out on a couple players that we
want to target.
That’s an important piece to that strategy, is being in tune with a lot of those elements from
each club or even trees of decision makers.
Q. How many different scenarios do you think you’ll have run through? Is it more at
pick 56?
JAMES GLADSTONE: I don’t know that it’s any more as much as it is you probably hone in
on your hot list. You’re pretty refined at that point. We’ve got a really intimate and detailed
understanding of who and what we want, those types of elements. It trims the list a good
bit.
While there’s 250-plus picks, it’s nowhere close to us saying these are our priorities, 250-
plus. It’s a lot fewer and farther between. It allows us, even if we were picking earlier, to kind
of focus that conversation a little bit.
LIAM COEN: And you find out how you like people by going through that process. Okay, he
is taken. Who are we taking? Going through that process, find out who people like.
JAMES GLADSTONE: You just took this guy, now you’re probably not taking this guy at that
slot. Are you cool with that?
Q. Liam, does it help that you’re evaluating guys that are coming out of high school
when you were coaching college? Do you have to convince Tony Boselli not to take 11
offensive linemen (joking)?
LIAM COEN: [Laughs]. Trust me, yes. If they don’t play hard, it’s hard for Tony to get around
that. Regardless of position.
JAMES GLADSTONE: If they don’t block or tackle [X motion].
LIAM COEN: At a high clip—We’re working on him. I appreciate that about Tony because it’s
our culture. It’s what we want to be, is physical and tough. That can’t be something that we
sacrifice.
Then to say, yeah, there’s a lot of players that are coming out that I’ve recruited intimately in
terms of being in their houses. Coached them in college, a number of guys that we’ve
evaluated, then also been in some of their homes, or at camps, seen those guys.
Yeah, that’s a cool part, is to see the evolution of those guys, to know maybe a little bit
more of the background on some of those players that I was fortunate enough to be around
in the SEC. A lot of guys that went other places that we had on visits or that I went and saw
off campus.
I really appreciate that part. I mean, that was the best part I thought about recruiting in
college, was going into high schools and seeing the players, seeing them in their
environment, meeting the coaches and their teachers.
It brings back some memories, yeah, for sure.
Q. You and your staff are connected to the process. What is it like for you seeing James
in the scouting department?
LIAM COEN: Yeah, it’s really cool. You’re in the lab so much in football during the season
with your coaches, whether that’s schematically, personnel, fundamentals, technique, but
also philosophically. I get a new perspective—not a new perspective, but just a different
lens of culture, of belief, of exactly what we’re hunting up, and that alignment showing up of
core beliefs, what you believe in as an evaluator, as a coach, as personnel.
It’s really cool to hear different perspectives from some of the guys in the room that we’re
sitting there watching tape with, seeing that. But a lot of the times it’s very much in
alignment, which is fun.
Q. James, what is the strongest position group in this draft?
JAMES GLADSTONE: That’s probably hard to say. I think the good part is, based off of
where we’re mapping things out, there’s a lot of depth at positions that we feel like we’re
going to address.
Beyond that, as it always seems to be the case, is when it comes to the rush, there’s a good
chunk of defensive ends in this crop in comparison to maybe some of the others, which I
think will make for an exciting first round. Typically, when you can rush the passer, there’s
going to be a priority, a premium that gets placed off that.
Q. James, many believe that defensive tackle is the weakest position group in this
year’s draft. They say they’re very good against the run, but don’t create any pressure
inside. Is that agreeable? Are there complete defensive tackles in this draft?
JAMES GLADSTONE: There’s no reason to think that guys that we might label as
incomplete become complete by the time their NFL career is over. There is development
that occurs and surprises people. That’s why day three and undrafted college free agents
become Pro Bowlers and All Pros. So, to cap that as a concrete sort of outlook is hard to do.
I think there will be plenty of people that, four or five years from now, surprise a lot of the
remarks or counter a lot of the remarks that can be said.
But to that end, it’s typically the case that the guys on the inside. They tend to do a pretty
good job at holding up against the run more than they would rush the passer. That’s
typically the case.
It’s actually more abnormal to be somebody that is sacking the QB at a regular tick on the
interior. So, by default it’s typically going to be the way you described on inside of the
defensive line.
I think there’s plenty of reason to think over the course of the next four years, some of these
guys are going to surprise the narrative.
Q. Speaking of defensive tackles, New York Giants DL Dexter Lawrence is a guy that
requested a trade. Is that somebody you guys might pick up the phone on? See what
the asking price is?
JAMES GLADSTONE: That’s not something we’ve gone into. Obviously, he’s under contract
with them, so not at liberty necessarily to even talk about it.
Q. When you get the players back here, what do you want your initial message to them
to be?
LIAM COEN: You’re chomping at the bit, especially after going to the owners’ meetings,
talking some smack and having some fun. It just feels a little bit closer, getting the guys
back in the building.
The entire message is we’re attacking this offseason, and we’re attacking the details, we’re
attacking our relationships, we’re attacking our communication, because there’s new,
there’s change, there’s different communications and relationships that need to be
blended and matched.
Pouring into each other from a details standpoint, I think that’s going to be key and critical.
Getting better with less time, I think I mentioned that last week. We were fortunate last year
as a first-year staff to have an extra week. We maximized the entire offseason with less time
as a coaching staff and with the players being extremely dialed into everything that we’re
trying to improve on.
Those areas I talked about of stink that we need to work on, then continuing to focus on the
fundamentals and techniques which we always want to coach. We’re attacking everything
that we’re doing this offseason.
Q. RBs Bhayshul Tuten and LeQuint Allen Jr. did some really good things as rookies.
What are elements of their game that you are excited to see improve in year two?
LIAM COEN: You look at what ‘Tut’ showed in terms of getting downhill on it inside the
tackles that really wasn’t on his tape in college. I think we can do a better job of giving him
some opportunities, a little bit more, that fit his skillset as well in college, get him going in
some of those instances, as well in the pass game, in the screen game. I thought he did a
great job. I know he had the one fumble against the Colts. Ball security is what we honed on
a lot. We really tried to work on. That wasn’t just with him, that was with the whole group.
Year two, let’s go be more creative. Now you learned ball security at a premium, what we’re
looking for, the standard, now let’s go take it to the next level.
LeQuint I think showed so much in terms of the toughness, physicality, the care factor,
third-down runs that he was really good at for us. I know he had 60 catches or so in college,
so that’s an area I think we can continue to lean into him as well.
Q. What scout on your staff has no filter at this time of year?
JAMES GLADSTONE: I’d like to think that we’re in a spot where everybody’s in that bucket.
We cultivate the watercooler conversations to make it less a boardroom style more of, ‘Hey,
if you were just catching me at the watercooler, what would you bring to the surface?’ What
would you talk about and make it sound like that, not a buttoned-up report reading.
I do think it’s very important to get to the actual sentiment and the root of how you’re feeling
about a player, a dynamic position conversation, all those types of things, without trying to
work around your real feeling on it.
Sometimes the idea that, ‘Hey, I got to be buttoned up or filtered,’ can get in the way of the
root coming to the top of the conversation or the unfiltered sentiment coming to the top.
We’ve tried to get to the place where everybody fits that mold. I think it’s starting to show
itself less where it’s any one individual and it’s actually, in a very positive way, unfiltered.
Q. Are you able to gauge if you’re a lot higher on a prospect than you think teams
around the league are? If so, how do you gauge when to select that player?
JAMES GLADSTONE: I think it does become apparent in the instances where let’s just say
the world is saying a player is going early, but you don’t see the vision for how they would fit
here. We just don’t like them as much as maybe what you would label the ‘mock draft’
world is saying. The flipside of that is you don’t see this guy anywhere, yet there’s a lot of
appreciation in some instances.
What we’ll really focus on is taking players that we feel have a very clear fit within the way
we operate, regardless of what that might mean in terms of the outward perspective. It’s
what fits us. It’s what makes sense to us. At the end of the day if they help us win football
games, that’s a win for the Jaguars.
Q. Miami QB Carson Beck is a local prospect here. How much do you think his
experience in different schemes and big games will help him find a home?
LIAM COEN: Yeah, I think you look at his production and different things that he was asked
to do at Georgia, both underneath the center and in the shotgun, turning his back to the
defense, making I guess you’d call it NFL throws from a route tree standpoint, from a timing
and rhythm standpoint.
I think he’s been really well-coached. Then you go to Miami and you’re operating a little bit
more shotgun, spread, so now you’re seeing a little bit more of the baseball shortstop. I
don’t know if he played baseball, but like spit. Whereas Georgia, more play-action under
center, let the ball get down the field a little bit, now you’re able to see some of the shorter,
intermediate, different window throws that he was able to make this year.
I remember watching him in pregame in ’23 when we were at Georgia. I was watching him
throw the ball pregame. I was like, Dang, that thing is coming off his hand pretty good.
Haven’t been able to meet him or anything like that but I think he’s got a shot.
Q. Does knowing former coaches of prospects, not necessarily because the coach is
your friend, but the expectations and the workload, how the player responds, does
that track or help you make decisions on how guys are going to respond once you get
them into your program?
LIAM COEN: Absolutely. I think our scouting staff, they gather so much information from
the university, the school, the director of ops, the athletic trainers, strength and
conditioning, the coaching staff, you have so many different resources.
To be able to call the head football coach, not just because he’s a head football coach, but
because we have a shared interest and value of standards and of how to coach and how to
go about things, what a player can and cannot take in terms of coaching, how they handle
coaching, how they receive information and how they best learn. Those are really important
conversations when it comes to some of the information that we’re gathering.
You try to gain as much, but also not try to make too many phone calls that you’re maybe
muddying the waters. But I think some of those guys that you’re really close with, like John
[Florida Head Coach Jon Sumrall] and [Florida Defensive Coordinator] Brad White, for
instance at Florida two weeks ago. Yeah, you’re able to have some real conversations and
get real intel that way.
