Robert Smith
speaker
1,476 appearances
11 recordings
6 series
first heard Dec 2024
last heard 8 Jul
Robert Smith’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
Trend
recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 6 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 1.
Appearances
Jeffrey Whitney. I am one of the founders and presidents at the Sports and Entertainment Group, a full-service sports agency in Washington, D.C. Been doing it for 20-plus years.
We represent about 40 NFL players at any given time. So we're one of the larger agencies.
We're involved in every aspect of our clients' lives on a daily basis. We spend probably the least amount of time actually negotiating contracts. I'm a family therapist, a relationship therapist, some type of preacher or pastor when need be. Financial advisor? Financial advisor, just day-to-day counselor. And that's what I love doing. No day is the same.
I got up today and I get a call from a player who's injured. And so I have to deal with that. I get a call from a player who's moving and he needs to be guiding in the right direction. Young players, they'll call me and ask me what TV they should purchase. We're in many ways with these young people involved with them in a very intimate and deep fashion.
In the past, we were actually known as the running back agency. We've represented more running backs over the last 20 years than any other agency.
Maurice Jones Drew, Matt Forte, Tevin Coleman, Jordan Howard, James White, Sweet Feet from New England, Kendall Hunter, Le'Veon Bell, Michael Carter. We have Cody Schrader this year, who's now with the Rams.
We have pared down. The market has spoken. And over the last few years, we got into the receiver, cornerback, that kind of market. We never got out of the business of representing running backs, but we did start shaping our roster a little bit.
That's exactly what you saw. There were agents during the last few years who just didn't represent running backs at all. And there literally were running backs in the market looking for representation. There's a supply and demand issue. There are more running backs than positions. It is a position where you can find really good players all across the draft and after the draft.
There also is this, the running quarterback position. You can look at the total number of yards that a team has. Now, a lot of that yardage is coming not from the running backs, but it's coming from the quarterback. So now probably half the league has quarterbacks who can run as well as the running back.
The average fan sometimes doesn't fully appreciate that the NFL is a huge business. It is a business at the highest level. It's $20 billion. It'll go to $25 billion, the ultimate goal. I'm hearing it's going to be a $50 billion industry in the next 10 years. I think we've seen over the last 10 years kind of a cultural shift, not just in the NFL, but across sports.
As fans, we simply see the outcome of the game, and we don't really understand that at the end of the day, these are corporations that are going to be responsive to their shareholders and consumers. And the NFL is no different. People like to see the ball in the air, the acrobatic catches and the leaps. The fans want to see long balls. They want to see passing.
I still can watch a 10 to 7 game, a defensive battle. The best player is the middle linebacker and the running back. And I'm happy with that. But for the younger generation, absolutely boring. We can talk supply and demand. We can talk the running quarterback and those all things. do have some influence in the devaluation for the running back position.
Ultimately, if we really dig down and look at root causes, it's really the corporation, the actual NFL, responding to their consumer base and what their consumer base wants to see.
You've seen a ton of rule changes, obviously, to make it a higher scoring game with more offense. The defenses have been handicapped. The pass interference rules. You can't hit the quarterback. Some of the rules are good for the safety of the players. But certainly the root of the reason it's to increase the scoring and the way you do that is through passing.
Make no mistake about it. The running back is the most violent position in the most violent sport on the planet. Running backs are getting hit on every play. In pass protection, they're getting hit. You've got a running back who's 5'10", 215 pounds, and he's blocking a 325-pound defensive lineman. The defensive players are getting bigger and faster every year.
That physicality for the running back is real. The likelihood of a running back getting through the season unscathed, no injuries, is slim to none. And so a lot of teams, because of that, they go with running backs by committee.
Well, as you guys have talked about in countless episodes on Freakonomics, you have to be very careful about trying to change one variable in a system without impacting the system in a way that you haven't anticipated. And ultimately, the market is going to decide where they value players the most and where that money is going to make the most sense for that team.
The last couple of years, you're seeing a little bit of resurgence in the running game. Everything is cyclical, right? If you keep those bell bottoms long enough, they'll come back. That, again, is the sports agent Jeffrey Whitney. You ask a running back what's the most important duty that they have, the vast majority will be like running the football. And it's not.
It's pass protection and catching the ball and running as part of it. I think we're seeing some young running backs, again, who can do it all, can catch it, can run it, good in pass protection.
I tell them to become a specialist, a long snapper or a kicker. You play forever. You don't get touched. That's what I would advise them to do. If you're not going to be the quarterback, be the long snapper or be the kicker.
Showing 1441–1460 of 1,476 · page 73 of 74
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