Before Robert Griffin III stares down an NFL blitz, he first needed to come face-to-face with the glint in the eyes of Jon Gruden.
Griffin sat down with the former NFL coach and current ESPN broadcaster as part of "Gruden Camp," the ESPN show where we get to watch Gruden squint and grin wildly during an interview with a top NFL prospect.
In some cases, like last year's Cam Newton segment, how a player handles Gruden's trademark intensity (that glint!) helps give us a sense of their personality. At the very least, it's fun just watching these guys try to make sense of Gruden, who sometimes seems to be playing an exaggerated version of himself. (Think Alec Baldwin in "30 Rock.")
Of course, not many players enter the league as polished as RG3, who handled Gruden's line of questioning with ease in a clip aired this weekend.
With Stanford's Andrew Luck and Griffin widely believed to be going 1-2 in the draft, Gruden asked the Baylor star why he wants to be the top pick on April 26.
"It's not the money, of course, because nowadays everything's slotted with the new CBA," Griffin said, brandishing his well-known business acumen. "I think it's just that competitiveness. You don't want to ever concede and say, 'He's the No. 1 pick, I'm happy to be the second pick.' "
"So in this case, there's two No. 1 picks. Washington didn't trade up to No. 2 to pick a guy at No. 2, they're going to pick a guy they'd pick at No. 1. Really, in this draft, there are two No. 1 picks. That's why I won't be mad if Andy goes first."
Got that?
"Sounds good to me," Griffin responded. "The one thing I've always said: I don't play against quarterbacks, I play against defenses. No matter what, it's going to be 'Luck vs. Griffin' for the rest of our careers. We always know that we'll be compared side-by-side."
