Jim Owczarski

jowczarski@enquirer.com

The sting of AFC wildcard loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers will linger for quite some time within the walls of Paul Brown Stadium, but the work toward reshaping the team for the 2016 season began in earnest the following week.

The coaching staff changed quite a bit, but the focus now is the run up to the NFL Draft on April 28-30 in Chicago and the start of free agency at 4 p.m. on March 9.

While down in Mobile, Alabama for the Senior Bowl, The Enquirer caught up with Bengals director of player personnel Duke Tobin for an early look at how the team is preparing for the draft after losing area scout Greg Seamon to Cleveland and his approach to free agency with 14 unrestricted players looking for new deals.

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1. There were some high profile changes on the coaching staff but you lost an important part of your team on the personnel side in area scout Greg Seamon. Have you replaced him yet and what did he mean to you?

Duke Tobin: We haven’t. Greg was a valuable guy for us. He was unique in that he was an accomplished coach and then he was also a long time coach, so he had a unique perspective. He did a good job for us. He’s going to be hard to replace. We’re going to go slow in replacing him. We’re going to see who’s available. This is not the typical time personnel people get turned over. He had been wanting to get back to coaching and we supported him in that. We knew that was where his heart was. He’s at a point in his life where he had a little bit of freedom to move and so we were happy for him. At the same time sad that he’s not with us anymore because he was a valuable guy. We haven’t replaced him. We will. The timetable is to be determined. If I walk into somebody I want to hire as I leave (the Senior Bowl) it may be fast, or it could be a little bit slower. Typically staffs around the league are after the draft type things. We’ll just see. We’ve got some guys in mind that we like and we’ll see where it shakes out. We will replace him.

2. The combine is coming up, then the draft – where does that leave you at this point then?

DT: Going forward, the work that he would have done is going to be split amongst the rest of us. He had done a big chunk of it already through the fall. He had done his area. Some of the juniors he was ahead on already. So, we have all of his information that he did up until the day he left. So yeah, there’s going to be maybe a little more work for the rest of us but we were going to be looking at those guys anyway. So, it’s not ideal, but again it’s something we supported. I think we’ll be able to cover it.

3. And your coaches have also been a key part of scouting as well, haven’t they?

DT: Our coaches are an important part, always have been. I think a lot of teams use their coaches. Some don’t at all. But we’re not unique in getting the coaches involved. We rely on their input. We want their input. We want buy in on the guys that we select. I think the more work you put in the more you’re able to buy in. They’re valuable guys. We’ve got guys that have been evaluating for a long time. So when you’ve got experienced guys like that, why not use them? And the staff that we have, and we’ve got a lot of new (coaches) so I’m looking forward to working with some of those guys. I think they’re experienced so I would anticipate they’re going to be happy to get an opportunity to have a voice, because our coaches do have a voice. We want that. We want them to be involve in the process so they know the guy intimately when he’s walking in to the building.

4. You mentioned the new coaches; we talked about Greg’s departure. The team prides itself on consistency, so how do you feel about the number of changes since the end of the season?

DT: Yeah, there will be a little bit of a learning curve with the new guys in how we do things. There’s not going to be a learning curve in how to look at players. The guys that we’ve hired are damned experience guys, so it’s not necessarily how to look at players it’s what to do with the information once you have it and what’s going to be what’s expected of you in meetings and that kind of stuff. We’ll go over that. I would assume these guys have enough experience where it won’t be an issue for them. Kevin (Coyle’s) been with us, so he’ll know how we do things. There won’t be a lot of surprises by the time we get (to the draft). It’s evaluations. It’s how we feel. It’s ‘hey, I like this guy because and I don’t like this guy because,' so the guys we’ve got will do a good job of that. I’m looking forward to getting to know them.

5. Looking ahead to free agency, is this year a bit different for you to approach because of the number of starters and impact players?

DT: The season ends and you immediately start thinking about putting the team together for next year and who’s that going to involve and who can we afford to bring back under the cap and who’s going to be really pursued around the league. And none of this will be answered until that comes to pass.

We want our guys back. That’s no secret. People know that we want the players who have done well for us to come back. Now whether it works out financially in their best interests or not, that’s what we’re going to be talking to them about. We’ve got guys who will get opportunity elsewhere and we’ll have to fill in with new ones. The thing about the draft is it falls after some of that free agency period so we’ll have a little more direction by the time we get to the draft as to what holes still exist and what areas we were able to fill in with free agents. It’s no secret we’re going to focus on our guys and we’re going to focus on our young guys, developing them into those positions, and this crop of new guys. That’s going to be our focus. Then if we have to fill in with somebody else’s free agents, that’s the last component that we normally look at it. But if we were lose a lot of our guys, there’s going to be a point where we start looking maybe at some other veteran-type guys and we’ll see if they’re going to be a fit for us. We don’t swear that off. It’s just not our main source of players.

6. Do you feel confident about your ability to bring back a big chunk of this free agent class?

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DT: We’re hopeful. I don’t think anybody really knows exactly where it’s going to shake out, even the individual players whose contracts are up. I think they’re hopeful. Some might be more hopeful that they get offers elsewhere. Some might be hopeful that our offer is the best offer. Some might be hopeful that it’s close enough to sway. We’ll see. We can’t predict what the other teams are going to do, who they’re going to pursue, what they’re going to offer and what the situation will be and what the player will ultimately decide. There’s just so many moving pieces. We’ve got to look at ourselves, say this is what this team can afford to do for this guy in the grand scheme of things.

And we’ll do the best we can with those guys, pursues them as hard as we can, and if they get better options, better opportunities, we’ll wish them well and move on to the next guy. We like the guys that we know and develop. We know what exactly what we’re going to get with those guys. You bring in a guy from another team and a lot of times it doesn’t work out as one for one. The production doesn’t follow the guys. And it’s been typical with our guys who have gone elsewhere, too. The production doesn’t follow. It’s the ultimate team game. The longer you can be around the same group, the more you’re going to produce. And that’s just the way that history has shown it. So, we’re hopeful we can keep our group together.

7. Is going for the “best available” player still the axiom for the 2016 draft or do you see some spots on this roster that you have to target?

DT: Every year there’s areas that we’re anticipating being a little bit lighter than we want to be, maybe not quite as good as we want to be, so every year there’s focus areas. We’re not going to ignore those. We’re not going to ignore our needs. At the same time we’re not going to turn down a really good player to take a need pick either. So, it’s a fine line between need and ability and we try to balance that the best we can.

It’s not ideal when you’re reliant on first year players, young players, coming in and producing for you right away. Now, if they come in and show that they can produce, we’ll let them produce, but it’s not ideal saying oh, OK, we’ve got to draft a guy that’s got to come in and fill this position immediately. So we’ve gotten our team to the point where our young guys can come in, learn, develop at the pace that they can learn and develop at and then move into the role. That’s kind of the ideal situation. So, we’re not really wanting to get into a situation where we’re saying well, we’ve got to pick a guy here and he’s got to come in and start immediately. Now if he does, great, but in today’s NFL, that’s the reality for a lot of draft choices. They’ve got to come in and play right away. The ideal situation from a team perspective is developing those guys a little bit before that happens.