Every Great Leader Has THIS Secret Weapon | Les Snead (Los Angeles Rams GM)

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2:45Welcome to the weekend edition of the Daily Stoic. Each weekday, we bring you a meditation inspired by the ancient Stoics, something to help you live up to those four Stoic virtues of courage, justice, temperance, and wisdom. And then here on the weekend, we take a deeper dive into those same topics. We interview Stoic philosophers. We explore at length how these Stoic ideas can be applied to our actual lives and the challenging issues of our time. Here on the weekend, when you have a little bit more space, when things have slowed down, be sure to take some time to think, to go for a walk, to sit with your journal, and most importantly, to prepare for what the week ahead may bring.

3:36Hey, it's Ryan. Welcome to another episode of the Daily Stealic Podcast. podcast. So back in 2022, I believe I gave a talk to the Marines out in 29 Palms. And I was trying to think like, where did I want to start this thing? What did I want to build this talk around? It was actually sort of surreal. I was like talking to a theater of about 2000 Marines. And then the next day did the same talk. It rotated another big group of Marines. And so I was like, what do I want to talk about? What would be interesting? How do I catch these young men and women's attention? Because they were all like 18, 19.

4:17Most of them hadn't gone to college. Most of them were not excited to get a talk about ancient philosophy. What can I connect them with? And I decided I would open with football. And here's what I opened with.

4:31This is not the first time I've talked to a group of Marines, but it is the first time I've seen Marines eating popcorn while I talk, so this is quite a privilege for me. We're going to talk about ancient philosophy, and I know that sounds strange. Pretty much every audience I get in front of, well, they put the popcorn away real quick when they hear that I'm going to talk about ancient philosophy because it doesn't sound like the most exciting thing in the world. I get that. It seems old and dusty and ancient. A couple years ago, I had the opportunity. I went and I talked to the Los Angeles Rams at their training camp up in Irvine, and it was a pretty cool experience.

5:05You might be thinking again what they were thinking, which is what does ancient philosophy have to teach a professional football team? What is an old dusty book from an obscure school of ancient philosophy possibly have to do with winning, with victory, with beating the shit out of someone else? I get that. But in fact, ancient philosophy in the ancient world, philosophers weren't like your professors or your teachers. They didn't wear turtlenecks. They were active people in the actual world. They fought in wars. They started companies. They ran for political office. Right. They did things in real life.

5:43The Stoics were athletes and generals, thinkers, writers. They did stuff. Right. Philosophy was something that informed what they did. It shaped what they did. It made them better at what they did. And as it happened, the Rams managed to turn things around. they had a bad season and then a pretty good season. They won a Super Bowl. They sent me a pretty cool Super Bowl ring. But I got to know Les Snead, who's the GM of the Rams, and we've become friends over the years. And when I was talking to Les, I interviewed him on the Daily Stoic podcast not too long ago. One of the things we talked about, he brought up this idea of panic rules.

6:18He said a panic rule is like what you do when you're overwhelmed, when things are falling apart, when you're flooded with information, with conflicting information, right? What do you revert to in moments of crisis, personal or professional, right? The things that always stand true, sort of really short aphorisms or epigrams or slogans that you stick to, that you go to in moments where you really need clarity. Some of his, you gave me some, there's a batting order for a reason, nip it in the bud, right? We is greater than me, wake up sprinting, don't be scared, keep the main thing, the main thing.

6:57And he's got a bunch of them, just like every team has a bunch of them, just like you guys have a bunch of them. So this idea of panic rules, I think it's pretty applicable. It's what I wanted to talk to you guys about today. The art of not panicking, right? Getting clarity. I know you guys have some of your slogans, right? It was kind of a weird experience for me because I'm actually a Saints fan. And And after Sean Payton was suspended for the trumped up Bounty Gate scandal, which we don't need to get into here, he put this large poster on the wall of the practice facility. He just said, do your job, right?

7:29This is a panic rule situation. Your coach is suspended. You miss him for a year. It's a bunch of penalties. What are we supposed to do? You're supposed to do your job, right? You're supposed to do your job in every situation and circumstance, right? In things big and small, glamorous or not, your job is to do your job. Whether you get credit for it or not, your job is to do your job. If you do it right, it doesn't matter if it's not fancy or special or recognized. It's meaningful and important and significant and honorable if you do it well. As they say, how you do anything is how you do everything.

8:11You take the task, menial or not, and you do it with everything you have. This is what the Stoics are talking about. This is excellence, right? So when you're overwhelmed, when you don't know what to do, what you do is the most basic part of your job.

8:31As I said, Les Snead had talked about this the first time he was on the Daily Stoic podcast. This is what he'd actually said.

8:42The really good teams, the really good coaches, right? They're able to teach and keep these simple principles, right? Simple during the chaos and lack of order that's going on during a game and obviously life. No, that's a good analogy for life because it's sort of like, you know, tell the truth, be a good person, do your best. These are like things we know, we say, and then life makes things really complicated. And now there's a now it's not quite clear what your best is or should you tell the whole truth? But but there might be consequences for telling the truth. Right. But there's all these reasons where those simple rules, life is trying to sort of distract you from those simple rules.

9:30But if you just stick with what you know, if you stick with what you believe, General Mattis says, you know, know your flat ass rules and stick to them. If you just do that, you'll be fine. But the problem is almost when we when we overthink it, when we when we allow ourselves to be sort of knocked off the job we've been assigned, that's where we get into trouble. Yeah, I think going to General Mattis and circling back to what I just chatted about, really good coaches will talk about your panic rules, right? When there's chaos and your brain is panicking, okay, just go to your flat-ass-out rules.

10:13A lot just happened, but slow down. You got number three. You got the third eligible. There he is. One, two, three. Maybe it all changed before. But it's simple math. Go to your flat ass panic rules. Stay with three. It'll probably work out. But a lot of times, as you said, during the chaos and lack of order, you may even forget that you had three. And now who is three? And why is that three? And can I even count the three? Well, I like the idea of panic rules. Do you have those as a GM? Like, I've got to imagine, like, you're thinking, hey, we're going to draft this person, or we're going to make this trade, or we're going to renegotiate this contract.

10:50And then all of a sudden, somebody says something on social media, then there's a report on ESPN. You know, now the fans, they think strongly about this, or you're getting, you know, the owner is putting in their opinion. Do you have like, flat ass rules or panic rules that you revert to under pressure or stress? Like, here's what I, here are the basic assumptions I have as a GM, you know, what are those and how do you revert back to them under pressure? You definitely have panic rules. And it's interesting when us in sports get a chance to, uh, to, uh, right, read, read books by people like yourselves, We add to those panic rules because some of those simple rules and the wisdom that you articulate and the examples behind them can go to the list.

11:49So there is definitely and probably at the end of the day, somewhere along the way, keep the main thing. The main thing is a panic rule. Sure. we say around here, we, not me. And sometimes that means we is greater than me, even though we're well aware that the individual, the means that make up the we are the heartbeat and matter because they're people, but it can, it can help you go back to, okay, wait a minute. We're here to do what's best for the whole. So how do we make a decision? Okay. Maybe we're, we're making a more individual decision that may set some precedence that these other individuals that are part of the we now, right, are disturbed by it.

12:39And it's an unattended consequence. So there's many of them. And one of them is when in doubt, don't act. When in doubt, think about it more, right? Because there's an element of doubt there that, okay, if we have to make the decision right now and there's more doubt than certainty, don't make it, right? Don't make the false. Don't trade somebody under pressure, that kind of thing. And making that trade might have been the right thing to do, but we would rather have the, let's call it the false. Is that right? We'd rather have the false negative than false positive. Yeah. So, but OK, wait a minute.

13:28Tomorrow, we still have an opportunity to make that same trade. OK, let's think about it longer. We thought there was a timeline. So you just continue analyzing decisions. So there's a lot of those panic rules. No, I see what you're saying. It's better that you miss out potentially on a trade than to develop the habit of making decisions that you're not 100 % sure about. Right.

13:58So when he came back out to the painted porch this summer, I wanted to build on this idea of panic rules. And I wanted to talk more about football. As I said in part one, my relationship with the Rams goes back quite a ways. I've known Les quite a long time through his wife, Kara, who's been a big booster and supporter of the books. books. And actually, they got to see me talk twice. I gave a talk in LA with Robert Green several years ago, which they came out to. That was awesome. And then I gave a talk at the NFL owners meeting. I believe this was in 2019, which Les was there. It was the owners, the GMs, and the head coaches, and then the spouses.

14:43So it was a pretty surreal audience. I've talked about this before, but they helped sort of brief me and walk me through sort of what would be relevant and what would not be relevant to this audience. A couple of years after I gave that talk, I had a meeting in Beverly Hills. The person asked if I would meet them at the montage in Beverly Hills. It was a very fancy hotel. So I pull up in my rental car, the valet, give the keys to the valet. And the guy goes, Hey, are you Ryan Holiday? And I go, yeah. And he goes, Oh, I love your books. And I'm, I'm reading meditations. And I go, Oh, oh, this is awesome.

15:16This is what I absolutely love to hear. And I go, how did you hear about it? And he goes, oh, well, you know, Mr. Kroenke, he spends a lot of time at this hotel and he told me to read it. So Stan had heard about my books through Les and from my talk at the owner's meeting. And then here he is passing it to the valet at a fancy hotel. This young kid is finding philosophy. I just, I love that. I love stuff like that. That's what lights me up. That's why I do what I do. Sometimes people are a little snooty about my work. You know, this is popular with bros in sports or whatever. But that's, to me, what it's about through sports that can find this large, wider audience, which is why I'm excited my kids have now gotten into football.

15:59And hopefully we can displace Alexander Hamilton a little bit in our rotation, and maybe occasionally listen to some other things and do some other things. It was fascinating to have Les out. We not only did this podcast, then we also went, did a long walkthrough of the bookstore and talked about books for quite some time. So I think you're really going to like this. I split this one up into two parts because I thought it was important and very listenable. And I'm excited to bring it to you now. As I said, Les is the GM of the Rams, a position he's held for 13 years, which is an incredible tenure.

16:37He's got a Super Bowl in there, another Super Bowl appearance. He's just totally turned the Rams around. Before that, he was with the Jaguars and the Falcons. And here's today's episode. I think you're really going to like it.

16:53You guys were just talking about your assistant, your former assistant who just got hired as a GM. Yes. Did he follow your advice? Like, just do the thing? You know, the answer would be yes. And it was interesting about him. I don't know if he ever he's one of those, let's call it probably rare people that that that's how he was coded anyway. So he he was perfect for that in that he never tried to get the next job. He really just wanted to do his best at making, let's call it, my life easier or making the GM jobs more impactful. Yeah. So that's what he went about doing. And by doing that, I think he was very, let's call it, proactive in probably my idiosyncrasies and also then, hey, maybe what the organization needed, desire, what would make it more efficient.

17:53So he never came and said, I think we ought to do this. He just, the next time, right, the phase of the calendar came around that he had already implemented all of that. And you were like, wow, okay, that's, I guess that's what's really good is that we didn't, we never had a meeting. He just said - He just did it. He just did it. How long did he work for you? It was probably, it would be about nine years. I think that's the other thing is people want the thing, but they want it right now. They're like, How can I be a GM or how can I be a best-selling author and how can I do it right now? You would appreciate this from his dad.

18:28So you get it. It's interesting too. He was 34. So he's 34. One of the youngest GMs, if not the youngest. And I remember when Jacksonville, one of their best players ever, Tony Buscelli, was helping with the search. I remember him asking me, how old is James? I'm like, you know what, Tony? You can ask my staff. I'm not really a big birthday guy. You know, can't say I, you know, you got to believe in birthdays. they happen, but it's just, I really don't know how old he is. And he's like, what do you mean you don't know how old he is? I'm like, I promise you I don't. I mean, he's somewhere between 25 and 30, but you'd really appreciate his dad, but his dad, longtime high school football coach.

19:04And probably James was on his path in St. Louis. That's where we first met. And he coached my son in St. Louis. And that was probably going to be his path. I would bet he would be a head football coach and a principal of a high school and be one of the best at both. But his dad, during this whole process, his question and advice really is question, James, you know, you don't have to go be a GM if you don't want to be. I want to make sure that's what you want to do. Because James had never really ever articulated to anyone, hey, I would like to be a GM one day. He really basically articulated, look, however long we work together, I want to, right?

19:48Just be great at what I'm doing. And then we'll see what happens after that. So it was really neat to see a parent going, okay. The opposite of pressure. This is one of 32, but if you don't want to do it, you don't have to.

20:08Thanks to Toyota Trucks for sponsoring this episode. When I bought my ranch in 2015 out here in Bastro County, I drove my car about halfway down the dirt road that we live on, thought this isn't going to work, stopped, parked it, walked the rest of the way home, borrowed my wife's car, drove in Austin and bought a truck. What I bought was a Toyota Tacoma. And this truck wasn't just transportation getting me to and from my house. It unlocked a whole different style of living for us, not just on the ranch, but in our little Texas towns. There were places I could go now that I couldn't go before, especially out here in the piney forests, through the fields, and on the unpaved roads like the one that I lived in.

20:53We got to go deep into the hill country's wild beauty. We've driven all the way out to East Texas. We've driven across the country. And by we, I mean not just my wife, but both my kids who I drove home from the hospital in that truck. Toyota trucks are built for those who understand that the best adventures happen when you're willing to veer off course, because you never know when you'll end up on a Toyota adventure detour. And of course, this is stoicism, too, because every detour, every obstacle is an opportunity. But it's helpful if you can handle the difficulty inherent in that. If you've got the resilience and the right companion to make it wherever the road takes you.

21:33Discover your uncharted territory. Learn more at toyota.com slash trucks slash adventure dash detours. We just took our kids to an outdoor performance at the Nutcracker. They had a snow cone and then they went insane in the car ride home. And one of the things I try to remind myself when that's happening is that I don't control my kids' behavior, especially when they're too far gone like that. But I do control how I respond, right? That's stoicism, but it's also what Dr. Becky talks about. Dr. Becky is a clinical psychologist and a best-selling author, and she founded Good Inside, which is there to give parents practical, actionable tools for handling those everyday challenges with confidence.

22:16My wife introduced me to Dr. Becky's books. I love them. I've recommended them a million times. I've had her on the podcast. And as it happens, Dr. Becky is hosting two live Q &A events for Good Inside members. I am one of them. She signed me up for it about a year and a half ago. I've loved it ever since. On December 1st, you can join Dr. Becky for her How Not to Raise Assholes event, which is about avoiding entitlement and raising kind, empathetic kids. And on December 15th, she's hosting her How Not to Lose It Over the Holidays event, which I'm sure we could all use. As I said, I'm a big fan of Dr.

22:53Becky. She's been a great influence for me as a parent and just as a human being. And Daily Stoic listeners can join for 15 % off with code STOIC15. You just got to head over to goodinside.com to catch the events.

23:14There's a story about this samurai master. The student comes to him and says, you know, I want to be a samurai master. How long does it take? And he goes, 10 years. And the student's like, no, no, no, I really want to be a samurai master. I'm going to give everything. I'll be very dedicated. How long will it take? And then the master goes, 15 years. And he goes, no, no, I don't think you understand. I'm in a hurry. I got to be the master. I'm coming to you. I want you to teach me to be a master and I need to do it in as short a time as possible. How long will it take? And the teacher goes, 20 years.

23:45And there's something about patience there that if you think you can do it in a short amount of time, if you think you're the kid going places, If you think you can somehow speed it up, like the people who become the youngest to ever do something, I actually tend to find we're not that motivated to do a thing by a certain time. They were just totally absorbed in doing the thing. And then somebody else very successful or experienced sees something in them and elevates them sooner than maybe they even think they were ready for. That's how it happens. It's not something you can force or even acquire for yourself.

24:25Perfect. Now, because you used that story, I was thinking, I was coming in, okay, how are you going to be impressive on this podcast, right? There's pressure. You're very impressive. My panic rules, and the only thing I have is my new panic rule is you can't microwave life. But the samurai master just— Yes, that's what he's saying. —is saying that. Now, it is interesting. Someone like James, it seems like he was microwaved, but maybe he was— Nine years is not a Michael. Yeah, that is still nine years. But point being is he didn't try to do it in a day. He didn't try to do it. That was not his goal.

24:57And he was, I think we made the joke as it was making news around the time he got the job. But not that an apprentice, this is all you do. But I really, really loved green tea. And I always go, James, the first thing I want you to do is just make sure I got a green tea in the morning. because he had gotten a job and I'm like, there's going to be times where I don't even know what to give you to do. But if I'm busy, just make sure you don't come look like one of those puppies. You got your puppy out there and they're kind of looking at you like, let's go play. And I'm like, I just don't have time to play right now.

25:29But I use the example that there was that moment of James just recognizing that even though I never asked for a green tea in the afternoon, he kind of knew that I really wanted to be. I wanted a green tea in the afternoon. And then I probably wasn't going to be the guy to go, hey, James, I know you're getting me a green tea in the morning, but you need to do it in the afternoon. But he kind of recognized all of that. Then next thing you know, there was always the green tea there. Interesting. And then next thing you know, I'm like, wow, this is great. And then, but the point being is, I know there's more to life than getting someone green tea, but he dominated that.

26:05And what I tell people is everything after that, as he got more responsibility. How you do anything is how you do everything. If you treat that as serious, you'll treat all the other things as serious. You'll be great at that. I know in the NFL, like if another team wants to hire someone, they have to like ask the team if they can interview that person, right? Yes. So is an assistant in a position that the Jaguars had to message you to ask if they could interview your assistant? Now the rules are a little different where if you're going to interview someone for their number one football executive, Yeah.

26:40Then you don't have to ask for permission. You just got to notify. So did you get notified? Definitely got notified. What was your reaction like? Because I think there's two different types of bosses. There's the sort of possessive, resentful boss, right? This is what Robert Greene talks about in Don't Outshine the Master. There's that boss. And then there's like the sort of coaching tree boss. There's the, you look at like an organization like the Spurs, which is basically a coaching and GM clinic for the NBA at this point, right? At that point, I called it sweet bitter. So the bitter being, wow, we got a chance to lose a very valuable human being.

27:12The sweet is he's definitely earned this. He's ready. Wasn't totally surprised because I started in Jacksonville. I knew a lot of people in that building. They had hired Liam Cohen, who had worked with us as our offensive coordinator. Now, he was coming from Tampa Bay at the time. So there was this, when Liam was interviewing, there was... You sent him to Tampa. He definitely discussed, hey, if I were the head coach here, I'd love to set it up like we had it set up when I was in Los Angeles. So there was a lot of discussion about how we did things systematically in L.A. with the Rams. So it wasn't like, wow, all of a sudden we get a notification, and, oh, wow, they discovered James.

27:53So you somewhat knew it was coming based on that. So more spurs, more sweet, better. Yeah. But definitely sweet first because it was... Oh, I see what you're saying. Sweet, bitter because it's more sweet than bitter. Like you're happy and then you also understand like, shit, this is going to cost me at some level. And then also now you have to... You're in competition against someone you know is very good. And all he had done for myself, the ramp. More happy than bitter is why I described it. And that's also... I think that's the obligation. Like very few people when you hire them, you're like, this person is going to work for me forever.

28:27Like you're part of the arrangement, part of the payoff for getting the green tea is that you're not only not going to stand in this person's way in the future, but you're actually going to help them get to where they want to go. Which is, again, almost certainly not getting green tea forever. Like it's an exchange. You have an obligation and I think a duty to like pay forward the door opening that other people did for you. The fortunate thing being maybe it's going in there. Started in my first year as a GM was 2012. We're going into the 25 season. Yeah. Right? So is that 14, 13? Whatever. Pretty good run.

29:03I would have bet the under. Yeah. So point being is when you sit back and realize the only way you, as an individual, have that kind of run is a lot of people like James and a lot of others, right, dominating their roles. And it's all compound. The Rams are successful. And here I am. But at this phase in the career, in the journey, in the adventure, there's that, let's call it paradigm framing that, you know what, you definitely want to give back to those that are, give back to the game. People did that to myself. And now it's really cool to be in this position. Wow, you can really impact. At the end of your career, you're not going to be like, can you believe like in 2026, I made X, you know, or you're not even probably going to be thinking of the Super Bowls.

29:50You're probably going to be thinking about the impact that you had on other. Like, I think at the end of your career, you're going to be thinking about other people. You're going to think about your family, but you're also going to think professionally. Did you leave the game better than you found it? Did you help other people do what you're doing? I think about your legacy is ultimately measured not just in what you do, but in what the people you helped go on to do. And that's how you have a much bigger outsized impact. And there's some coaches that don't have good coaching trees, you know? And then there's some coaches that we don't think of as being that great.

30:22They didn't win a Super Bowl or they didn't win a championship. But then you sort of zoom out and you go, oh, but seven of their assistants did. And you go, oh, wow, that's actually almost more impressive. Yes. We've lost a lot of people, coaches. Brad Holmes, who's in Detroit, worked with us and went on to become a GM. What's probably what's called very fulfilling when you sit back, it's one thing to help someone, let's call it, either get the interview, help someone get the job. But we've had a lot of people leave our building and actually have success. Yeah. And I think Sean and I will even say it's not like we sat down and had these right classes and said, OK, this is how you become successful.

31:03It has a lot to do with who they were. Yeah. We were just fortunate to, hey, ask them to get on the boat. You get them for a passing moment. Yes. But we all got together and, as we said earlier, tried to be good. Yes. We tried to help the Rams be good. are better and it worked. And then when they go on, but to see them have success, I always call it it's one of those fulfilling, almost surreal moments. Like, wow, there was a tree that went out and now it's, it's thriving somewhere else. And you really didn't set out to do it. It just, it can be overwhelming at times. Like, okay, that's, it goes back to what we said earlier, best advice.

31:40At least there's a lot of advices. There's a lot of philosophies and systems, but But, wow, let's just, especially if there's a collective and there's a collaborative, let's try to make the we. Let's try to go help the we be good to great. Help the league, help the people. I think that's the thing that actually people, because it's not totally selfless. Like people don't understand kind of the genius of the way the Spurs have done it too, which is interesting. So all these coaches have gone on, coaches and players have gone on to do other things. But what's also interesting is how many of them have come back to the Spurs for stints.

32:11you know, like a coach gets fired and then you'll notice, oh, whoa, like you'll go to Spurs game and be like, is that who I think it is? Like at the, you know, sitting behind the bench or is that who, you know, in the owner's box and you realize, oh yeah, this former head coach came back and spent two years as a consultant in San Antonio or two years as like, they've created a culture where it's a safe place. So yeah, people go on and do other things that get poached, but it doesn't always work out and nobody's outside the organization forever. But if you've created a place that people want to be that feels safe and is a home base, you can get access to those people again.

32:47And I'm sure that's just the visible part. I'm sure there are texts and phone calls about, hey, we can't draft this guy, but you might want to take a look. I bet it comes back to you. You put enough good shit out in the world, it comes back to you. What's neat is I'm sure a lot of people, let's use the Spurs of example, and what I've always felt was one of the probably more impactful things you can do as if you're somewhere good, you know, especially when you're, let's, I always call it instead of trying to climb, right? Try to be good at what you're doing. But in that moment where you have some downtime, journal why you think, right, this ecosystem sustains success.

33:25So that's the positives. But in the other column go, if I ever had a chance to take this philosophy somewhere else, maybe I would add this to it. And what's neat is you probably see, let's call it a spur system. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. But as it moves on, there's a chance that it's actually evolving and getting stronger. And sometimes when you're in charge, so if you're R.C. Buford, if you're Greg Popovich, they're going through their changes now, right? Because they have the responsibility of sustaining this, you often don't have as much time to journal. Sure. you're just, hey, the next day on the calendar trying to sustain it.

34:06And I do think that's why really good people, right, under working within the ecosystem do have that time to journal and go, ooh. And it's awesome if you can sit down and download after action view, how do we get better from within? But when someone takes it and I call it adds their fingerprint to it, like you said, Steve. Yeah, they go out and maybe they can experiment and try things that you can't do in your organization. And then if they come back, you can apply or you can just learn from what they're doing. Yeah, you should want your assistants and your co-workers and your employees to go off and do things and report back.

34:40Like the exchange continues, even if you're not technically colleagues or, you know, co-workers anymore. No doubt. You want to go check out some books.

35:01You know, what's great is this is the whole stalking section, right? Like all the people that we've stopped and use football as a way to kind of get them in the net like yourself. I don't know if you remember. That's how we found you. It is. It's Jim Collins. It's Annie Duke. thinking in bets and then Annie ends up hooking us up with Susan Cain who I'm sure is somewhere around here. Bittersweet is over here. I changed her book. Angela Duckworth? Okay, I was like, is he saying that wrong? Did you read Bittersweet? It's very good. Oh, Bittersweet's amazing and, you know, this is how, and Quiet has changed.

35:38Quiet changed his life. This is my favorite. She has the Ten Commandments in here. So this is when I move out as an introvert. She has one that basically said you the person who will, let's call it, if I see you coming there, instead of going across the street, I'll take the ride and avoid you. Yeah. It was in there. Oh, yeah. It's okay to cross the street to avoid making a small top quarter. So number seven has been my entire life. That's you. Yeah. No, totally. So, no, that's been probably, I think that's been the most fun thing for us. And now Austin, obviously, is perfect for it, right? Like it's the intersection of sports and big ideas because every single one of these books ends up having a sports chapter in it.

36:24Totally. Grit, Angela Duckworth, right? And then we end up helping Susan Cain find a kicking coach for her amazing kid. And he's now nailing 50 some odd yard field goals. Really? Yes. Really? So that's the random cycle of things. And how funny must it be for her? Like she's this sort of literary introverted author person. And then she has a kid who's like a star athlete, probably very opposite personalities. Well, if you've met her husband, he's obviously very, he is a force in nature too. So it shouldn't surprise you when the apple doesn't fall too far. But she's. Right? But she loves it. She blames us on the, obviously it's genetically good.

37:04You find it? Yep. She blames us. She's just out of the ball. Who came to it? All right, so here's the point. His point is that like most things require long bits of concentration, but that that concentration isn't necessarily like sitting at a computer deliberately thinking. It's long walks. It's we go here for the summer and I just kind of think and work on stuff and fiddle around. You know, it doesn't always look like what you think it's going to look like. I also think, too, it marinates in the back of your head, right? If you've ever learned. That's why these are so important. Oh, like I'm learning to play guitar, and learning is very difficult at this point.

37:44But it's amazing when you take time off. You struggle, struggle, struggle. You take time off for whatever reason, a couple weeks, and you come back, and your fingers can do it. Yes. It's working in the background somewhere. It's very strange. Growing up in New Fall, Alabama, they had the sidewalks, but there was a park. I call it green space in the middle. So I would every year... Just a strip, like a strip strip with big trees down the middle. So it would be, okay, there would be an art show there. So like an Oktoberfest or one of those deals. But I remember always being, it would be, it would kind of be when the football, the whole cycle of football was over and it was kind of the first of summer.

38:25I would always go back to my hometown and I would take walks kind of where I grew up. Sure. And basically just walk all day. That's where I would get some of my better, Let's call it innovative, creative ideas. And I was just thinking, oh, weird. Well, why can't I think of that at work at the office? I try to do a walk in the morning and a walk at night. And that's usually, that'll give me what I'm supposed to work on during the day. And that's how I think about the thing that I was working on all day. And I go, oh, that's it. And then I'll come back, I'll solve whatever that thing is. I did do a couple of sportsbooks in my life.

38:56I don't know. Did I ever send you this Chris Bosch book that I did? You know what's really hilarious? We blame you. For some reason, we get Chris Bosh's Christmas card every year. And we have no idea why. We've never met it. It's just Ron's. Did I say this one? Sorry, I think it's your fault. Did you get this one? No. His wife, Adrian, is like on top of it. She's a maiden. That's probably why he did it. That's Tom Brady's favorite sports book. Yeah. And then, do you care about it at Ford? Oh, I worked on... Do you look Paul Rebel at? No. Paul Rebel's like the greatest lacrosse player to ever live.

39:29Just like totally dominant. We didn't do lacrosse. Belichick tried to get him to... The opening story in the book is that Belichick sees him and tries to convince him to become a tight end. And then he's thinking about it. And then Belichick goes, you know what? And it goes, you know what? Actually, you have a chance to be the greatest lacrosse player ever. Do that instead. But it's like, you know, it's probably a$50 million decision. You know? Well, and the other answer is you can do both, right? Like there's this kid at Notre Dame who is one of their best receivers or was. I don't know if he got drafted the share of his own.

40:03He comes back. He won all these national championships now, and he's incredible on the football field, too. That book's great. This is one of the best. Yes. He's in love with Phil Jackson as a concept. It was probably 1996 when I was with the Jacksonville Jaguars, and I went. I mean, Phil Jackson wasn't Phil Jackson. Right. It is. That would be before all the Lakers did. This is, I think it's one of the best philosophical books in life. Totally. His 11 rings is pretty good, too. Have you read Levels of the Game by John McPhee? Oh, I love John McPhee so much. Great. That's, I'm buying that one.

40:41Okay, that book's incredible. It's about Arthur Ashe. Oh, that's cool. Yes. Yeah, I love John McPhee. What's the one I just read? Have you read that? Have listened to that. Oh, dad, he was on the podcast on that one. Yeah, I think that explains a lot, and explains a lot, too, why, you know. This generation of kids is a little more difficult to aim football. These are just people who have been on the show recently. Oh, right here? Yeah. You just heard of that? I love this. He was here a couple weeks ago. These two books I think of a lot. And you're a Springsteen fan? Not necessarily. I mean, no, I just like him.

41:22I like this book about the Naked of Nebraska. I give that to a bunch of people. Nebraska? Yeah. Ooh, tell me about Play No and the Tyrant. No, no, the album, Nebraska. Okay. If you're asking that, it's not for you. Plato and the Tigray, tell me about that. So Plato, obviously, is a writer about philosophy and government. It's a republic. But then he feels like he needs to sort of get in the game and, like, actually advise people in politics. And so he starts working for this guy. He was just here at the police. He starts working for, what's his name? Dionysus. and uh the guy sucks he's just like bad and clato is sort of like in this trap you can't see it he kind of it's like um it's like people now who like they see what they want to see in trump and they think they can reform him and use him to their own purposes and it goes badly for all of them that's what it's and so it's about played on that he wrote another book that i love that's more connected to the stoics which is like seneca is nero's teacher and so how does this really smart man create such a horrendous protege and why didn't he leave sooner and and it's all it's all about that about just seeing what you want to see it totally i mean you see this like how many how many teams think oh we can we can fix that guy or we can change him or it'll be different here the inside view right like that's what we always say so many years in i've realized you can't yeah you're not fixing anyone yeah you're either putting up with it or managing around it yes I will say that's what their culture is.

42:59The goal is to fix, if the person can be useful, that's one thing. But to fix someone then to become useful, usually they never become useful. Oh, that's a really interesting distinction. Right. If you're like, hey, I think we can absorb them into the culture, we'll get something out of it. That's different than they're broken and I can fix them. And then they'll be what I want them to be. Yes. Right. That's usually where. And I think what they're really good at is. Never have a success story on that. No, character is fate, as they say. And what they're really good at is we're not bringing you on, Ryan, but you can only bring part of yourself with you.

43:34Yeah. Right? Like, we know what we're dealing with. So bring your whole self as long as this part, which is the football part, is right. Then we don't care what you do. I'm sorry. And also, though, within reason. Within reason. The live people tell themselves, though, is like, it'll be different here. Because our culture is so good. Right. Like, you know, we're going to have these guardrails in place. We're going to do this. And it's like, it always goes the same way. But it is interesting. There's a kind of an offshoot of it. So somebody like Baker Mayfield, who had gotten deflated for whatever reason when he was in Cleveland.

44:08And he comes into our culture. And because he is such a high energy guy and all he had to do was think about football, which is what he wanted to do. And he wasn't the first overall pick. He was not. And two days later, he leads one of the great comebacks. And right. He revitalized his love for football. Let's just say we're in football. This is our task list of how to help the Rams be good today. So we say whoever we bring in, just give them the task list. We all work together. Contowns to not. OK, before that person can execute his or her task, We now have to change these, what we would consider maybe, you know, flaws and adequacy.

44:56So it's never about changing the person. It's more about inviting the person in. Right. Give them our task list and we all work together. But it's also, too, you've changed your time over where now you really look at it as like you're selecting people into almost like special forces. It's an elite thing where you're not, you know, bringing somebody in. You're trying to try to develop. You might can change. A culture probably can influence by degrees. Yeah. But not by time. Yeah. Right. You're not going to they're not going to become someone totally different. Like Kyrie Irving is always going to be Kyrie Irving, which is to say a problem.

45:37You know what I mean? He's always going to be. Yeah, I did say that. It's like, hey, how many teams is this guy going to blow up before you go? He blows up teams. that's what he does because he's or they have a shelf life and you and you you have to know that and know what going in and not think to your point then it'll be different here yes right that's a great name of a book it'll be different here it's different this time it's the the thing i don't tell them this book you would like this got the history of notebooks oh and then i told you i'd give you the uh joe gideon book we were sitting at her table about oh yeah i mean year of magical thinking okay it is one of like just the most so you're imagining devastating beautiful blue nights is about the death of my daughter i read that too which is amazing this is so what she never talks about in blue nights is her daughter didn't just drop dead she's an alcoholic yes and so they obviously struggled with it as a family for a long time and this is every week she would go to therapy and trying to work on herself because that's all you can control but then also what do they do about this situation with their daughter and after each session she would write this like basically write up verbatim what happened in the session what she learned what she was thinking oh wow and then she kept it in a little envelope or in a manila folder next to her desk and just says dear john it was just addressed to her husband and then nobody knew about it until after she died and they found it next to her desk it's like it's kind of this like it reads almost like a you know like a novel where the novel's like letters it feels like the letters of one parent to another as they're both dealing with this so you're getting only one side of it and you know it but it's also just you filling in the gap and you but the tragic the terrible you know how it ends and she doesn't not yet this section you need like something where people can just crawl up in a ball on the floor i mean death be not proud are you kidding me have you read uh 84 charm crossroad no so speaking of like uh books of letters okay so this woman she's a an american writer who's trying to get a hold of this rare book and this is right after world war two and so she writes to this british bookseller at 84 tronning crossroad and they start up this friendship and it's just a collection of her letters between her and this family over about 10 years of history she's becoming a successful writer they're living through like rationing and all this it's it's a beautiful book about people Here's my, I love ideas.

48:01So here's my new idea, that we start letter writing again. Yeah, sure. There's got to be a little desk where people can write letters here. And we're going to start the art of letter writing again. You will like this. This notebook book is incredible, though. You will like that a lot. I'm trying to think what else we might find. Do we have So Good You Can't Ignore You? I'm surprised that we don't. Here's a good question for you. Is it James Madison? It's James Madison. Is there a good book on James Madison? President? Yes. Not that I've read, but I'll give you this one. So this is A Slave in the White House.

48:40Not many people know about this book, but it's a biography and then sort of a memoir from this guy named Paul Jennings, who was a slave in the Madison household. And he writes about his time working in the White House for them. He's the one that, you know, Dolly Madison actually saves the painting. Do you think this Southern lady was cutting down a painting and rolling it up like he did it? That's cool. Yes. But I had a good James Madison book. That's an interesting one. Someone was just in here the other day, like some random person, and they did a biarchy on Henry President. Where did you hear about James Madison?

49:13It was on a podcast. It was on someone has written a book and it's about how we need to ease in homosexual atheist Jew writing a book about that. The basis of our society is Christianity and we need to be called back up into it. And he talked about it. But it was interesting. Madison's philosophy on how, let's call it a country's ecosystem naturally handles factions. Yeah. And then the ambition. And it was, I was like, oh, that was pretty brilliant. And then I was like, where's the Madison book? I would not rent one, but I'll do that. It will start with his. You would like that book, Les? Surely you're joking, Mr.

49:55Feynman. I just read a, it was a letter that he wrote to his wife. Yes. And she had been dead already for several years. I have a better Feynman book. Let me see. Look, Les. Lazy, where's Feynman's rainbow? I'm going to squeeze it. If you want to trigger Lush, you show him this. You don't like that? He doesn't like this. That book or that? Concept of, he's like, I'm not dying to zero. I'm like, I might. Who are you saving it for? For the next day. If you'd like to find a case, I would like one more. This is Feynman as he's dying. Speaking of apprentices, and he sort of has this grad student, this kind of exchange between student and teacher.

50:35It's really, really good. That's cool. Have you found, because it's interesting, especially being around Austin, And a lot of these people are first, like they did it themselves. They bootstrapped. They didn't have somebody paving the way. And they're trying to now like get onto that second arc and like give back. And it's really interesting that Arthur Brooks made me think of it. Strength. But have you read the second mountain? No. I don't know if they have that. Second Mountain is by David Brooks. And it's about what you do in the second half of your career. It shouldn't be just more of the same thing.

51:13Your second mountain is sort of more... The first book we ever read together was David Brooks. The Social Animal. Social Animal, yeah. Stanley McChrystal's new book, On Character. Very good. Oh, that would be cool. I was thinking about him. So when you were talking about... When you guys were in the podcast and you were talking about that, you can tell if somebody's writing something, doing something, and there's bad intention behind it. He said on something, and I can't get it out of my mind, intention has a smell. And so you know when somebody wants something from you or you know when somebody's doing something that's...

51:54So when football season comes around and everybody wants tickets... Yes. And all of a sudden they're inviting you to lunch. Hi. Yeah. You can smell it on people like a bag for one. So same thing with writing books, that you're trying to accomplish something instead of just writing a book. No, I can tell too, people want book lyrics. And we just connected with him. Oh, Peter Gillespie is here. Yeah, I just saw him the other night. And Les had to email him because he now has the second lowest cholesterol in the history of the Rams, thanks to Peter and T. He's very excited about that. That's quite an achievement.

52:31I win competitive mode, but don't get peered. Are you still eating only sardines and eat pork rinds or whatever you're eating? I go in phases, so sardines are not a regular anymore. Even though they're still good. You would, and you guys got into it some. Antifarachia's a little bit. It is. Oh, yeah. Never put that in. That, to me, is another thing. Playing it, yeah. And we talk about it a lot. Yeah, if you're in sports. If you're in sports, it's like, what are we doing? Are we trying to win or are we trying to, you know, just not get fired? And you do feel, I hear him on the phone. I'm not naming names, but I hear him on the phone with other general managers in your life.

53:13Difference between people who are, A, you're stable because you're in a good ecosystem. So you're not worried about your job. But also, like, some people make bold moves and some people that's just not how they're wired. In sports, I might be, I need to take it to another level. We're really trying to do something special. Hey, Les, be honest about something. You ready? Okay. Okay. At the end of your career, are you going to be most excited about the people you helped or your Super Bowl ring? I'll answer that by saying, because we have the Super Bowl ring, yes, I can be jacked about helping. I'll show you guys my office.

53:58Thanks so much for listening. If you could rate this podcast and leave a review on iTunes, that would mean so much to us and it would really help the show. We appreciate it and I'll see you next episode.