Interview tricks in action! →

How do you feel this situation is different than what Eli was facing when he came up?
Well, every situation is different. I’ve read a little bit, with people speculating, “Would they do that?” That was the situation a long, long time that involved the Colts and involved the Elways. When Eli came along, there were a lot of circumstances there. I’m not very comfortable talking about. I wasn’t then. I got beat up about it. It’s gone.

I think the great thing is that San Diego has a great quarterback there. They’ve had outstanding teams, and Eli is very happy where he wound up. He loves being the quarterback of the New York Giants.

You’re involved with the College Football Coach of the Year Award. Who have you been most impressed with, from a college coaching standpoint?
I think so many people do a great job. I’ve been involved with Liberty Mutual and the Coach of the Year, and we’re down to 25 finalists. Liberty Mutual rewards coaches in four different divisions for Coach of the Year. We’re down to 10 finalists in the Football Bowl Subdivision, and this is like a who’s who: Mike Gundy, Brady Hoke, what a job he did at Michigan, Mark Hudspeth, Mike London, who did one of the best coaching jobs of the country at the University of Virginia. We know about Les Miles and Nick Saban, who are both playing for a national championship. Bobby Petrino at Arkansas. I’m not sure Arkansas isn’t the third-best team in the country. Mark Richt lost two games, won 10 in a row at Georgia. Bill Snyder, I saw him last night. What a great story that is — what he did at Kansas State, getting them on the map and then coming back to coach them again to a great year. Dabo Swinney’s got his Clemson team going to the Orange Bowl. Pretty impressive group with five finalists in three other divisions.

This interview with Archie Manning from Grantland isn’t particularly interesting, but I love this bit for an absolutely textbook example of an interviewer realizing that the person that he’s talking to is done with the topic and is shutting down, and so asks a softball about something boring to 99% of his readers, but about which his subject is passionate. I know that bit well — anytime I’m doing a celebrity/musician/athlete interview and I want to push on something, I try to keep a “let’s talk about your charity work/side project/dream to direct!”-type question in my pocket for when I start to sense that they’re not going to talk to me anymore if I keep pushing.