In the war room: How the Cardinals drafted Josh Rosen
Apr 27, 2018, 12:26 PM | Updated: 12:31 pm
“Josh! Steve Keim with the Cardinals, how you doing?”
Brief pause. The camera shows the Arizona general manager holding the phone to his ear in the team’s conference room during the draft.
“You ready to come out to the desert?”
The first call was to the @Raiders.
The next one was to @Josh3Rosen. #CardsDraft pic.twitter.com/8Vo77uDoIG
— Arizona Cardinals (@AZCardinals) April 27, 2018
On Thursday night, the Arizona Cardinals released a video of the war room during the draft, giving fans a glimpse of the atmosphere as Keim, team owner Michael Bidwill and staff finalized the trade with the Oakland Raiders that would allow Arizona to draft the UCLA quarterback.
Let’s rewind a little.
When the Raiders were on the clock at pick No. 10, Bidwill turned to Keim.
“Buckle your seatbelt here,” he said.
Keim picked up the phone. On the other side was Raiders general manager Reggie McKenzie.
“Hey Reg.” Pause. “So again, we’ll give you 15, 79 and 152, which is our fifth.”
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On Doug & Wolf on 98.7 FM Arizona’s Sports Station on Friday, Keim explained that he had been in contact with Raiders’ staff for two weeks.
“I’ve gone back and forth with (Raiders head coach) Jon Gruden this week quite a bit and Reggie McKenzie and told them that we’d be interested if a certain scenario played out, and it did, and it made the transition pretty easy,” Keim said.
On Thursday, the final discussion was short.
A pause as the Raiders considered, then Keim spoke once more.
“You’ll do it? OK Reg, appreciate you. Congrats man.”
After this, Bidwill made a call to announce the Cardinals would be picking Rosen. He asked how much time was on the clock. Seven minutes.
The trade had been finalized in three minutes.
Keim called Rosen to tell him he had been drafted.
There’s no telling what the quarterback said during the pauses in the phone call – maybe a thank you, maybe telling Keim the team won’t regret it. Maybe Rosen said the previous nine teams will regret not taking him, which he told media later.
Whatever the case, Keim answered: “Well I know that, that’s why we made that pick.”
As he responded, management around the table got up to shake hands and congratulate each other on drafting the Cardinals’ quarterback of the future.
Head coach Steve Wilks took the phone.
“We’re excited man, we really are,” he said. “You’re going to do some great things for us for a long time.”
