Feb. 26, 2026, 12:31 p.m. ET
The Jacksonville Jaguars are looking ahead to the NFL Combine this week and, later, the draft. But some current NFL players are looking back, and their recollections will have Jaguars fans cringing.
In 2013, LSU’s Tyrann Matthieu was a cornerback with a lot of hype surrounding him heading into the draft; the cornerback was a Heisman Trophy finalist and set an LSU career record for forced fumbles (11). Though he had some personal issues off the field, he was still considered one of the top cornerback prospects, and he ended up getting picked by the Arizona Cardinals.
His rookie season went well, with Matthieu named to the PFWA All-Rookie Team; by 2019, he had landed with the Kansas City Chiefs, where he remained until 2022, and then with the New Orleans Saints. He announced his retirement at the end of the 2025 season, after a very respectable career: Matthieu is a Super Bowl champion, was named to the Pro Bowl three times, and was a three-time First-Team All-Pro.
Yet in a recent interview, it was the Jags Matthieu talked about. He had interviewed with Jacksonville during the 2013 combine, and suffice it to say… the team didn’t exactly make a good impression. During an appearance on the “In The Bayou” podcast, Matthieu said the Jaguars were his “weirdest” interview, and it isn’t hard to see why.
“It’s like, 20 dudes in the room, right? It’s just you by yourself. You ain’t got no lawyer or nothing. It’s just you, like millions of dollars on the line, but can I at least bring my mama with me?” he began, laughing. “So I’m sitting in there and I’m just like, you know, like, what’s next? And dude’s sitting in front of me and literally, like, didn’t ask me anything, but was like, I want you to guess who’s everybody is in the room. And I’m looking, I’m looking, I’m like, well you sitting right in front of me, you must be important. You the guy. I’m like, who are you? The owner?”
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Fan reaction was, understandably, not the greatest; one responded, “Thankfully, those clowns are gone from Duval. What he said doesn’t surprise me at all.”
The “clown” in question is, presumably, Dave Caldwell, who was the general manager at the time. And as another fan noted, “Dave Caldwell does that and then proceeds to draft two terrible DBs before Mathieu. Truly one of the worst GMs in NFL history.”
Poor management is something Jacksonville had been fighting for quite some time, first with Caldwell and then, later, with Trent Baalke. This blast-from-the-past isn’t pleasant to revisit — not because Mathieu would have been a make-or-break player, but because it’s a reminder of just how bad the franchise has been.
Yet it’s also a reminder of how far the Jags have come. It’s still early, but James Gladstone and Liam Coen did an incredible job revitalizing the team in 2025, and hopefully, fans won’t have to wince at any more embarrassing stories like this one for a long, long time.