Sam Rapoport, NFL Senior Director | Off the Record with Dannie Rogers Episode 14

On this episode of Off the Record, Dannie sits down with NFL Senior Director Sam Rapoport. The two discuss how Sam landed at the NFL after playing pro women’s football in Canada, Sam's first internship with the league office and more.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
A different setup here on off the record, I have
Sam Rappaport from the NFL League Office joining me today.
She oversees a diversity, equity and inclusion within the NFL,
and I know that that position is just widespread across
the league. Now we have Lindsay Verstagin over here with
the De Trey Lines, who does an awesome job. So, Sam,
I know you have been with the NFL now for

(00:20):
a couple decades, which is crazy to think. How did
you land your position with the league. So I was
in school in two thousand and three. I was studying
sports science, which I honestly had no interest in. I
studied the major because it had the words sports in it.
And I was sitting in the back of glass thinking
about how in the heck am I going to differentiate

(00:42):
myself from the thousands of people who apply for NFL internships,
especially men, especially Americans. And so I was sitting there
and I thought of the idea. Since I played football
and I was a quarterback, I sent a picture of
myself in my full tackle football uniform, and I sent
my resume with an actual football, and on the football,

(01:03):
I wrote what other quarterback could accurately deliver a past
three hundred and eighty six miles, which was the distance
between my school and the NFL headquarters. And you know,
I it's super gimmicky, but for me, it was something
I know. I knew I needed to do something to
stand out and something not to give the same old
resume in And you know, not that I don't really
recommend that nowadays, but I do recommend doing things that

(01:26):
differentiate yourself because resumes look all the same at some point,
and so you have to do something to show how
badly you wanted and I really wanted to work at
the NFL. First question is how much was the shipping
on that resume. It's a good question as a college kid, man,
I remember bringing that to I don't remember ups or
whatever it was, and it's probably like twenty five bucks
at the time or something. But that's like that's like

(01:48):
a week's beer money, you know, oh a million percent.
And then and then gosh, my second question is you
sent a picture of in full tackle uniform. How old
were you when you stop playing football. I had to
retire pretty early because I started my job at the
NFL and the hours were pretty demanding, So I think
I was about twenty three when I had to retire,

(02:09):
which sucks because that's your prime, right. I definitely went
out in my prime, which I still remember thinking I
should have just given it a few more years, but
I just didn't have the hours in the day. And
so I had two amazing years playing women's tackle football
for Montreal where I lived, and now I like watching
and supporting, Oh my gosh, and just the fact that

(02:30):
they have those opportunities there. I know they have semi
pro leagues here in Detroit. So from your vantage point,
how massive was the NFL to a Canadian like yourself
living there? I was out of body at all times
during my first internship, that's for sure. And you know
I grew up a Cowboys fans. So I remember my
first week of my internship. I was alone in the

(02:52):
hallways and at two eighty Park Avenue, which was the
old league office, and I was walking this way and
just Emmett Smith alone just walks right by me and
kind of nods and smiles. And I remember calling my
father at the time to say, like, well, the hell
was going on? Right? Like that was it was mind going.
I was still young. I was twenty one years old
at the time, and for me, that was just, you know,

(03:13):
another indication of where I belong. And you know, those
moments are still I'm not jaded. Those moments are still
super cool for me. And I was in the at
Super Bowl in the elevator with Troy Aikman, and I
don't know him professionally, but I just saw him in
the elevator and I went back to fourteen year old me,
you know, watching him play and rewinding his VHS tapes
and analyzing his footwork. And so I feel so lucky

(03:36):
to work in a league where you get those types
of opportunities. What started the love for football? Who inspired it?
Playing it? So you know, my father was a big
football fan, but he had two daughters and he never
really thought to influence us to like football because he
didn't even know that there was girls football when we
were young. So really I started playing it. I started

(03:58):
getting good at it my eyes, and it was something
that built my confidence as a young kid. And I
got so good at it in my eyes that I
wanted to watch people who were amazing at it, and
so I really love I started watching the NFL and
I started, you know, analyzing quarterbacks. I really loved watching
the league for quarterbacks. You know, when I was growing up,
it was John Elway and Troy Aikman and Warren Moon

(04:19):
and Randal Cunningham and so many guys who I really
admired and watched and studied and you know they helped
me get better and yeah, I just playing it really
was what did it for me? And what was the
first internship you held with the NFL? I mean it
was so not qualified for it. It was for like
creative marketing. I had no background in that whatsoever. But

(04:41):
I walked in there and I told my first boss's
name was Karen, and I told her that I was
going to be the best creative marketing interns she's ever had,
even though I was like, I know nothing about this,
and so, you know, I think I did a decent job.
You know, I was able to come back the following
year and then eventually stay on full time. But you know,
I advice I give to a lot of people to
who ask about starting out in the NFL is it

(05:03):
doesn't need to be where or physically unique. You know
the department that you belong in right away. Our league
is so small an insular that if you knock it
out of the park. And what you're doing, no matter
what it is, your reputation is going to build and
grow and it's going to get around the league. And
that's what I was hoping to do with that internship. Yeah,
word spreads fast, of course with the really really good ones.

(05:23):
That's awesome. You completely from built from the ground up
the women's career in football forum, right I did. Yeah,
I created it back in twenty seventeen. Wow, and it's
been going strong. What this is year seven now? Seven? Yep,
that's right, Oh my gosh. And we it's I know,
it's been a thing at the combine typically that's where
it is. And you have women who work in college

(05:47):
football trying to get them in the same room as
NFL head coaches and gms and all the alike. So
I know it hasn't been in personal last the last
two years. It's been virtual. But what kind of opportunity
is that for young women in football? When we looked
around the league, we realized that and we spoke to
gms and head coaches and they we asked them where

(06:07):
they found entry level talent? Where do you find your
entry level coaches and scouts and the resounding answers we got.
Were you know at a bar and mobile Alabama during
Senior Bowl, or you know at a cigar lounge chat Combine. Right,
these are places that women typically don't hang out, but
we're here. We're just not there, And so we decided
to build an organic environment for women to be able

(06:29):
to impress upon head coaches and gms. Maybe not in
cigar lounges and golf courses, even though some people, some
women love going there, but you know at Combine where
everyone in football is for a week. And so we
built this platform giving the opportunity to women who are
in college football to meet with head coaches and gms
and try to impress them. And through that program, over

(06:50):
two hundred and twenty five women have secured jobs since
it started. So they're they're taking that opportunity and they're
using it, and it's it's really it's it's fun to
be a bystander. What's your favorite success story coming out
of the forum. So many success stories, you know, there
are a couple. You know, we had our eyes on

(07:11):
coach Belichick for a long time, and you know, from
the start, we're like, do you think we could ever
get Coach Belichick to come on. And you know, we
are lucky that we've had several members from the Detroit
Lions on the football and business side, including you know,
owners and your president would have you come by, which
is incredible. But we knew that getting Coach Belichick, what

(07:32):
that would do for other coaches, you know, and the
ripple impact it would have to get him on board.
And so a couple of years ago we went forward
and we threw the invite out and we got a
yes within minutes. And so, you know, Coach Belichick, he
kind of opened up the zoom with all these coaches
and he said, He's like, all right, let's talk ball.
What do you want to know? And so they were
just you know, shooting the breeze, going back and forth.

(07:54):
Coach rabel was on there as well, and at the
end of that zoom, Coach Belichick handed his personal email
address to all of the coaches and said, if you
want more development, reach out to me. And so, you know,
it's it's moments like that where you realize the type
of impact you can have because Coach Belichick being involved. Now,
like every head coach in the NFL is going to say,
it's and that's super powerful. So I think having coach

(08:16):
Belichick involved was huge. But also just you know, more
so than that, I'd say, is the little success stories
that we hear from the women and how this program
changed their trajectories and how it afforded them opportunities that
they felt like they weren't they didn't have access to prior.
That's the real gold in the program. I love that
any Um, yeah, more specific to the women who went
to the forum who might have gotten jobs out of

(08:38):
this in terms of the success stories, yeah, a couple
of them. So the last time we were in person,
right before COVID hit. You know, Coach McDermott has spoke
of the Buffalo Bills has spoken at our program meant
many times, and that he met a couple of coaches
there and they were the two coaches were off to
the airport to go home after the program, and he
called them from the airport and offered them jobs. You know,

(09:01):
Coach Rivera offered one of the women a job on
the spot because she asked him an impressive question about
you know, his defensive scheme a couple of years ago. Um,
you know it's and now really head coaches and gms
are kind of fighting over talent at the forum because
they know that, you know, this is vetted talent. You know,
they have experience in college football, so you know they're
not they're not totally green, they have some experience. And

(09:22):
you know, that just shows the progress and the development
that we've seen year after year. If women want to
go to this forum, how do they do it? Who
do they contact? So we don't have an application process
for it because we don't have the bandwidth to manage it.
We tried that one year and I was loved. I'd
love to see how many women applied for it, but
to sort through that mini event was kind of impossible.

(09:44):
So we go through our relationships with the colleges um
an organization called Women Leaders in College Sports, and throughout
the year we have a list going for every four
for every Women's Forum of potential talent to look through.
And what we look for really is what the gms
and head coaches tell us that they look for. And
so you know, it's that drive, it's having in mind

(10:05):
what you want to do. It's having a professional, you know,
a professional presence online. It's a very important component to it.
And you know, just demonstrating your how bad you want
it is a big component to it. The last time
I checked, there were twelve female coaches in the league
this year alone. I believe we can account for one
of them. Jill Castanza oversees our science performance science for

(10:28):
all the players. She's always walking around with her iPad
and she's unreal at what she does. So along with
the forum, how can more women get into those coaching roles,
do you think? Yeah? So the challenge we have with
women in coaching, and I'll talk about like pure coaching,
like you know, positional coaching and on the field, is
there aren't that many women that do it. And so

(10:51):
we have a challenge to find women every year that
have the experience that are ready for that you know,
entry level NFL opportunity. But this program isn't only about
NFL jobs. It's also about college jobs. And we're super
proud of the women who got college football opportunities through
the program as well. A good example of that is
Dartmouth with coach Buddy Teevens. He's kind of starting a

(11:13):
female coaching tree up there and what He's hired a
female coach every year, and I think almost every one
of them have landed a job in the NFL after
coaching at Dartmouth. So this isn't just about you know,
let's count how many women are in the NFL. This
is about growing the entire pool of girls and women
that can get involved in this sport in the areas
in which they're passionate about. That's amazing and I feel like, yeah,

(11:36):
if Dartmouth is putting women into these awesome positions, I'm
sure the head coach is teaching them how to lead
in everything. So I know from our standpoint over at
the Detroit Lions, they're going to have some more initiatives
and teaching women how to be amazing leaders. So from
your standpoint, just looking at it from a team level,

(11:57):
I know you're in the league office, but from a
team level, how can organizations just create spaces where they
are teaching women how to be really, really great leaders?
In your opinion, I love the question, Danny, and my
answer is, don't focus all your effort on just improving
the women. And so in order to allow women to

(12:18):
truly succeed, you also need to change men. And everyone
needs to improve and get better. But while women need
development work, men need development work and so I think
that what we need to work on as a league
is ensuring that our cultures are being created so women
can be successful, and so we're not trying to mold

(12:40):
into a dude's culture and trying to be like a
guy's guy or a guy's girl or whatever it's called,
and be able to be at who we are, our
true selves, be women, if that's how you identify in
these roles. And so I think the true work is
everyone needs to develop. Women need to develop men to develop.
But I think the greatest men in this league, and

(13:00):
I can think of so many, are the ones that
constantly ask women at their clubs how they can be
better from a culture standpoint and make those changes. And
someone that comes to mind as coach Dabel at the Giants,
who consistently asks the women at his club that question,
and he and Joe Shane are really working towards creating
a culture where everyone has an equal opportunity to succeed.

(13:22):
So my answer to that is almost like equal balance
between developing women in this field but developing men to
make sure that they aren't creating anything unintentionally that are
that aren't allowing women to succeed and grow. I can
not love. Cannot love more like how you describe that

(13:43):
in your answer and everything that's amazing, and I agree.
I want to get back to you. I know you
have passions for societal change and then football, so here
it is the best of both worlds. But what is
the most difficult thing about those two intersecting each other
that you might have come across in your seven years
of overseeing diversity, equity and inclusion. For me, you know,

(14:04):
the platform that we have that is the NFL, I mean,
the NFL's global right. We have hundreds of millions of
fans in this world. We have the ability to do
so much with that shield. And you know, when I'm
talking to my friends and family or when I'm talking
you here, I always have the same answer for this
that it's such a privilege to be able to work
for that shield because what you want to see in
the country you can get done through that shield. And

(14:26):
I think part of the work, part of what I'm
so proud about with the work in gender equity is
not only the effect it's having in football, but the
effect it's having in sport and in corporate America as well.
And you know, corporations are asking us, you know, how
we've done this and how they can apply these tactics
to what they're doing, and we share our secret sauce
because there's no intellectual property there. We want to see

(14:47):
this everywhere. And so I just I feel fortunate that
Number one, I work in a league that allows you
to do work like this and if you have ideas,
let you flourish within them. But then also really the
societal implication as it can have beyond football, and that
really is the part of my job I'm the most
passionate about. Oh my gosh, yeah, no, that's incredible. I mean,

(15:08):
when did you know that societal change in football were
the route you were going to take. I think when
I when I moved to this country, I certainly understood
the power of the NFL, But I think what moves
me so much about football too is kind of how
like it it's the fabric of this country, right. It
brings people together. I heard so many times like it's

(15:29):
the only thing I have to talk about with my
uncle or my aunt or whatever it is, you know
what I mean. It really brings everyone together. And so
when I looked at that, I thought, if it's in
everyone's house, right, and Super Bowl certainly is if it's
in everyone's home. It's if everyone's talking about that on
Sunday and Monday, you know there's opportunity there. And with
this reach that we have, you know, um Billy Jean

(15:50):
King says, pressure is a privilege, and I think with
this privilege that we have with the league, it's incumbent
on all of us to use our platforms to create change.
And that's what all of us are trying to do.
Who is maybe your mentor through I don't know, if
it's most of your time with the NFL or even
back to college, was there someone that you look to
that really helped you navigate the space? I think I

(16:12):
pick from a lot of different people. I'm fortunate I
get to pick from a lot of different people for
like what I admire about their leadership and try to
kind of dive into that. I think, you know, Donna Ponte,
who's our chief Admin football Admin officer at the NFL,
is someone whom I'm very close with and she's guided
me throughout my entire career. She's kind of the godmother
of football. We all look up to her and she's

(16:33):
always the smartest person in the room wherever she is,
and you know, really someone that has helped guide me
and been a roadmap for so many things. But I think,
now you know my manager right now, Jonathan Bean and
myth to me or so such cool leaders to U
to reflect upon and to kind of observe, because I

(16:55):
really admire what they've done in the past three years
to shift the NFL into such a laser sharp focus
with d EI, what is the most What is the
project besides the forum, which I know is probably very
close to your heart. What is another project with d
EI that you are super proud of that you've been
able to kind of build up from the ground up.
I can't take any credit for it, but I think

(17:17):
one of the most moving moments I've had in the
NFL was right after Carl Nassib came out. I think
about a week later, we put out NFL put out
an ad under Tim Alice, our chief marketing officer, and
the ad was called football is Gay. It was very
mind blowing for me to see, you know, that spot
and goosebumps and all those things. And I'm really proud

(17:37):
of the work that we've done in the LGBTQ space
because we've been bold, and in the past sometimes I've
struggled with us being you know, comfortable in the gray
and not making statements. But in the past five years,
I have to say it our lead. We've made some
serious statements, putting a flag in the ground, saying this
is who we are and if you don't like it,
tough And I think when football is gay came out,

(18:00):
I needed a minute, and I'm super proud of us
and what that did for our fan base and how
many fans you know who identify within that community, within
my community, have come out and said I now feel
comfortable going to games because before I felt like it
wasn't for me. So things like that, it's it's what
keeps me going any more powerful initiatives that are coming

(18:22):
down the pipeline here soon. I think, you know, the
bid for a girl's flag and women's flag to be
in the Olympics, or flag football in general to be
in the Olympics all genders is super interesting to me
because you know, there's so many girls, especially they are
growing up loving the sport, playing the sport, but not
seeing a future for themselves in it. And you know,

(18:45):
man if if flag football gets into the Olympics. Girls
from all over the world are going to start playing
these sport and record numbers. And I'm excited to track
that and see what happens with it, and I'm excited
to be a part of, you know, the momentum. You
just listen to another episode of Off the Record with
Danny Rogers. A new episode drops every Tuesday.