Welcome to Outdoorking, biglenny. The exhaust looks as if someone has just welded a piece of tube onto the original Briggs muffler, probably because that side of the muffler had rusted away. It should be replaced with a standard Briggs muffler, of course. It is usual to do a tune-up on the engine when you first buy a mower: change the oil, inspect and gap the spark plug, clean or inspect the air filter, make sure the speed control and kill switch work properly, and see if it starts easily and runs smoothly through the speed range without hunting. I haven't been able to see what kind of carburetor you have there, but it might be an early type with the choke in the air cleaner. Just make sure the choke works properly, including having full movement.
The front roller is a wearing part on those SBs. Yours looks to be the type with the plastic end caps. These need to be replaced when they wear out.
If the reel (rotating blades) is not free to turn, there are two likely explanations. One is that the bearings have deteriorated. The other is that either the bed knife (fixed blade) has been adjusted incorrectely or there is rust on both fixed and moving blades, reducing the clearance. The latter is the more likely cause of the problem. Any rust will need to be cleaned off carefully, without rounding the corners of the blades or removing metal.
Please keep us posted on your progress in getting it properly tidied up. There is quite a bit of craft in adjusting the blades, and people here can help you with that, but there is a lot of information in the Outdoorking archives that you might look at first.
