Speaker 1: Welcome into the Ravens Press Past podcast that is Thursday. Today,
Speaker 1: we had a chance to hear from the coordinators, so
Speaker 1: let's kick things off with Special Teams coordinator Chris Horton.
Speaker 2: Good to see everyone. I hope you guys all had
Speaker 2: a great Christmas. I think right now really starting to
Speaker 2: see our guys play the kind of football we've been
Speaker 2: knowing that we can play.
Speaker 3: Throughout this season.
Speaker 2: Just gonna keep encouraging them to just go out there
Speaker 2: and just light it rip, have fun doing what they're doing,
Speaker 2: and guys are making plays for us right now, questions.
Speaker 4: Chris.
Speaker 5: In the postgame speech from John on the recording, he
Speaker 5: said that it was the best game you guys played
Speaker 5: in all three phases that you mentioned the special teams specifically,
Speaker 5: Just what did you like about the performance from that
Speaker 5: forty nine Ers game?
Speaker 2: You know, I just thought we went out and our
Speaker 2: guys one of the things we've continued to do is
Speaker 2: really just maximize our effort, our physicality, go out there
Speaker 2: and just and just play hard. And then we had
Speaker 2: an opportunity to really execute some play. We had another
Speaker 2: good punt return. Thailand's doing a great job again. He's
Speaker 2: taking advantage of his opportunities. We got guys covering kicks well,
Speaker 2: you know, obviously we let one get out on us
Speaker 2: for a little bit, but you know what, it didn't
Speaker 2: hurt us.
Speaker 3: That was a good returner back there, you know.
Speaker 2: And just to see our guys just go around, fly around,
Speaker 2: get off the ball, not guys back and really play
Speaker 2: a physical football game against a physical team really showed us,
Speaker 2: you know, kind of who we are.
Speaker 3: And then when you look at the other phases, you know.
Speaker 2: Our field goal block, our field goal team, those guys
Speaker 2: have been outstanding the last couple of weeks of just
Speaker 2: making kicks, the protection, all those things that we talked
Speaker 2: about when it wasn't going well, and we just want
Speaker 2: to make sure we continue to keep that up.
Speaker 6: To take it better.
Speaker 7: But do you feel like this is as well as
Speaker 7: the whole specific.
Speaker 1: Group has played this.
Speaker 8: Year, just where you guys are right.
Speaker 3: Now, I do. I think this is. I think we're
Speaker 3: starting to hit our hit our stride at the right time.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: Obviously, some of the things that happened early in the
Speaker 2: year really uncharacteristic, really came down to kind of one
Speaker 2: thing guy here or there. But I think all eleven
Speaker 2: guys are starting to play as one. And uh, as
Speaker 2: we continue to do that, you'll continue to see us
Speaker 2: make a lot more place.
Speaker 9: Time to get the very most out of his opp
Speaker 9: return opportunities. He's not a crazy burner. He's not the
Speaker 9: most elusive guy, but he seems to every time you
Speaker 9: get the most out of what cookie?
Speaker 1: Then why how did he do that?
Speaker 3: I think it's just phil, you know. I think it's
Speaker 3: a guy.
Speaker 2: I think it's a guy that understands natural ability with
Speaker 2: the ball in his hands. You know, it's those things
Speaker 2: in a sense. This guy, it's the right ball, and
Speaker 2: he's making great decisions. He's making the right decisions and
Speaker 2: and again he is taking advantage of those opportunities. He's
Speaker 2: a skilled player, you know. Uh, he's good with the
Speaker 2: ball in his hands. He can make guys missing. As
Speaker 2: as we found out, he's a strong runner, you know.
Speaker 2: And so that's that's good to see.
Speaker 3: How old you guys have another runs.
Speaker 2: I wouldn't says he's more decisive, Mike. I think it's
Speaker 2: more of uh, how how efficient can we be? We
Speaker 2: talk a lot about efficiency because every ball is not
Speaker 2: a returnable ball, and I think when when he does
Speaker 2: return the ball, he's getting those yards.
Speaker 3: I think all of our returners have done that for us.
Speaker 1: That was special teams coordinator Chris Horton. Next up is
Speaker 1: defensive coordinator Mike McDonald.
Speaker 10: All Right, good to see every buddy. How are we doing.
Speaker 5: Well?
Speaker 11: After the last interception, we saw the double fist pump
Speaker 11: and the fellow and it looked like.
Speaker 9: You almost took a weave his hand off with the guy.
Speaker 9: Why do you think that release of emotion came at
Speaker 9: that at that moment?
Speaker 12: Oh man, Uh, it was just it was a great
Speaker 12: moment for us to close the game out, and at
Speaker 12: that point, the game wasn't entirely over.
Speaker 10: You know, if they.
Speaker 12: Scored, probably an on side situation with timeout. So you know,
Speaker 12: you're you know, you close the game out. Uh, you
Speaker 12: know that magnitude and you know you're just juiced about
Speaker 12: the guys and then the performance that the guys put
Speaker 12: out there, and and then it just came out.
Speaker 3: How do you hinder where Miami's seems to.
Speaker 12: Last time you asked me a question, Mike, we've played
Speaker 12: pretty good on defense, so let's hopefully repeat that. Yeah,
Speaker 12: it's it's a it's definitely, I mean, it's a challenge.
Speaker 12: It's unique to the rest of the league because it's
Speaker 12: just it's at every spot, you know, every every every
Speaker 12: guy that can touch the ball can take off.
Speaker 10: And score from any point.
Speaker 12: So it sounds cliche, but it is all eleven. I mean,
Speaker 12: you have to take great angles, you have to have
Speaker 12: great force, great secondary force, and the third guy in
Speaker 12: the alley, you know, so and and the ball can
Speaker 12: hit at any point in the field. They'll you know,
Speaker 12: anywhere from the A gap all the way out to
Speaker 12: the end of the alley.
Speaker 10: So it's a challenge. It's a challenge.
Speaker 12: So you know, how we structure things and how we
Speaker 12: play blocks and uh, you know, they do some things
Speaker 12: schematically that are a little different that we've seen in
Speaker 12: the run game and then the perimeter uh like you
Speaker 12: know screen game. So, uh, we're getting a great look
Speaker 12: this week. You know, I think the guys would practice well,
Speaker 12: you know today and the walk through, yes, but you know,
Speaker 12: definitely need to attack that the rest of the week.
Speaker 8: A lot of tosses from the outside and it's get
Speaker 8: to something you get the sides to you French your
Speaker 8: bands or you're outside.
Speaker 12: Guys that probably yeah, well I wouldn't say it's uh,
Speaker 12: it's it's everyone that's responsible for the perimeter, right, It's
Speaker 12: not just the defensive ends. Sometimes those guys are unblocked
Speaker 12: and they're getting cracked, you know, so they've got to
Speaker 12: be able to play those blocks. But it's the guys
Speaker 12: behind them too that have to replace when their guy
Speaker 12: blocks the perimeter too.
Speaker 9: How much do you reference preparing this week? Do you
Speaker 9: reference last year's game with them? And how much have
Speaker 9: you grown as a coordinator since then?
Speaker 4: That was really really on in your play calling career here.
Speaker 10: Uh, you know, we haven't. We haven't talked about last year.
Speaker 12: So far into the season, completely new team, but personally,
Speaker 12: you know, of course you're going to learn from that
Speaker 12: game last year. You want to learn quicker, quicker than not,
Speaker 12: you know, than not because you're playing the next week.
Speaker 12: So if you're not learning on a week to week
Speaker 12: basis off of how your guys are playing and how
Speaker 12: you're calling things and how you're structuring game plans and
Speaker 12: the positions your guys are you're trying to put your
Speaker 12: your guys in and how things are ruled out and
Speaker 12: how clear they are, then you're doing your team of disservice.
Speaker 12: So That's something that we take a lot of pride
Speaker 12: in of trying to learn from week to week and
Speaker 12: definitely that game. You look back and we made a
Speaker 12: lot of corrections after that game, you know, take strides
Speaker 12: for the rest of the year, and you know, unfortunately
Speaker 12: those are going to happen in the NFL, and it's
Speaker 12: about how you respond as a team and taking responsibility
Speaker 12: for you know, things that you can improve on, I
Speaker 12: think as a team and definitely individually, Like that was
Speaker 12: our approach then, and that's a long time ago. Man,
Speaker 12: you know where to but you know you're obviously going
Speaker 12: to try to learn from from every every setback that
Speaker 12: you have.
Speaker 13: Mike, what's the challenge of how you defend the Tyreek
Speaker 13: kill kind of the you know, you guys have physical corners.
Speaker 13: How do you to go back and forth with whether
Speaker 13: or now you want to press a guy like that?
Speaker 13: Give him space because he's shown he can win in
Speaker 13: both ways.
Speaker 12: Well, they do a great job of getting in the
Speaker 12: ball creatively, so you you know, it's it's different if
Speaker 12: someone just lines up at the X and he's on
Speaker 12: the ball and he's not moving and you know where
Speaker 12: he's gonna be.
Speaker 10: Uh, that's definitely not the case with the with the Tyreek.
Speaker 12: So you know, we have we have some initial plans
Speaker 12: on how we want to handle it obviously you know,
Speaker 12: and did bulge it right now. But it's a challenge,
Speaker 12: you know, on how they move them. And it's a
Speaker 12: credit to them with their system and the things.
Speaker 10: That he's able to do from different spots.
Speaker 7: To a place that I like that can practice something.
Speaker 7: Is it whit committee think you have a good designated
Speaker 7: Tyreek guy. I mean, there's not a lot of guys
Speaker 7: that kind of.
Speaker 10: Might much to speak. Yeah, you try your best, can
Speaker 10: we got we got our look team does a great job.
Speaker 12: I mean, so there's a lot of times we're looking
Speaker 12: at like, man, well that's not gonna work because they
Speaker 12: you know, they do such a they give such a
Speaker 12: great look.
Speaker 10: So it's a con We were just talking actually talking
Speaker 10: to some of the DB's today.
Speaker 12: Hey, it's a constant evaluation of what we're executing well
Speaker 12: throughout throughout the game or throughout the week, excuse me, uh,
Speaker 12: And then as the week starts to unfold on on
Speaker 12: how we decide to play the game. You know, you're
Speaker 12: constantly evaluating that and then saying hey, Okay, guys, I
Speaker 12: think we're gonna go this direction going into the game,
Speaker 12: and obviously you'll adjust as the game kind of unfolds.
Speaker 12: But our look team does a great job of getting
Speaker 12: the splits and the releases, and our young guys do
Speaker 12: a great job of getting those guys ready to go.
Speaker 13: Said a lot about how these three offenses of the
Speaker 13: Rams and the Dolphins are about to face and the
Speaker 13: Niners have very similar offenses. The way that the Dolphins motion,
Speaker 13: though the how do you do you kind of have
Speaker 13: to put them in their own category from those other teams.
Speaker 12: Well, I'd say they the thing they share is they
Speaker 12: motion frequently and with fast motion with condensed sets.
Speaker 10: But it's a little bit.
Speaker 12: Each team has definitely a different personality of how they're
Speaker 12: operating and why and who's doing it. Like I referenced
Speaker 12: last week, there's always a rhyme or reason on what
Speaker 12: they're trying to achieve. These guys definitely operate independently of
Speaker 12: those two, even though it's you know, similar family of offenses,
Speaker 12: probably similar terminology things like that, but uh, it's a
Speaker 12: it's a unique operation on their end.
Speaker 11: Some of the year, you inevitably get people start to
Speaker 11: speculate about at coach openings. Your name has been very
Speaker 11: popular in that conversation last few weeks.
Speaker 5: How do you deal with that?
Speaker 9: Do you compartmentalize it to you ignore it completely?
Speaker 3: I mean, you know what do you kind of make
Speaker 3: of that?
Speaker 10: Oh?
Speaker 12: Man, it's uh what, it's hard, it's hard to ignore
Speaker 12: it's it's it's an and it's an honor to hear
Speaker 12: about it. I mean, it's such a it's such a
Speaker 12: unique opportunity when it does come up. For guys that
Speaker 12: know me, I'm a one track guy. It's very difficult
Speaker 12: for me to kind of do two things at once.
Speaker 12: So try your best to you know, just focus on
Speaker 12: the things that we need to focus on, you know,
Speaker 12: which is the next game and getting our guys a
Speaker 12: position to win. But you know, I thought I thought
Speaker 12: you guys would probably asked about this at some point.
Speaker 12: But I think it's an opportunity to talk about. Like
Speaker 12: when we when we started our staff at the beginning
Speaker 12: of last year, we said we were all in all together,
Speaker 12: we wanted to do it together as a staff and
Speaker 12: be a collaboration. And so to have that opportunity or
Speaker 12: you know, have your name come up like that, like,
Speaker 12: I think it's really a reflection of art of our
Speaker 12: coaches and our staff together. I mean, we're we got
Speaker 12: a great staff man. Our coaches do a phenomenal job
Speaker 12: of prepping our guys on a week to week basis
Speaker 12: getting buy in. We have such a diverse group of thought,
Speaker 12: and we're not afraid to challenge one another too. So
Speaker 12: I mean we'll crack a joke and we have a
Speaker 12: good time.
Speaker 10: But those guys.
Speaker 12: There deserve a lot of credit to for for what
Speaker 12: the position that we've been able to put our guys
Speaker 12: in as well.
Speaker 10: Now the chast's time to throw in the NFL.
Speaker 7: How how challenging is it to kind of persruptive bread
Speaker 7: on them, you know, especially when it's first and second
Speaker 7: from the music pretty open?
Speaker 10: Yeah, easier said than done.
Speaker 12: Something that we're always stressing is marrying the Russian coverage together. Uh,
Speaker 12: you know, it's if you're it's easy to say we
Speaker 12: own a disguise and light of the quarterback, but if
Speaker 12: it's a progression read, it's very difficult. If they're just
Speaker 12: looking at spots and his eyes are very disciplined. Obviously
Speaker 12: they got really fast guys that they can create space.
Speaker 12: So if you're going to try our best to disrupt
Speaker 12: some timing, and obviously our Russian coverage or a rush
Speaker 12: has to come alive. You know, even if the balls
Speaker 12: out fast, if you're consistently you know, consistently bringing we finally,
Speaker 12: you know, do get him to hold the ball and
Speaker 12: try to get to a second or.
Speaker 10: Third option, maybe maybe it'll come alive.
Speaker 12: And then if the ball's out fast, if we can
Speaker 12: you know, get get our hands on the ball up front,
Speaker 12: that'll that'll go a long way as well.
Speaker 1: That was defensive coordinator Mike McDonald and last but not least,
Speaker 1: his offensive coordinator, Todd Munkett.
Speaker 13: Todd, how pleased were you with the offensive lines performance
Speaker 13: on Monday night? Yet?
Speaker 10: Good?
Speaker 4: I thought they did it. Thought they did a great job.
Speaker 4: I mean, that's that's a tough front man, well coached,
Speaker 4: play hard, they're aggressive. Playing at home, I thought, uh,
Speaker 4: you know, we did our fair share of chipping and
Speaker 4: some things to help sliding to certain people. But when
Speaker 4: they had opportunities one on one, I thought for sure
Speaker 4: they held their own. And you know, Lamar is one
Speaker 4: that you know, if you don't get a clean shot
Speaker 4: at him and there's some space, he does a good
Speaker 4: job of escaping.
Speaker 11: I thought you talked about, you know, La mar vision
Speaker 11: as a runner, excellent in your in your high curious's
Speaker 11: vision as you've passed here, particularly when he's you know,
Speaker 11: all those off script plays and extending the plays and
Speaker 11: things like that which get you've seen from him, you
Speaker 11: know you're gonna have a season over.
Speaker 4: Until Yeah, I do think that's the strength of his
Speaker 4: I do think he sees the field very well. You know,
Speaker 4: take for instance, well we'll talk about the scrambles first.
Speaker 4: You know, he does. He does a tremendous job, and
Speaker 4: we've worked awfully hard with our scrambled drills in terms
Speaker 4: of our spacing down the field reacting to the quarterback.
Speaker 4: But even beyond that, I think he's he's able to
Speaker 4: communicate what he sees and and you know, what he anticipates,
Speaker 4: and then when he gets outside the pocket, does a
Speaker 4: great great job seeing things. But you know, the touchdown
Speaker 4: to Zay, you know, more times than not on that
Speaker 4: we're trying to get the defense to move laterally and
Speaker 4: we're thinking outside post rail to the back. I don't
Speaker 4: even know if we ever hits a one time, you know,
Speaker 4: on that part of it. But he saw the reaction
Speaker 4: of the safety and made an unbelievable play.
Speaker 9: To be real, honest, Paul Leyley's progress and clearly getting
Speaker 9: more opportunities now it seems to be to take advantage.
Speaker 11: Of them as well.
Speaker 4: Who's oh yeah, I've never heard someone actually say it.
Speaker 4: It's like, Daniel, like, what is that? It's like your
Speaker 4: buddies in college when they have nicknames like Ski and
Speaker 4: someone would call and say, is Paul there, Paul Blagowski?
Speaker 3: Who's that?
Speaker 4: You know it's a Ski you know he know my name?
Speaker 4: All right, Daniel, Uh no, It's been great, you know,
Speaker 4: an opportunity from the play. You know, obviously Pat Pat's
Speaker 4: played a bunch you know previously, but to get him
Speaker 4: out there and get playing and uh, you know, with
Speaker 4: with our situation at tackle has been great.
Speaker 3: How unique is that?
Speaker 13: To have this rotation along the offensive line is not
Speaker 13: usually a spot. Do we see that type of constant
Speaker 13: rotation throughout the game? How's it been to have those
Speaker 13: guys rotated and keeping guys engaged without the course of
Speaker 13: the game.
Speaker 4: It is unusual, you know, it's but that's a credit
Speaker 4: to our personnel staff, you know, obviously having that depth
Speaker 4: where you feel comfortable doing that, right, I mean, and
Speaker 4: and that's been something that's helped us with with with
Speaker 4: Morgan and also Ronnie as they battle through you know,
Speaker 4: some nagging things that have continued. So, uh, it's been
Speaker 4: a huge plus for us.
Speaker 7: Got what are the challenges that's going against this fan
Speaker 7: yoke defense that, Yeah, I guess kind of does a
Speaker 7: lot of the same things that Mike step there's a
Speaker 7: man of guises and what is Lamar's his capability and
Speaker 7: you know best second play ability that you've talked about
Speaker 7: and maybe need guys as a kind of counter and.
Speaker 10: Coach for an offense.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So first off, you know, they do a tremendous job.
Speaker 4: To the naked eye, you would sit there and say
Speaker 4: they're not complicated, but they do a great job with
Speaker 4: their tools on whether it's upfront or in the back end.
Speaker 4: I think they do a great job. I think when
Speaker 4: you have what would be called a system, it's easier
Speaker 4: to adjust to what you do because they're used to
Speaker 4: how teams are going to try to attack them, and
Speaker 4: so they immediately can get to another tool or another
Speaker 4: answer based on how you attack him. I think they
Speaker 4: do a great job of adjusting They're guys play awfully
Speaker 4: hard and they're playing with a lot of confidence right now.
Speaker 4: You know, like anything m HM with Lamar is just
Speaker 4: you know that can trying to continue in the past
Speaker 4: game in terms of consistency and drop consistency in terms
Speaker 4: of where his eyes are at, which he's been doing
Speaker 4: a great job of. And then when the play breaks down,
Speaker 4: as we've said, as a two play quarterback, are our
Speaker 4: guys continuing to understand spacing reacting because that's that's got
Speaker 4: to be a big part of what we do.
Speaker 5: Todd, since we gave the Dolphins defense has been number
Speaker 5: one in points allowed and number one in the yards
Speaker 5: were game allowed, second in sacks. Just what are you
Speaker 5: seeing on defense that is clicking for them?
Speaker 4: And oh, it's hard. It's hard to really say other
Speaker 4: than you know, obviously they got Jayalen Ramsey back that
Speaker 4: gives you comfort at the one corner spot. But it's
Speaker 4: not as if they didn't have other pros playing. So
Speaker 4: that's that's a little you know, over the top. I
Speaker 4: look at games at the beginning and I see, you know,
Speaker 4: them playing well before I see them playing well.
Speaker 13: Now.
Speaker 4: Sometimes there's certain matchups you know that play against you
Speaker 4: or certain games that play for you. But I don't
Speaker 4: really see. I mean, they're doing the same things. They're
Speaker 4: playing awfully well, playing awfully hard, you know, So I
Speaker 4: don't I don't really. I know that's gonna sound bad
Speaker 4: when I say that that I don't see a difference.
Speaker 4: I thought they were really good at the beginning, and
Speaker 4: I think they're really good now. I mean that's you know,
Speaker 4: maybe in their minds they've cleaned some things up and
Speaker 4: they feel like they've given up less, you know, and
Speaker 4: played things a little bit more, you know, cleaner. They
Speaker 4: might have been going through the same things that we
Speaker 4: went through as a new coordinator and learning adjustments on
Speaker 4: the fly and how they're playing their defense, and you'd
Speaker 4: have to ask them, But I think they've played well
Speaker 4: all year. And I think if you asked coaches that
Speaker 4: have played against them, they feel awfully strong about how
Speaker 4: well they've played on defense.
Speaker 8: I wouldn't you know about Tyler landor bomb when you
Speaker 8: got the year and what he you know, mean around
Speaker 8: with him every day, how he goes about it or
Speaker 8: probably when he does on the field, how value to
Speaker 8: him has that favorite to.
Speaker 4: Your own been great?
Speaker 10: You know?
Speaker 4: I mean all he does is work. He's really smart,
Speaker 4: he's athletic, you know. So, I mean it's hard to
Speaker 4: to get a guy as complete as he is when
Speaker 4: you talk about his uh talent level, his intelligence. He
Speaker 4: loves playing the position. We really have outside of maybe
Speaker 4: the that I can think of, outside of the you know,
Speaker 4: the safety that we got with the snap, we haven't
Speaker 4: initiative snaps. I mean we haven't. It's been I mean,
Speaker 4: he's playing an elite level, you know. So. You know,
Speaker 4: at first, when I got here and I found out that, like,
Speaker 4: wasn't he the draft pick for Hollywood Brown, I was like, really,
Speaker 4: I mean that's what we got a center instead of
Speaker 4: a big time Why I don't Then we got yes,
Speaker 4: said perfect, said we got a and we got a center. Great,
Speaker 4: this is good stuff.
Speaker 9: Miami's pressure, you know, they got fifty two sacks, but
Speaker 9: it's not kind of like here, it's.
Speaker 4: Not one guy with eighteen or something like that.
Speaker 3: They've kind of different guys contributing that. What do they
Speaker 3: do to pressure wise? That makes them special?
Speaker 4: I think their interior guys are relentless. They do a
Speaker 4: great job of pushing the pocket, which brings the outside
Speaker 4: rushers into play. You know when they moved. You know,
Speaker 4: the linebacker you know out what's his name, what's forty three?
Speaker 4: I can and Kingo does a great job on the edge.
Speaker 4: He's athletic, he can get edgy, you know they do.
Speaker 4: They do a really good job. And like a lot
Speaker 4: of teams, you know, when you have relentless pass rushers
Speaker 4: and you're up in games, those are going to come.
Speaker 4: You know that that's a byproduct of teams are throwing
Speaker 4: the football. They do a great job of that. Wouldn't
Speaker 4: consider them a pressure team by nature, but I would
Speaker 4: say that they do a good job of picking their spots.
Speaker 4: I think Long is a tremendou linebacker blitzing wise, he
Speaker 4: gets real edgy, you know, and so you know, it
Speaker 4: just compounds. I think they're up and they're relentless. I
Speaker 4: think those are the things that you know, you'll see
Speaker 4: a lot of sacks of ball doesn't come out and
Speaker 4: they continue to fight, uh, you know, and push the pocket.
Speaker 3: So you go back and look.
Speaker 13: At think about some of the tape you watched when
Speaker 13: you took this job, and you saw how defenses were
Speaker 13: maybe trying to stop Lamar the runner at times.
Speaker 3: Do you notice the.
Speaker 13: Difference now when you watch film and see how defenses
Speaker 13: are guarded him.
Speaker 4: It's hard really for me to compare because when we've
Speaker 4: watched in the past one, I wasn't here, so I
Speaker 4: wasn't as in depth in watching it, okay, as thorough
Speaker 4: and we're a little bit different in terms of our
Speaker 4: personnel groupings. So it's a little bit different to compare,
Speaker 4: you know, when you're in multiple tight end groups in
Speaker 4: the last years so so, but certainly teams have had
Speaker 4: different plans in some common themes that they've tried to
Speaker 4: do too, to try and one a disrupted we do
Speaker 4: an offense and to corral him. So that is the
Speaker 4: challenge for us and for them, you know, to see
Speaker 4: what they're trying to do. But for the most part,
Speaker 4: you'll you'll have a few wrinkles. But when you play
Speaker 4: really good defenses, just like we're about to face, they
Speaker 4: didn't get really good by changing a lot of things.
Speaker 4: You know, you have a belief system and what you
Speaker 4: do and then you stick to it and then you
Speaker 4: can live with the results.
Speaker 7: I imagine that when you were looking at the film
Speaker 7: from last year, when you were in the off season night,
Speaker 7: I ever thought they'd made any if with all this
Speaker 7: last year has stood out, how close do you think
Speaker 7: he is to you know, that kind of player, that
Speaker 7: kind of performance, and what do you see from her
Speaker 7: as his field and kind of healthier of his past year?
Speaker 4: A great question, you know. I mean, you really can
Speaker 4: see with each day each week, him gaining more and
Speaker 4: more confidence, his ability to practice. Basically almost being out
Speaker 4: a year, not really, I mean, but missing the off
Speaker 4: season is a better way of putting in a lot
Speaker 4: of camp. But you can see his confidence beginning to grow,
Speaker 4: and he's playing faster, you can see that, and he
Speaker 4: has it in him. And so it's been better every
Speaker 4: week and he's been able to practice every week. And
Speaker 4: that's a big part of a player's development when you
Speaker 4: have a skill set that he has, and he loves football,
Speaker 4: he likes to practice. So it's just a matter of
Speaker 4: staying healthy in that development will continue to come.
Speaker 1: Today the locker room, we talk with one of the
Speaker 1: leaders of the defense, Roquan Smith. He really sets the
Speaker 1: tone for this defense. And here's what he had to
Speaker 1: say during his time with reporters.
Speaker 3: With the nentime.
Speaker 13: Now, you know, if all these December games, they're all big,
Speaker 13: but you go from one big matchup out in San
Speaker 13: Francisco to now the Dolphins come to town to potentially
Speaker 13: not just win the division, but now win the AFC.
Speaker 14: Yeah, it's definitely a huge game, but we're not making
Speaker 14: it uh any bigger than what it is. It's the
Speaker 14: next game on the schedule, and we're gonna treat it
Speaker 14: just like uh any other game throughout the regular season,
Speaker 14: and we're gonna be ready to rock and roll and
Speaker 14: gotta protect the house by any means.
Speaker 3: Saw you show up on injury?
Speaker 4: Cool with a pack injury?
Speaker 13: How you feel out right now?
Speaker 3: I feel great?
Speaker 14: You see me out there practice ready to go?
Speaker 3: Baby? What's some of the challenge except this team.
Speaker 14: Brands so yeah, No, I think it's a uh really
Speaker 14: talented team. Uh starting at the quarterback position, what's starting
Speaker 14: with the head coaching position? I think he's a uh
Speaker 14: actually like it uh personality you know from Afar in
Speaker 14: a sense, but uh in the way he uh carries himself.
Speaker 14: But like starting with two of Manu Treek on the outside,
Speaker 14: uh the running back uh three to one most twenty eight,
Speaker 14: A lot of speed out there. Tight ends play goodball
Speaker 14: as well, and they I think they just all work
Speaker 14: well together and it's definitely attract team on grass. But
Speaker 14: you know, we wouldn't like it any other way. We
Speaker 14: prefer to go through the best to be the best.
Speaker 14: So we're looking forward to the matchup. I think it's
Speaker 14: gonna be a great one.
Speaker 7: Name And you've said it other times.
Speaker 8: You love the way you play McDonald paul's game and.
Speaker 3: Works few can you spand on that a little bit?
Speaker 3: What what is it that you that you love so much?
Speaker 14: Uh? I just think it's a wizard. I think it's
Speaker 14: more so finds out what what teams struggle with, what
Speaker 14: teams struggle with, team's weaknesses and our strength and being
Speaker 14: able to like make those into a game plan, uh situation.
Speaker 14: So I think it's just that in a nutshell and
Speaker 14: just having everybody on the same page throughout the week
Speaker 14: and on game day just.
Speaker 3: Ready to rock and roll.
Speaker 14: So I enjoy playing in the defense and I think
Speaker 14: it's it's pretty sweet. So if you haven't played in them, hey,
Speaker 14: it's pretty sweet.
Speaker 15: You know how important is you mean?
Speaker 3: You can't hear that.
Speaker 15: I speed with your scouts, right, So how important is
Speaker 15: kind of mentally looking at the fellows in a week
Speaker 15: like this set track our team term, you know, and
Speaker 15: kind of gauging what your difference is gonna be whin
Speaker 15: they're actually sagas.
Speaker 14: Yeah, at the end of the day, Uh, the field
Speaker 14: is one hundred yards long, and what is it like
Speaker 14: fifty three yards wild?
Speaker 3: Fifty two how many?
Speaker 14: Yeah, yeah, something like that, uh yards wide, So you
Speaker 14: can only go so far. You know, there's a hundred
Speaker 14: yards this way and fifty is something uh going across
Speaker 14: that way. So when you look at it from not perspective,
Speaker 14: I think it's just more so doing our jobs and
Speaker 14: getting back to our responsibility.
Speaker 8: And I think if we.
Speaker 14: Do that, we'll uh slow slow a lot of that down.
Speaker 14: But you know, obviously, uh it's a lot easier said
Speaker 14: than done. But we're ready for it, and we're gonna
Speaker 14: be ready for it.
Speaker 3: How much motivation? How you know you win, you get
Speaker 3: that number one seed? How much motivation is that?
Speaker 14: Uh? I think that's that goes for both sides, if
Speaker 14: I'm not mistaken. I'm not sure, but uh yeah, it's
Speaker 14: definitely big. But I think it's the next game, honestly,
Speaker 14: and it's the next game, and it's like all livelihood
Speaker 14: versus their livelihood. So when you look at it from
Speaker 14: that perspective, Uh, it's very simple for any man. And
Speaker 14: we're at home, so you gotta defend your grass by
Speaker 14: any means. And we're definitely gonna invite them in and
Speaker 14: we're gonna have to do everything that it takes to
Speaker 14: get the job done. But we know it's not gonna
Speaker 14: come easy. But hey, nothing comes easy worth having you, right,
Speaker 14: so we'll be ready.
Speaker 15: Obviously you talk with this a little bit last week
Speaker 15: with the Niners, but the amount of emotion that Miami Bass,
Speaker 15: what's heat registering that to make sure all.
Speaker 3: Responsibilities forgot you?
Speaker 14: Honestly, man, I just think it's it's eye candy for sure,
Speaker 14: And honestly, I think it's just more so final formation.
Speaker 14: You get back to what you're doing. I think how
Speaker 14: I look at every single game, every single ponent I
Speaker 14: go up against, regardless of the amount of motions you're doing,
Speaker 14: I'm looking at the final formation, the final picture, because
Speaker 14: that's what you truly want to do out that picture.
Speaker 14: And like maybe some guys can't, like car like can't
Speaker 14: really visualize that see that in a sense, But that's
Speaker 14: how I look at things, and that's how me and
Speaker 14: PQ just try to look at things throughout the week.
Speaker 1: Since Kyle Hamilton is a really important player for this
Speaker 1: defense and he talk with reporters today at his locker.
Speaker 10: I'm good.
Speaker 6: Uh, day by day, it could have been worse.
Speaker 3: You think it, think it play Sunday.
Speaker 6: U, it's day by day, so evaluating, you know, short
Speaker 6: week out the day less to kind of evaluate everything.
Speaker 6: But I mean do everything I can to make through
Speaker 6: the game.
Speaker 3: Ky, what exactly how it looked like the reda got
Speaker 3: folded up underneath you? But did you reaggree is your
Speaker 3: injury essentially or yeah?
Speaker 6: It was the same thing. And you know, I was
Speaker 6: talking about taking the brace off before the games. It
Speaker 6: was annoying me, but something told me not to And
Speaker 6: I'm glad I didn't because when I was on a
Speaker 6: the brace Moudeer prevented something else is happening. But yeah,
Speaker 6: I just got my ankle rolled up and I guess
Speaker 6: that kind of went up into my knee and caused
Speaker 6: some knee pain.
Speaker 10: But I'm good.
Speaker 3: I wanted to play where you got the second interception
Speaker 3: and you were laying on the ground for a while there.
Speaker 3: What was going through your head at that time when
Speaker 3: you when you got hitting low into high.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I didn't even Obviously I didn't see the places
Speaker 6: after the game, and it looks kind of wild looking
Speaker 6: at it from that perspective, But I mean splitching obviously
Speaker 6: got hit on the ground and got landed on and
Speaker 6: kind of had to hit a hard reset on the ground.
Speaker 6: Caught my breath and then instead of the play was
Speaker 6: still going on. Just you know, they always preach front
Speaker 6: of the ball and good things happening. That's a it's
Speaker 6: a great play by Marlow at the same time, plaster
Speaker 6: and scrambling quarterback and uh, in the right place at
Speaker 6: the right time.
Speaker 13: How important was it? You know, so much talk about
Speaker 13: all the star players on the nine or side of
Speaker 13: the ball, but it was you guys and stars that
Speaker 13: ended up taking over the night.
Speaker 6: I mean, the same message before the game that we
Speaker 6: were saying, and you know, outside of the building, people
Speaker 6: are gonna have their own narratives on notions, and I
Speaker 6: could honestly care less. I think a lot of people
Speaker 6: here could care less about how good or bad or
Speaker 6: to somebody saying that we are. And I think the
Speaker 6: same ghost after a win like that, Uh, you gotta
Speaker 6: keep the same mentality. You can't feed in all the
Speaker 6: good press that you're getting now, and I feel like
Speaker 6: the same time, everybody in here is having the same
Speaker 6: mindset that we at before the game, going from.
Speaker 13: San Francisco's offense now on the AMAS.
Speaker 6: Yeah, there's some similarities there, but at the same time,
Speaker 6: personnel is completely different. They provide a bunch of problems
Speaker 6: on their side of the ball. They got a capable quarterback,
Speaker 6: you get a bunch of receivers and uh some running
Speaker 6: backs who are all really fast and do their job
Speaker 6: as well. And I think it's up to us to
Speaker 6: exect the game plan that we haven't played, which I
Speaker 6: think is a great one, and for us.
Speaker 10: To go out there and get a wink.
Speaker 3: In a different note, what has been the best thing
Speaker 3: for you working with Mike McDonald over the last.
Speaker 9: Two years, and when you make of his game being
Speaker 9: in all the speculation about the head coach opening exhibus.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean if that, you know, we're we're got
Speaker 6: a goal in mind. Still.
Speaker 10: We got to finish out what we started here.
Speaker 6: But if that were to happen, it would be as
Speaker 6: much aserve. You know, he's a young right star in
Speaker 6: our league and you know, just like the players are
Speaker 6: executing at a high level, so is he and we
Speaker 6: don't do that without him and all the other people
Speaker 6: of the stuff. So he's got a great plan place
Speaker 6: every week. And he's open to criticism for sure from us,
Speaker 6: you know when we're being a little a little sensitive
Speaker 6: and braddy about stuff. But he hears us what we're
Speaker 6: talking to man. I think that's a great quality would
Speaker 6: mean to you.
Speaker 9: Just lead to novid WINPEC pinch the number one. See
Speaker 9: you have that on you're right there on Sunday.
Speaker 10: Yeah, it was.
Speaker 6: We were kind of talking about it in the defensive ending.
Speaker 6: We get a two for one special this week. If
Speaker 6: we get a win, we win a division and we
Speaker 6: went to the conference and it doesn't get much bigger
Speaker 6: than that. I hope, I hope that we all have
Speaker 6: the mentality to come in and I know for a
Speaker 6: fact that we're all everything in this game, and I
Speaker 6: know that next week obviously it's a big game against
Speaker 6: Pittsburgh as well. But we got to focus on the
Speaker 6: task at hand, and we don't. Uh, we don't win
Speaker 6: this week, and we still leave things up here. But
Speaker 6: I think it's a good thing. And everything that we
Speaker 6: want in front of us is in our heads.
Speaker 10: Last one for Kyle Police put your reaction.
Speaker 8: I thought it was pretty cool.
Speaker 6: I didn't initially people were talking to me about it
Speaker 6: after the game, about whether I win or not, and
Speaker 6: I was like, okay, cool whatever, but uh, and then
Speaker 6: a bunch of people were coming and gratulating me, like
Speaker 6: I want MVP or something. But I mean, it's just
Speaker 6: another weekly accolade. I bet y'all can Dave who won
Speaker 6: the Defense Player of the Week in week seven. So
Speaker 6: it's it's cool for the time being, but we still
Speaker 6: got another another game to win.
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