(On if the corners will rotate on DeAndre Hopkins) “Obviously, he is a dynamic player, and he is Watson’s go-to guy. He is a person that we have to know where he is at on the field. They have kind of changed some things around since last time we played them. He lines up all over the place now where usually he was just the backside ‘X’ for the most part, but you know, obviously we have to plan for him. I feel comfortable with our plan if we put A.J. [Bouye] over there or whoever we put on him, we feel comfortable with our plan, but he is tough to defend.”
(On if Tre Herndon and A.J. Bouye will have to defend him at different times) “Yes, they will both be out on the field at the same time. They might be over there, they might not. I am not really sure yet. It is early, we do not leave until 6 p.m. today, so we will figure out what we are going to do there.”
(On if there is a way the team can give the defensive backs help against DeAndre Hopkins) “Yes. I think at times when Jalen [Ramsey] played, we gave him some help and did some different things. You have to at least have eyes towards him, let’s just say because he [Hopkins] is his go-to guy not only on third downs, but on first and second downs. We have to do some things creative-wise to try and eliminate as many catches and touches as he can get.”
(On what his game plan is) “Try not to let them score is our game plan going in. Like I said, I think ‘Hop’ [DeAndre Hopkins] is obviously excellent, but what really makes them go, I think, is their quarterback. He is probably the most dynamic player that we will face all year long. He can go throw the ball extremely well and he really hurts you with his legs. Not only do we have to worry about ‘Hop,’ but we have to worry about the quarterback.”
(On how he feels about his linebacker play) “The [new linebackers] have been here another week, which makes me feel more comfortable. We are not just throwing them in there with three days of practice. Najee [Goode] is back this week, so he will be back in the starting lineup with Myles [Jack]. Obviously with the outside linebacker stuff, Leon [Jacobs] is still not back, but Austin [Calitro] has played both positions, which really helps us. We feel more comfortable obviously this week than we did last week of playing the guys that are new.”
(On how Myles Jack has progressed as the season has went on) “He has played extremely well, especially the last two or three weeks, executing the game plan, getting us lined up as we keep going here with our personnel. He has to get everybody lined up, so it was impressive how he did it last week with the guys that we had in and then obviously D.J. [Hayden] went down, so we had to play a different nickel. He is doing a nice job of just quarterbacking our whole defense.”
(On if NFL defenders take it personal when a team runs for a lot of yards on them and if the team rallied after the Carolina performance) “Calais [Campbell] mentioned yesterday that I think we haven given up 50 or some yards rushing in the last two ball games. He obviously was very impressed with that and we were as a coaching staff. When somebody can turn around and just hand the ball off, it is the easiest thing to do in football and especially when we are an eight-man front team and you get that many yards on us, it is not good. We communicated that with our team. We were obviously not pleased, they were not pleased after the Carolina game. They take it to heart and we have to be able to stop the run because we have some good pass rushers. We took each week with our D-line – you have to earn the right to rush the passer and to do that, we have to stop the run and they have done it the last couple weeks.”
(On how much credit Myles Jack should get for the defensive turnaround) “He is our quarterback. He is our Gardner Minshew II or Nick Foles of the defense, whatever you want to say. He takes a lot of pride in being the quarterback and getting those younger guys lined up. Especially early in the week last week, Austin [Calitro] had not really played for us on defense. Myles is not only getting us lined up, he was getting him lined up. You have to give a lot of credit to Myles.”
(On what the preliminary plan would be if the team does not have D.J. Hayden) “We have two other guys that have played nickel. Tre [Herndon] has played nickel, [Breon Borders] has played some nickel. Tae Hayes, we just got him off the practice squad, so we have three different guys that we can play if D.J. [Hayden] does not go. D.J. is getting better and better each day, so we will see what it is game time with where D.J. is at.”
(On his reaction to Tre Herndon’s game last Sunday) “I was excited for him obviously. He has put in a lot of work. We talked about it in these situations earlier. He does everything right. He works his tail off, he studies and for him to come out with two interceptions last week … Both of them were really nice catches, too. He has some good ball skills and you can tell our whole team was excited for him for how hard he works and to have that success last week.”
(On Taven Bryan’s improvement) “The biggest thing is you see him getting off the ball. He is disruptive. We always knew he was a strong handed guy that could play in the run game, but what he gives us in the pass game is that real good push inside because he is so strong. I think that has really helped our outside rushers where the quarterback can’t step up. Those guys [the outside rushers] get the stat numbers, but as a coaching staff, we know a lot of that is from the inside push. Not only from Taven, but from Calais [Campbell] and Dawuane [Smoot] on third down. He has gotten better and better. He has to continue to play well for us for us to play well.”
(On how much momentum helps the pass rush) “I think we talked about turnovers and they come in bunches. The same thing with sacks. You get a couple sacks early and those guys start frothing with the mouth. It is really good to see the pressure and the disruption that we have and once they get to third down, all they want to do is rush. They get excited and they see other guys and it kind of gets them even more jacked up for third down.”
