K Jason Sanders
(I know you’re laser-focused on Sunday, but do you remember how many times you’ve gone back and watched the fake field goal play, if at all, the last few days?) – “No, I don’t; but it’s like what I said. There’s four games left. You don’t want your season to be defined by something else you do that’s not good. You want to go out there and make your kicks and walk out of there 100 percent.”
(How many people texted you about the play that you haven’t heard from in years? Were there a number of those?) – “Sure; but at the same time, I want to focus on my job. I don’t want to take any outside elements that can distract me from coming in on Wednesday. I go into practice and try to do my job there.”
(The most random person who reached out to you. Was there like a grammar school teacher? Has there been anyone where you literally didn’t hear from them in six or seven years and all of a sudden you get a text?) – “No. Not really.”
(So it was more just friends, maybe? Might more just texts from friends, perhaps from New Mexico? Any from college?) – “There were a couple college teammates, yeah. Just the normal people that you know, family members…”
(Did you think P Matt Haack was going to throw it to you conventionally or were you a little surprised he just flicked it?) – “Matt was going to do his job, whether he was going to throw a nice spiral or he was just going to flick it like he did. He’s the one that had to do the heavy lifting on the field goal fake, so I think I give credit to Matt more than me. I was just the guy that happened to stand in the end zone falling to the ground with his hands out. (laughter)”
(That’s why you gave P Matt Haack the ball?) – “Yeah, 100 percent.”
(From a field goal standpoint, it’s gone well. Do you feel like you’re happy with how you’re hitting the ball recently?) – “I think I’m confident with how I’m hitting it. I try to avoid all of the numbers and take it one week at a time. Quite honestly, I don’t even know what my percentage is right now and I don’t really want to know. I want to go out each week and treat it like a new week and build off the kicks that I’ve had like going into Sunday, building off that 51-yarder I had in this last week and use that confidence to get you through this week.”
(You’re staring at a stretch now of three games out of four – the last four in potentially cold situations. What the bigger challenge there?) – “It’s the same thing. We had a couple of games last year in the cold weather. I believe (I went) 4-for-4 at the Packers, and I consider that a cold game. It’s just preparing the same way as you do every week.”
WR Trevor Davis
(How have you grasped the playbook so far? Do you feel like you can pick it up?) – “I’m learning it day-by-day. I had to do that when I moved to Oakland quickly and had a quick turnaround as well, so I’m kind of used to different offenses and some things are similar, some things are different; but at the end of the day, the offense is offense. You need to learn the concepts by themselves as well as the formations, so it shouldn’t be too bad.”
(Did anyone here – Head Coach Brian Flores or anyone – say they remembered you in a particular game either for Oakland or earlier in your career?) – “No, I haven’t gotten to talk about that. I haven’t been able to meet everybody yet. I’m getting there.”
(Does your head spin the first 24 hours on a new team? What’s that experience like?) – “I’m kind of used to it now after having the situation once going from Green Bay to Oakland. You’ve really just got to dive into everything, learn all the names you can and then really dive into the playbook as much as you can (and) try to get ready to play.”
(How late were you up studying the playbook the last couple nights?) – “I didn’t even sleep before I got here because it was a redeye flight, so I got in in the morning. I tried to get as much sleep as I possibly could before coming in here.”
(Did you go right from the flight Tuesday night to practice Wednesday morning?) – “Yeah.”
(How was practice Wednesday on no sleep?) – “It’s football. People have pulled all-nighters before. I might’ve got some (sleep), a little bit on the plane, but it wasn’t too bad. Take a little – whatever those little shot energy things are – and you’ll be good.”
(What’s the volume of material you have to learn this week? Is it 20 pages, 30 pages? I know a lot of it could be on an iPad, but how big is it?) – “Man, it is on the iPad, so I don’t even know. I’ve just been scrolling, so I don’t know. (laughter)”
(Is it a lot?) – “Yeah. Offenses are, they’re intricate; but at the same time, also you have packages that are just for certain weeks so at the end of the day, it’s not the full offense. Right now I’m trying to learn the whole thing and kind of learn things conceptually, but when it comes down to a specific week you’re in, it’s a lot less so hopefully you can hone in on that and then go learn the full offense after that.”
(Any skill guys you know on the team that you’ve sort of asked them for any input?) – “Of course (Patrick) ‘Patty’ Laird. I’ve played with him (at Cal). That’s one familiar face I have and then the other receivers in the room help me as well.”
(Is RB Patrick Laird the only guy you had the previous connection with?) – “Yes, when it comes to playing-wise. Yeah.”
(As far as the return game goes, that’s probably not as much the material that you have to know, you just do what comes natural to you. Do you feel like that might be where you can make more of an immediate impact come Sunday?) – “Yeah. Like you said, the special teams playbook is normally a lot easier than the intricate offense. Being able to do that would be nice; but I don’t know come this week, the next week – I have no idea on what’s going on yet.”
(Besides sleep, what’s the other thing about just day-to-day life that’s most impacted when you join a new team that week? Is there anything else that you just have to put aside, can’t do – talking to family? Anything like that?) – “Oh you mean like you can’t do?”
(Yeah, things you can’t do basically.) – “(laughter) Oh yeah, you’re locked away in your hotel room basically every night and just trying to learn as many plays as you can – just sitting on an iPad and looking at the time and setting your alarm clock. That’s really your life for the next couple weeks until you really get everything down (and) feel comfortable.”
RB Zach Zenner
(Even as tired as you were last night, did you still study for a few hours? How does that work on the first day on a new team?) – “(laughter) Of course. Yeah, I mean I’m trying to prepare. I hung out here for a while and studied all the way up until I called my wife and then went to bed.”
(You seem very level but for some guys, their first day on a new team when they’re claimed off waivers during the season, do you think it can cause anxiety? Can it be stressful just in terms of being overwhelmed with a lot of material?) – “It’s definitely stressful but it’s just part of the game. The majority of players in the NFL, this will happen to them at some point. There’s probably – I don’t know what the percentage is but I would estimate it’s a low percentage of individuals who start their careers somewhere and end their career there.”
(Head Coach Brian Flores told us today that he actually studies all of the waiver guys who are available as obviously the General Manager Chris Grier does. Did Flores say anything to you which made you realize that he knows you and has seen your work? Was there any exchange like that?) – “We had a meeting, for sure. I know that he’s a smart guy. I know that he’s up on all of that stuff like you said. He knows what’s going on throughout the league, is paying attention and that was clear.”
(Did anybody in the building – General Manager Chris Grier or a position coach or anyone – say I remember you in a particular game? Was there a particular moment that somebody mentioned to you?) – “No. Most of it has just been trying to help me learn what’s going on. Maybe we’ll get to some of those other conversations in a week or two.”
(One last thing – what’s the level of complexity here with learning assignments as a running back and special teams guy compared to previous stops? Is it comparable? More difficult?) – “I think it’s comparable. It just depends. The football concepts are very similar across teams but the language is different, so that’s the main issue.”
Head Coach Brian Flores
(A couple of things on the running game – I know no one can be happy with the 3.1 per carry average. I know it’s always a combination of things with the running game. Would you say that the blocking has been more of an issue than the running backs finding holes? And also, who has your best run blocker been this year?) – “Like you said, there’s a lot of things that go into it. I think it’s a combination of the things you just mentioned. Sometimes it’s blocking. Sometimes it’s running. Sometimes it’s receivers not getting the correct guys. Sometimes it’s miscommunication. Sometimes it’s – it’s a myriad of things. At the end of the day, you don’t point at just one thing. It’s never one thing. You just try to get all of it right and if we can get everybody on the same page – and again, it’s a hard thing to do – get 11 guys on the same page, execute versus defensively what they’re giving us – but we’ve got to be able to do it. We’ve got to do it more consistently. It’s something we’ve talked about for a lot of weeks now, and I think they’re working at it. I have to give credit to the defenses that we’ve seen. We’ve played against some good fronts, and I think the score plays a role in how much we’ve been able to run; but every game is a little bit different and we’re not going to make excuses or say, ‘hey, it’s this or that.’ We have to block better. We have to run better. We have to do everything a little bit better.”
(Who’s been the best run blocker do you think of your linemen?) – “I think – you could point to one guy, but one guy is not going to get it done. I’m not going to point out one guy. I think we all have to do a better job, starting with me. That’s my message to the team. It is. One’s not going to get it done. That’s my answer to that.”
(Offensive Coordinator Chad O’Shea singled out QB Ryan Fitzpatrick and C Daniel Kilgore as two leaders of the offense who maybe corral the younger guys together when you guys are kind of trailing in games and leading the comeback. Who are some guys on your defense that really have all the players kind of locked down and locked in when things are going not so great?) – “(Jerome) Baker, (Davon) Godchaux, Raekwon (McMillan), Jomal Wiltz, Eric Rowe – I think all of those guys. I think this is a team that feels like we can battle back and get ourselves back in games when we’re down. I’d like for us to not play that way and try to play a little bit earlier in games. It’s something we’ve talked about a lot among other things, but I think we’ve got a lot of guys that have belief in each other. We all know there’s no quit. We’re going to keep competing, and if you do that, things turn in games. You need that belief in order to get back in games and to start games as well.”
(How has LB Sam Eguavoen done this season, especially relative to his transition from CFL to NFL?) – “I think he’s made a lot of improvement since the day he got here, really since we started spending time with him. This is a guy who works extremely hard. Football is important to him. He studies. His preparation is very good in all areas defensively and on special teams. Whatever roles we ask him to perform in, he learns it quickly and does it to the best of his ability and we’ve asked him to do a lot of things in the kicking game and defensively in different groupings and different positions; so I think he’s made a nice adjustment and I still think there’s a lot more room to grow and develop. We’re going to use these last few weeks of the season to do that and then hopefully that gives us a good start to what’s next to come.”
(How has LB Sam Eguavoen done in areas of physicality – run stopping, tackling and things like that?) – “I think he’s a physical guy. I think he plays downhill and is not afraid of contact. When we ask him to set the edge, he’s been able to do that. I think he’s a tough, physical guy and hopefully we’ll continue to see more of that from him throughout this week in particular and then the rest of the year.”
(What does DT John Jenkins bring to your defensive line? What would be his most underrated asset?) – “Leadership. I would say, I think that is underrated. He’s the veteran guy in the room, and he’s been on some good teams, around some good players and brings that experience and that leadership to the room. He’s a good player, too. He really does a good job with fundamentals, technique, specifically on first and second down. He’s a hard guy to move, and I think he’s played really solid football for us.”
(How does the run game philosophy change if at all, now that you’ve gone from RB Kenyan Drake to RB Kalen Ballage and now you’re with RB Patrick Laird? How do things change?) – “I don’t think it really changes much. We want to run the ball efficiently. That’s always at the forefront, and we want to move the ball efficiently in the run game, in the pass game, in the screen game, in the play-action game; but specific to the run game, nothing really changes, I would say. We’ll mix the scheme runs with the zone runs with the various runs we have, and at the end of the day, it comes down to execution. I have confidence in all our backs. We wouldn’t change what we would do for – I don’t think we have to change what we would do for Myles (Gaskin) or Patrick (Laird) or (Zach) Zenner or De’Lance (Turner). We just have to execute better than we have.”
(You’ve added four players in the last couple of days. Would you and General Manager Chris Grier and Vice President of Football Administration Brandon Shore just want to get a look at as many players as you can over the last month in practice settings to see if maybe you have something there and of the four, anyone that you remember in particular that you had seen in the scouting/pre-draft process or in games that stood out to you?) – “Yeah. All of these guys – obviously you guys know (I have) a background in scouting, so I watch a lot of – I watch everybody. The guys we brought in, I watched them all and we feel good about them. Mack Hollins for instance, he’s a tough, physical wide receiver, plays in the kicking game. He’s had some production offensively and in the kicking game. We like him. He’s a guy that obviously, we just saw him, so we know a lot about him and the rest of the group – Evan (Brown) with the Giants – we watched him in the preseason. I watch all this stuff, so anyone we feel like can help us get better that we feel like has some developmental potential, we’ll look into it. We don’t make every move we could possibly make, but the ones that we think feel like will help us, we try to make.”
(When you do look at these guys before you add them to the roster, how much film and how long are you taking to watching these things? Do you have the film cut for you so you can see some things beforehand? What’s that process?) – “I watch a lot before I make a determination on what I think a guy can or cannot do. My process is a little different than I guess some other people. I take a good amount of time once a name comes across my desk, or we check the waiver wire on a daily basis. I watch a good amount of it along with our next opponent. I’ve got a routine on how I’m doing this. We’re not going to delve into my exact routine right now. (laughter) But yeah, I do spend some time.”
(Is that process that General Manager Chris Grier or someone else in the front office will say ‘hey we’re looking at this guy, tell me what you think?’ And then you get back to Chris or someone else?) – “That’s fluid. There’s a lot of communication from that standpoint. I’ve looked at the wire every day for the last 15 years. It’s just part of my routine and process. I know all of the – or I look at, at least – all of the transactions on a daily basis. Chris and the personnel staff does the same thing. I just think that’s part of working in this league.”
(When you look at the wire, what percentage of players do you think that you know just based off looking, playing and watching football?) – “I know a lot of them. I’d say when I was in personnel, I knew pretty much all of them. When you get into coaching, you know the guys you’ve played and you know most of the league; but there are some teams you haven’t seen and some new players that have been acquired. You don’t see all of the draft picks so maybe not as much when you are coaching, but this is a different role. I spend more time on – the draft last year, obviously I knew a chunk of those players and the rookies that are in the league now, I know the lion’s share of those guys, and I’d say over the next couple of years I’ll know most everyone. Hopefully I’ll know everyone.”
(WR Trevor Davis is one of the new guys you brought in here. Where do you see him making the most immediate impact?) – “Well he’s got return value – kickoffs and punts. He’s fast, he’s big and he’s had some production offensively as well. Anybody who comes in here, the opportunity they receive is going to be up to them and how they perform in practice. Trevor had a nice practice yesterday and we’ll see how it goes today. That’s the case for everyone. You guys have heard me say that every day that I’m up here.”
(Going back to the waiver wire and mining it for gems, what’s one or two guys who you’re really proud of that you spotted on the waiver wire and really feel good about, ‘Hey, this guy really panned out.’) – “I could name a couple of guys but it’s not a one-man show. I think it’s the entire staff. We have a really good personnel staff here. They do a good job of uncovering guys and I’m not going to sit here and say I’m 100 percent on draft picks or free agents. No one is, but having that background I think helps me a lot. But again, it’s a team collective effort. It wasn’t me who found any specific player. I think that part of it is about having strong opinions on players and being able to forecast and predict what guys are going to do. I guess I feel confident in that area as well as I feel confident in our staff to get that part of it right.”
(I’ve heard other coaches say you guys play and coach with house money, and that you are playing with nothing to lose. What do you think about that aspect of it, and is that something you enjoy or appreciate being said about you?) – “We’re aggressive and we’re going to play to win. If we feel like there’s a place where we can gain an advantage, we’re going to try to do that; but I think every team does that. As far as playing with house money, I guess you can say that. We’re going to play to win. We’re going to play to win and if there is something that we like and we feel like we can make a play on, we’re going to try to do that. We’ve got a group of guys in there who practice hard and compete. You don’t win games with trick plays in this league. That’s just not how it works. You have to be able to execute on play-to-play basis and play consistently and we need to do that.”
(How would you assess G Michael Deiter’s growth?) – “Deiter, I think he’s had a solid rookie year and he’s continuing to develop and get better on a day-to-day basis. He’s had some ups and downs, and he just needs to continue to trust the process, play with consistency and play with the same effort, grit and toughness on a play-to-play basis. I think he’s tried to do that, and we’re going to stay on him to do that, that’s for sure.”
