Christian Wilkins – December 5, 2023
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Tuesday, December 5, 2023
DT Christian Wilkins
(Obviously I’m sure you try not to pay attention to the standings, but I’m sure you’ve been told multiple times that you guys are No. 1 in the AFC. Do you focus on that? Do you talk about it?) – “What day is it? Is it the last game of the season?”
(No.) – “Then I don’t care. Plain and simple as that. I will look up at the end when it’s time to look up and whenever that matters, but right now that doesn’t matter. We’ve still got five games left to play and that’s the mindset that we need to take in going into these last few games and these last few weeks and just have a mindset of dominance and being present in the moment so we can have our best foot going forward.”
(Outside of the standings and whatnot, just talk about the overall growth of the team just from start to right now.) – “Again, to the point I kind of just made, I think just the growth has come from a daily buy-in and a daily focus of being our best individually and then that obviously leads to team success and that’s being better each and every day, each and every game. We still haven’t played our best game yet. We’re doing some good things, but we’re still on that quest for perfection day-in and day-out and that’s the ultimate goal.”
(It’s weird that you say that because I actually agree with you. I don’t think you guys have. Even though you put 50 up on Denver, you probably could’ve played better. You didn’t even some of your key players that game. What will it take to play at your best?) – “Again, just the same thing I keep saying, same thing I’m hitting. Just getting to the point where you’re making every day meaningful, intentional and just focusing on that because then when you get to the game, it’s all easy and then you’re just playing good ball. But yeah, we haven’t played that perfect game yet and it’s hard to do. It’s hard to get there, but again, we want to continue to peak and continue to hit our stride especially at this point in the season. This is when you want to peak and play your best ball.”
(When we talk about characteristics of certain players, when you talk about S DeShon Elliott and LB David Long Jr., you hear the word intensity. Tell me about that aspect of their game and what they bring to the table from that standpoint.) – “Definitely. I’ll speak on those guys a little bit because they’ve been great additions to our team. Not just because of their talent and what they can do on the field, but just the energy they bring, their vibes. Just good dudes to have around and high character dudes who love ball who just fit right in and fit like a glove when they came in just as far as a personality standpoint and they’re able to help us a lot. That’s a good word to describe both of those guys because typically just as people, they’re very good people, good character guys, pretty chill for the most part. But when they’re out there playing, they’ve got that juice, they’ve got that intensity and ball is important to the them and they want to be their best. I really like having those guys around and they’re big pieces to our team.”
(What are the challenges of playing without LB Jerome Baker? I don’t think you’ve ever played without Jerome.) – “I don’t think not one game. ‘Bake’ (Jerome Baker) has been here since I have and since before me. He does a lot of good things for our team, but one of the fortunate things for our team is we have a lot of guys who can step up when their number is called and that’s important for good teams and we’re lucky to be able to have that. Duke (Riley) or whoever it is, who has to step up and play more, will be ready and I’m sure of that. Obviously you don’t ever like to lose guys, but if other guys who we know are reliable and dependable can step up, that’d be great.”
(I know you’re a guy who has a weekly routine. Does Monday Night Football throw that off a little bit?) – “I’m not going to lie. I’m not going to lie. It’s going to be tough for me because I’m such a routine guy and just kind of having an extra day, and as much as I love playing and getting to the games, you’ve got to wait an extra day, a full extra day – you’re at night now. But I’ll be fine, I guess. I got to do it, but I’m typically so routine that I’m going to be twiddling my thumbs and I’m going to have to fill some time, but there’s a lot I can do to fill it with – watch some extra tape or something. I’ll figure it out.”
(So was today that extra day or is Saturday that extra day? How does your calendar work?) – “Right now I’m just trying to keep my week as normal as possible. Today was my normal Tuesday for the most part and I’m kind of figuring out what I want to do with a couple days later in the week, but I’ll figure it out.”
(With Christmas right around the corner – non-football question – I’m asking, what’s the best Christmas gift you’ve gotten and what’s the worst Christmas gift you’ve gotten and now the situation you’re in as an NFL player, do you find yourself having to play Santa Claus?) – “That’s a good point because I was going to probably say, I’ll start off with the worst. The worst gift I probably get is nothing. Because now for some reason, when you get to this point, apparently gifts aren’t important. People think gifts aren’t important to you that you don’t care about nice, kind gestures and thoughts and that’s kind of messed up. You definitely find yourself playing Santa Claus with a big-ass bag. You’ve got to fit a lot of gifts in there for a lot of different people. That’s definitely for some reason as of late in my life, I haven’t received a lot of Christmas gifts. I don’t know maybe specifically what was the best gift I’ve ever had, but I just knew Christmas was always special and meant a lot to me as a kid. Just a little personal – I grew up with a big family, a lot of kids and my mom always worked very hard to make sure we had good Christmases. Like I remember – those are some of the best memories I had as a kid. Just waking up, all eight of us, nine of us running downstairs – energy galore, stairs about to break and I was ready to open gifts on Christmas morning. So I always like this time of year and it means a lot to me and I remember I had Nerf hoops, I had a Game Boy one year that I really loved, a Power Rangers kite – I was out there in the neighborhood running with my kite, with my Power Rangers purple kite so that was really cool. Some jacks. I learned how to play jacks and marbles with I was young. And then just always spending time with family which is important which I encourage everybody to do and definitely appreciate it.”
(So with teammates, do you guys exchange gifts?) – “That’s a big thing that we like to do. Each group kind of does something different or some guys like to go as far as doing stuff for the team. Obviously like ‘Cheetah’ (Tyreek Hill) did, and I did appreciate that because again, to my point earlier, we don’t get a lot of gifts, so I definitely appreciate my guy ‘Cheetah’ hooking up the team. But yeah, we all kind of do our own thing there.”
(So what can somebody get you? Because people always think “well, this guy can buy whatever he wants, he probably has everything.”) – “Yeah, but again, I’m a simple man and again for me it’s always more the thought that matters and in my older years – when I was a kid, I didn’t necessarily, ‘no, I want this,’ but I definitely appreciate that more now. It’s the thought that matters. Like it’s nice to be thought of or it could be a picture of an experience we had or whatever it is.”
(Somebody could knit you a sweater…) – “Yeah, a sweater and I’ll appreciate that. A nice hot meal or something. I don’t ask for much, so whoever’s listening, whoever’s thinking – get your boy something nice and thoughtful, I appreciate it. (laughter) But more for me, it’s definitely about the giving and I don’t just say that as a cliché thing. It’s nice to – especially for people that don’t expect much or anything, it’s nice to be able to give people a little bit extra this time of year.”
(So QB Tua Tagovailoa took his guitar playing to the ManningCast. I’ve seen him play ukulele, but I’ve never seen him play the guitar and he’s clearly taking his game up a level. Has he played for his team?) – “Not really and we might have to encourage him to do that or something, learn a little Christmas – we can go caroling or something. He can play his guitar. I don’t know. Learn a couple Christmas hits. But yeah, he did his thing last night on the show. I saw that and I was kind of singing to a couple of the songs he was playing and I guess Tua is a man of many talents and I didn’t know he could play the guitar like that. Again, more the ukulele, but he sounded pretty alright.”
