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Elijah Campbell – November 22, 2021 Download PDF version

Monday, November 22, 2021

DB Elijah Campbell

(Does it take a special mindset as an NFL player to be content and entirely motivated if you’re only pretty much playing on special teams and not on offense or defense, in your case?) – “I guess you could say it could take a special mindset to be a specialist and accept that role as a specialist. I take pride in special teams so I’m just thankful for having that opportunity and being able to go out there and do what I can to help support the team.”

(There’s been talk about how practices have been better lately. Not necessarily that being the reason behind the three-game winning streak but what does a good week of practice or crisp practice look like to you as a player?) – “I would just say that coach, about halfway through the season, we hit the halfway mark and he said from here on out, ‘We’re going to have a better half of the season. We’re playing a whole different type of football.’ I think when he said that, the whole team kind of bought into that and ever since we started our little streak, practices have had a little more energy to them. Can you ask the question again? Sorry, I don’t want to get off topic.”

(You’re doing great. What does a good week of practice look like?) – “A good week of practice? You come out and start with good energy the first week. You kind of want to minimize the mistakes in the beginning. There’s always going to be mistakes in the beginning of the week but as long as every day we continue to gradually get better, then by the time Friday comes, we have that crisp practice, we can put Wednesday and Thursday out of the window. As long as Friday we come with that crisp practice and everything is completed and we’re confident, I think that’s when we know we had a good week of practice.”

(Does the shift from a walkthrough on Friday to a walkthrough on Thursday, does that impact it do you think? That happened maybe a month ago.) – “I don’t know. I don’t try to get too deep into that. I kind of just go with whatever the schedule is. If it’s been working, it’s been working so we kind of just roll with it. You can say that had an effect on it but I just think we came with a different attitude the second half of the season and things have been going in our direction. We’re just trying to keep stacking these wins up.”

(I wanted to ask you more about that turning point that you mentioned. When you said coach said we’re going to play a different type of football, I assume you mean Head Coach Brian Flores, not one of the coordinators right?) – “Yes.”

(For you personally, hearing those words, what were you thinking and what were you feeling about this sort of reset that the team was undergoing?) – “I think it was just a mutual understanding amongst the whole team. We were 1-7 so I felt like we all knew that something had to change. We all knew that we just weren’t playing our best football. I think it was just something that needed to be said and once we all – you kind of just have to put it out there in the air and then it was the elephant in the room, so he kind of went into the team meeting and said it and everyone was kind of like, ‘Alright, we need to turn this around.’ We kind of all bought in and things have been on the up trend from there.”

(Just to follow those two questions, when it got to 1-7 with a seven-game losing streak, was Head Coach Brian Flores positive with the team as part of that message as opposed to chewing you guys out a lot? Was there an optimistic tone in his voice and in his message?) – “Yeah. I mean he’s always an optimistic coach. There’s always the goal of winning. You’re never just going to lay down and accept what was happening to us. I feel like every week we were optimistic and we always believe we should win every week. I don’t know. It was just a shift. We had so many close games in the beginning of the year. I just felt like it was a time that the ball was going to start going our way. I think it was just that time of year that everybody knew there needed to be a shift. He wasn’t necessarily chewing anybody out or getting on anybody individually. It was just accountability like we’ve got to do better.”

(Was there any message with it that he believes in you guys? Because there were never any cuts, firings or anything like that when it got to seven losses in a row. So was the message delivered that he believed in you guys?) – “I wouldn’t say that was what he said verbatim but pretty much. He did say we’re sticking with our guys and we trust in you guys. Yeah, he did believe in us and he still does. We have all of the pieces on this team from defense to offense to special teams. Like I said, it’s just certain things and certain plays didn’t go our way in big games and now the ball is going our way. We’re just going to keep rolling with it and just keep stacking these wins up hopefully, and keep our head down and keep grinding.”

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