Jerome Baker – October 7, 2021
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Thursday, October 7, 2021
LB Jerome Baker
(From a defensive standpoint, what do you feel most needs to improve? What have been the priority with you as a group with Defensive Coordinator Josh Boyer and Head Coach Brian Flores this week?) – “Just execution. We have guys that are trying to do as much as they can to help us. Sometimes it’s just doing your job that’s all that matters. Just executing, doing your job and letting us play together and execute, and the defense will do what we’ve always done. I think that’s been the message, just do your job and everything will work out.”
(The last couple of weeks without DT Raekwon Davis in the lineup, what does he provide you guys upfront that makes you guys kind of a better defense?) – “I mean he’s a big, massive, strong guy. I think the one thing we don’t give him a lot of credit for is he brings a lot of energy to us. It’s not the energy of ‘let’s go hard,’ it’s the energy of you just want to be out there and play with him. He goes out there and he goes hard for us. He’s just a big, strong guy in the middle of our defense. It always helps when you have guys like that. I’m definitely happy to have him back.”
(Following DT Raekwon Davis on social media, all offseason he was lifting weights and really working hard. Did you feel sorry for him that he had to be out the last couple of weeks and excited for him to be back?) – “I wouldn’t say I feel sorry for him. We have this relationship where we talk a lot of stuff to each other. I was basically telling him – just cracking jokes the whole time. But at the end of the day, he knows I love to have him out there and I want him to be out here. I know he’s excited to get out there and do great things on Sunday.”
(How do you joke?) – “He thinks he’s big and bad and nobody can step to him. Sometimes it’s the fear that nobody really talks to him. Me, I don’t care. He’s still my rookie. (laughter)”
(Is he your little brother too? We heard DT Christian Wilkins say he’s little bro.) – “I wouldn’t call him little bro. He’s a little big for that. (laughter) But he definitely has that spirit of a younger brother. I’m not about to call him my little brother, he’s too big for that. (laughter)”
(As a linebacker do you notice the big difference if he’s in front of you, taking up blockers and just kind of freeing you up a lot?) – “Yeah, just the pure mass of him, he takes up essentially three people. It’s him, and two other guys that usually have to block him. You can tell it’s a big difference, a big guy down there. It’s hard to move him. Double teams are going to happen, but it’s different when it’s a double team and the guy is not moving. We definitely need that and we’re excited to have him back.”
(Your thoughts on how you’ve been playing this year? It’s hard to match your numbers last year. You were in rare company, 100 tackles, five sacks – there was only two linebackers to do that. Are you pleased with how it’s gone for you the first four games personally?) – “I’ve never been a guy to focus on my stats, really. I’m more of a guy that says our defense needs to improve. That’s been the message all around, that we need to improve, we need to play better. That’s been my thing, I need to play better, I need to do better. When I say that, it’s I want this team to be the best that we can be. That’s my mentality. I think we’re all not happy with where we are right now and Sunday is a great opportunity to go out there and show that we can play with the great teams in this league. I’m excited for Sunday, I’m ready to get out there. We’re going against a great challenge. It should definitely be a fun one.”
(Last year, you guys had this identical start. The sky was falling, from us of course. Then you guys turned it around. What was the key to turning it around?) – “I’m not going to say it was a key or that it was a certain thing that happened. I think it’s one of those things where we have guys that want to make the play, they want to make the interception, they want to make the tackle. But in this defense, that’s truly not what it is. It’s about doing your job. If that’s setting the edge, if that’s filling the block, if that’s taking on double-teams, whatever it is. If that’s knowing your leverage on a third down coverage, I think that’s the thing that we just need to focus on what our individual task is. It will work out for us. And that goes for pretty much the whole team – offense, defense and special teams. If we just do our job, the plays are going to come to us and the games will start going our way. I think that’s the main thing. That’s the sauce. It sounds simple, but that truly is the recipe for it.”
(Is there frustration at all in the room because you all are better than a defense that would be ranked in the 20s, which is where you are right now, in terms of yardage. Is there a feeling like we’re better than this and we need to start showing it?) – “Yeah, it’s definitely a feeling of we need to go out there and really show that we’re one of the top defenses and one of the top teams out there. We’ve definitely had talks. We’ve definitely had just individual talks with our position groups, us as a defense, us as a team. We kind of took that approach of we’ve got to look in the mirror and we’ve got to stop blaming other people or blaming other things. We’ve got to really look in the mirror and turn this thing around for us. It’s not coaches, it’s not fans, it’s not media out there playing with us. It’s us. The only people that can really fix it is us and that’s the approach we have, and Sunday is a great opportunity for that.”
(So when guys are not doing their job and maybe they’re kind of all over the place, what does it look like then? Is it missed assignments? Is it guys having free running lanes? What does it look like guys are..) – “No and when I say this, it’s not to be – none of the guys we have are intentionally messing up or intentionally just losing their mind. A lot of the guys we have, they know exactly what they have to do, but it’s those little things of your hand placement is wrong or your leverage is wrong or it could be something so simple, but in this defense, those little things really – if you just keep doing little things, little things, little things – it adds up to losing games and that’s essentially what we need to turn around.”
(Could it be that teams have figured out this defense and know what’s coming and know how to counter it now? Because previously it was new.) – “Could it be? I mean you could always play the ‘could it be’ game, but essentially this defense just history-wise, going back all the way to the Patriots, it’s been just a great defense. So it’s hard to just say ‘could it be?’ But I think we’re not going to sit back and say ‘it could be this, it could be that.’ It could be the players on the field just not getting it done. And that’s what us as a team, us as a defense, that’s what we say. We’re not about to say the scheme is wrong. We’re not about to say the coaches are wrong. We’re not about to say anything is wrong. At the end of the day, we’re the ones on the field, we’re the ones that have got to turn it around. I think it definitely starts with us.”
(You’ve played against QB Tom Brady a lot. What comes to mind when you think about playing him obviously in a different jersey?) – “Greatness. He’s the greatest quarterback to ever step on the field. It’s truly an honor to play against a guy like that. For me, I’m a competitor. I think my earlier years in this league, I was starstruck of ‘this is Tom Brady. This is the guy I played Madden with my whole life. This is the guy that I looked up to growing up.’ But now I’m in a spot of I want to beat this guy. I want to go out there and ruin his day for him. (laughter) All credit to him. He’s definitely great, but at the end of the day, he’s the guy I’m competing against so just the competitor in me, I want to win. I want to walk off that field and feel that happiness and have everyone talk about us. That feeling is – you just compete for that, just to defeat another guy. So Sunday when it comes, I’m going to give all the credit to him now and it’s Tom Brady and this and that, but at the end of the day, I want to win the game so that’s what it’s about.”
(Do you know that you guys have the – the Dolphins have the best win-loss record against Tom Brady?) – “Yeah, I think it was the Patriots-Tampa game last week. They showed it on TV and I watched it, so yeah I’m aware of it. (laughter)”
(So you would play with QB Tom Brady in Madden growing up? You would pick the Patriots?) – “Yeah. Well, I was more of a guy that I did the fantasy draft thng, (laughter) and Tom Brady was always either if not the No. 1 quarterback, he was No. 2. So that was kind of a safe bet, go with a good quarterback and he was always one of those great quarterbacks.”
(What was the cooler moment? The first time you played QB Tom Brady or the first time you played as yourself in Madden?) – “Oh, the cooler moment was when I played with myself. (laughter) I think it was even cooler when my little cousins – they send me videos and it’s me and they’re – my little cousins are jokesters so if I drop a pick or if I get ran over or something, they’ll send me the video. (laughter) Those are like the cool moments that you never really thought about and now that I’m older, I don’t even play Madden like I used to. But seeing them and them sending me videos and them talking stuff to me, it’s always fun. But the conversation always ends as ‘I’m in the game.’ It’s definitely fun.”
