Transcripts

Search Transcripts
Jonnu Smith – December 2, 2024 Download PDF version

Monday, December 2, 2024

TE Jonnu Smith

(What can you say about your season? You’ve got – if I’m not mistaken – career highs in receptions and yards, you’ve been a main part of the offense through that three-game winning streak. What do you think of your season and maybe your last two seasons even.) – “All praise to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, first and foremost. Just having individually, the best year of my career, so that’s one thing that I’ve always understood that individuals don’t win football games. Lighting up the stat sheet doesn’t win football games, but I understand that individuals having individual success, if the bulk of the team is having individual success; then that’s going to lead to a bunch of wins, so I’m just trying to do my part and be the best version of myself for this team to put us in the best situation to win games.”

(Head Coach Mike McDaniel has talked a lot about overplay, capitalizing on overplay as an offense. How have you seen defenses adjust over these last few games as you’ve gotten more and more involved to try and take you away from the offensive gameplan?) – “We’re just taking what the defense gives us, man. You can’t play everything. You can’t have your cake and eat it, too, in this league. So we just continue to try to take what the defense gives us and just continue to execute. Like I said, you can’t guard everybody, you can’t guard every area of the field; so it’s just very imperative to us to capitalize when we see big space and opportunities to make big plays, whether it be down the field or underneath.”

(What’s the mindset of this team right now?) – “One game at a time, one game at a time. We’ve still got life, very optimistic, a lot of warriors in our locker room, a lot of fighters in our locker room, proud to be a part of this team, 100 percent and we’re going to continue to fight, continue to put our hard hats on and go to work.”

(This offense had a stretch of games where the run game got going, then now it hasn’t been as much. Now QB Tua Tagovailoa has been throwing the ball around to you and even some to WR Tyreek Hill and WR Jaylen Waddle, what do you think are some of the ways that can lead to some more balance? Both getting that run game and that pass game working together.) – “Yeah, we’ve got to find some obviously tranquility within the offense, you know what I mean? When I say tranquility, I mean more so balance, not peace. You don’t want a peaceful football team, that wouldn’t be a good football team. (laughter) But you definitely want to find some more balance in the offense and just get things back to where we know they can be. Like I said, it comes with evaluating the film, holding each other accountable, looking ourselves in the mirror, seeing what we can do better, and we started with that approach today and that’s just going to kind of be the mindset going forward.”

(Do you feel it is an emphasis for the team to get the run game back going?) – “Absolutely. If you want to win in this league, you’ve got to run the ball, plain and simple. I know even as a pass catcher – obviously would love to be in an offense where you throw the ball 40, 50 times a game. But if you’re not running the ball well, you’re just not going to win in this league. If you’re not going to run the ball consistently, consistently well, you’re just not going to win in this league so that’s just a point of emphasis that we strive to reach in this organization.”

(What do you think has been the key over these last three games? This has got to be one of the best three-game stretches of your career. What do you think has been the key?) – “Yeah, oh man, like I said earlier man, for me personally my faith in Jesus Christ has allowed me to just go out there, play free, play confident, you know what I mean? My faith has allowed me to know that I’ve been blessed with a gift that can’t go to waste, so it’s got to be daily work put in. Whether that be me staying after practice, me going out there before practice, recovering my body – rest is also a huge part of maintaining a high performance because you’re nothing without your body in this league – in any professional sport. So definitely got to take care of your body, but just keeping my mind right and again, just coming up here every day, being joyful that this amazing opportunity I’ve been blessed with to play this game that I love, that I still am in love with and just go out there, be free and be the best version of myself.”

Search Transcripts

Weekly Archives