Josh Boyer – October 13, 2020
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Tuesday, October 13, 2020
Defensive Coordinator Josh Boyer
(Since this was a good overall performance in terms of pressure and coverage and it was just a lot of good, what may be not so obvious after you reviewed the film that you were very pleased with?) – “I think win, lose – I think you go back every week and for me personally, it starts with myself and then you kind of look at the things that we’re doing and you kind of just self-evaluate. And I think there’s always good things and bad things each week, and the things that we’re not doing so well, we need to work hard to improve that because ultimately they’ll show up again. A lot of coordinators in this league, they’ll test you to make sure that you got stuff corrected. We’re working hard to do that, so I think the approach is the same. You start over. We’re done with San Francisco. We’re onto the Jets. We’ve got a division opponent this week. It’s a big game for us, and all our time, effort and energy is into the Jets.”
(I wanted to ask you about S Eric Rowe – a guy you’ve been around since 2016 when he got to New England and you really saw him fight through injuries in those early days. I just was curious what does it mean to you to see him really thriving here and can you turn that into something of a coaching point with how maybe the rest of the guys deal with and overcome adversity?) – “I think the good thing is for Eric (Rowe) is he’s a mentally tough kid. He’s a hard worker. He’s constantly striving to improve, which is what we ask him to do, and I think he’s seeing some results of that. Like everybody, there’s things that he’s got that he can continue to work on. As far as using him as an example and stuff, I think each individual’s case is a case-by-case study, if you will. I think sometimes things can start off good for a guy. Then they have to deal with a little bit of adversity and then they can come back. Sometimes guys just need a chance and then there’s other times that it doesn’t start off so good and guys work their way to that. I think it’s different individual to individual; but again, Eric is a hard worker. He’s been able to handle the ups and downs. He’s a good professional. He puts in a good day’s work and we’re going to continue to ask him to do that.”
(CB Xavien Howard now leads the league with three interceptions. I think his 15 since the end of 2017 or the most in the NFL even though he missed basically a season. Is he back now to where he was pre-injury? Is he by now a top-three cornerback in the NFL?) – “As far as the stats and the evaluations and comparisons, that’s probably a question for somebody else. What our focus is, is just getting the best out of each individual player week to week. Obviously like we’ve said time and time again, if you see guys out on the field, we feel like that they’re good to go and they can help us, and I think with all of us – and it’s really been a week to week deal – is we’re striving hard to improve, to be the best we can collectively as a group.”
(LB Jerome Baker after the game attributed the pass pressure that you all were able to generate on moving guys around, lining them up in different places, and said some of that was even based on decisions the players made just before the snap. Did you see it that way and I’m wondering how much flexibility for the players is built into the system?) – “Ultimately again, there’s no coaches out there in between the white lines on Sunday, so it’s the players making decisions. You try to build it in so that those guys have flexibility within calls to change things, to see things, so they can go out there and play fast at a high level. So there’s a structured scheme that we put out there and then within certain things or certain things that they see, guys can have the ability to adapt based on certain parameters, which I think our communication is improving as a group. We’ve still got a long way to go. We’re working hard at that. We’re working hard on that in the meetings and at practice, and hopefully it carries over to Sunday. It’s a hard thing to get 11 guys all on the same page and that’s what we’re working to do. And then you can have a variety of different guys out there from time to time. So really again, it’s a credit to the players putting in the time, the effort and the energy to get it right.”
(I wanted to ask you about DT Davon Godchaux – how his contributions at defensive line have helped you guys then how do you guys kind of move forward with this d-line rotation if he does have to miss some time with the biceps injury?) – “Again we’ll just see how it goes. I know ‘Flo’ (Head Coach Brian Flores) kind of deals with the injuries. We’ve been busy game planning most of the morning here, but Davon (Godchaux) – his leadership, his work ethic – all that stuff has been great. He’s been a mentor to the younger guys and on top of that, he’s been able to give us some production on the field. So nothing but good things to say about him, and like everybody else, he’s continuing to strive, to make himself the best player he can possibly be. As a coach, you always hope all of your guys are available to you and whatever the scenario is, we just kind of deal with it from there.”
(I could ask you about DT Zach Sieler every week because he’s just a beast, but instead I’ll ask you about the youngster DT Raekwon Davis, who maybe will be in line for some more playing time. How is his progress coming along? What does he have going for him? What does he still need to do better?) – “I think like all young guys, there’s some ups and downs, and I think you kind of have to one, learn what the NFL is about; two, learn about being professional, which I think Raekwon is working hard to do all those things. It’s hard to perform in this league. It’s hard to win in this league and there’s a constant reminder of ‘hey, you need to get better on this. You need to get better on this,’ or ‘hey, this is good. Let’s build on this.’ And I think Raekwon comes in – he loves football, he puts in a good day’s work and we’re going to hope that continues to improve week-by-week, which is what we’re all striving to do.”
(My question is also about DT Raekwon Davis. How ready is he to handle a bigger workload?) – “Raekwon, he’s been out there for a handful of snaps for us. What the workload is, obviously for us that’s going to depend on a week-to-week basis. Obviously we’re ultimately striving to put our guys in the best position to succeed. Raekwon is a guy that we have a good amount of confidence in. We’ve put him out there. Like I said, hopefully he continues to grow as this season moves along.”
(You had S Bobby McCain, CB Xavien Howard and CB Byron Jones on the field there for over 150 snaps in the game. I was curious what you saw from that first extended playing time from the three of those guys together, the way they communicated and handled the 49ers passing game throughout the course of that game.) – “I think as a group, as a team, whether it’s d-line, linebackers, secondary, there’s a lot of communication that goes out on the field. I think as a group, we’re getting better. I think Bobby obviously spearheads a lot of that communication with the linebacker group, but I would say it’s really a credit to the players putting in not only the time that we spend here, but putting in some extra time meeting and talking over situations, what they see on this, what do you see on this. I think the work ethic that we’re getting has been outstanding. We need to continue to do that and we need to continue to improve, and that’s what we’re working for. We have a big challenge this week, like I said, with the Jets coming up. It’s a divisional game that all of us are going to put our time, effort and energy into that.”
