Josh Boyer – October 20, 2020
Download PDF version
Tuesday, October 20, 2020
Defensive Coordinator Josh Boyer
(When you and Head Coach Brian Flores and General Manager Chris Grier were talking about defensive free agents – who was available last February, early March – what intrigued you when DE Emmanuel Ogbah’s name came up? What had you been familiar with from looking at him when you were in New England, etc.? And what intrigued you about his skillset and has he performed even beyond your expectations?) – “I think with all of the guys that we bring in, it starts with they’re fiercely competitive. They have a skillset on the field that we covet. He can do a lot of things. He’s very multiple and I think the other thing is he’s a hard worker. I think with a lot of things that we ask him to do, we can be multiple with that. He’s been able to do that and he’s shown constant improvement week after week. And I know a lot of people, they look at kind of – call it ‘flash stats,’ but there’s a lot of things that he does for us defensively that opens up things for other people, and he does a good job of setting the edge and we can move him around. He’s a good worker, good kid. He’s a joy to be around, and we’re hoping that continues to improve, that we can do more things with him.”
(Do you think that last defensive performance was one that Bill Arnsparger would have appreciated and if so, why?) – “(laughter) I think so because we were multiple, and I know Bill likes good defense. That’s a credit to our players. Those guys were out there. They were playing. I was able to go back and watch it this morning again because you’re always looking for little things here and there, and I think the thing that Bill probably would have been most impressed with is the way we were getting all 11 guys to the football. They were flying around and the communication was at a high level, so hopefully that sat – I would imagine it sat good in his eyes. I’m not sure on that, but hopefully we can continue to build on that.”
(I enjoyed watching the third-down packages – the blitzes. There was one time where you brought eight guys and the offensive linemen, it looked like their eyes were about to pop out of their heads because they realized that they didn’t have enough people to block. And then other times, you dropped two or three back into coverage. I’m curious, can you kind of help me understand how you decide when to blitz and how many to bring, especially in those third down situations?) – “I think it’s like all situations. You would like to have the ability to be multiple and I think everything starts with us on a down-in, down-out basis – not exclusive to third down – but you’re always trying to put pressure on the quarterback. You’re trying to put pressure on the offensive line to make them execute and hopefully in turn, that puts pressure on the offensive coordinator, so I think if you just line up in the same thing, the same fronts, the same coverages; it makes it fairly easy for the offense. There’s a lot of good players on offense. There’s a lot of good coordinators in this league, and if you make it easy on them, they’re going to hurt you. The hard part of doing that is we have different personnel packages, we have different groupings; and everyone needs to be on the same page as far as a communication standpoint for that to all operate at a high level, which we’ve been working very hard to get that turning in the right direction. Obviously we’ve done some good things and there’s some things that you go back and look at the film and I think our guys see that and say, ‘hey, this could be a little bit better here. This could be a little bit better there.’ And that’s really kind of how it all starts for us. It’s really a communication thing and we’re really trying to put pressure on the offensive line, the quarterback; and in turn hopefully that puts a little bit of pressure on the coordinator. But like I said, there’s a lot of good offensive linemen in this league, here’s a lot of good skill players in this league and there’s really a lot of good offensive coordinators that make it tough on us.”
(I was wondering, obviously this is your first career shutout as an NFL defensive coordinator. Were there any phone calls, notes, texts that kind of meant something to you? Did you get a game ball? Was there anything in the last couple of days that’s really stood out?) – “A former mentor of mine – Dean Pees – who he’s been a coordinator in this league for a long time and he’s had numerous shutouts; he reached out to me, so that meant a lot there. There’s a lot of other guys that they reached out and stuff; but again, I’ve been around football like I told you guys earlier since I could walk. And really a shutout – for a defense, we always kind of strive for that – but it’s really a team thing. The offense doesn’t put you in a bad situation or where you’re on a short field and then obviously in the kicking game, (Special Teams Coordinator) Danny (Crossman) – those guys – I mean we had great field position all day. So it’s really a team thing. At the end of the day, I’m happy we won and I’m happy for our guys and I’m happy for the guys that have success out there playing. It was nice to get some texts and stuff like that; but at the end of the day, you’re just trying to win the game and like I said, a shutout is really a team thing. The offense does a good job. They don’t put you on short fields and the kicking game, those guys usually put you in good field position, so it’s definitely a team thing.”
(Just piggybacking off that shutout deal, I was curious, is it like baseball where you have a no-hitter? At some point, do you start to think about? I saw they kicked a field goal one time. Were you hoping they don’t make it because that zero is something that seems so rare? Obviously this is the first one of any team this season?) – “It’s human nature that you – obviously on defense, you go into every week and you go, ‘hey, we don’t want to give them anything,’ and like I said, there’s a lot of good offenses in this league. There’s a lot of good skill players. If you make one mistake with the skill players that we face week-in and week-out, they can put you in scoring position in a hurry; but yeah, I would say as the game goes and you’re in the flow of the game and you kind of look up and go, ‘well okay, we’ve got a chance here.’ And again like I said, I think it was important to our players – not just our defensive players – I think our offensive players. I think ‘Flo’ (Head Coach Brian Flores) has done a great job building a culture that our guys are genuinely happy for each other. There’s no more play defensively that was evident of that than when Brandon Jones got that tackle for a loss for us on third-and-2. You could see the excitement with everybody, and they were all happy for him and it was a big play for us defensively. So, I think that’s really a credit to ‘Flo’ and (General Manager) Chris (Grier) and the culture that we have. When offensive guys are excited that defensively you’re getting a shutout; that’s a pretty good sign.”
(CB Xavien Howard is kind of looking like the guy he was in 2018 when he made the Pro Bowl with the way he’s playing right now. After what was a little bit of a down year before, he wound up on IR last year. Is it strictly a matter of him being back to where he was physically or is there more at play here that you’re seeing?) – “I think whether it’s Xavien (Howard) or any of our guys – and I know you guys probably get tired of me saying the same thing over and over again, and I’m sorry for being boring – but really what you’re trying to do is get the best out of Xavien week in and week out. We’re constantly striving for him to be the best version of himself. I think he has a great skillset and he’s got a good instinct for the ball, and hopefully we can continue to improve him from week to week. That’s kind of the idea and the goal and what we’re shooting for.”
(I wanted to get back to the issue of sacks for a minute. Last year at this time, the Miami Dolphins had seven. Right now you have 17. I’m wondering what you attribute that to and when was the last time you saw a 28-yard sack?) – “I think again it goes back to – any time that you can get pressure on a quarterback, you’re trying to do that. Again like I said, our goal from a structure standpoint is we’re trying to put pressure on the offensive line. We’re trying to put pressure on the quarterback. For those sacks that come to fruition, sometimes it’s an individual effort. Sometimes it’s a scheme thing. I think the communication that’s improved from week to week for us, I think has helped us. And again, sometimes it’s just a good individual effort. So a 28-yard sack – they don’t come around very often. I know that. That was a big play for us in the game. To be honest with you, as a coach, you go back and you look at the ones that you left out on the field. I know we had a good amount of pressure and we had a couple sacks here and there; but I think there’s a couple things if we fine-tune, there’s a couple that we left out there, too. Again, it’s always improvement. Whether we’re sitting here after a shutout or we’re sitting here after a poor defensive performance, the process for us in the same. That’s kind of how we’ll approach this week. We’ll look at how we can get better and things that we can do to increase the pressure on offenses and hopefully we’ll be able to take advantage of those opportunities when we get them in the game.”
(You were talking about culture and Head Coach Brian Flores also mentioned that yesterday – the chemistry on defense, guys enjoying playing with each other, enjoying each other’s success and lifting each other up when things are not going well. I’m sure you’ve been involved with defenses where that wasn’t the case. I’m just wondering how elusive is that kind of thing to create and how do you go about creating it?) – “I think obviously Coach Flores’ background and my background are very similar, and I would say that the teams that we’ve been on that have been good have all had that good chemistry. I think what you do is, it starts with guys that are fiercely competitive. They’re selfless guys. They put the team first and when you get a group of guys that can do that – and I know I’ve said this before and obviously this isn’t my quote – it’s been said time and time again, ‘it’s amazing what you can accomplish when nobody cares who gets the credit for it.’ I think when players buy into that, when coaches buy into that, you have the opportunity to become better than what you could be. And I think when you’ve got a group of guys working together and everybody’s on the same page, you start to see just genuine care and obviously we all spend more time in the building than we do with our own families during the season. One, that’s a credit to our families that they can handle that; and two, you just build a strong bond. When you’ve got the right type of guys that do that that genuinely care about one another, you have a tendency to play a little bit better because you really care about the guy that’s next to you or you really care about the guy that’s out there on offense or you really care about the guy that’s out there in the kicking game. Like I said, I think Chris (Grier) and ‘Flo’ have done a great job of bringing those type of guys in the building.”
