Liam Eichenberg – September 23, 2021
Download PDF version
Thursday, September 23, 2021
T Liam Eichenberg
(So what’s your week been like?) – “It’s been great. Obviously we lost to the Bills. That wasn’t awesome. That stung, for sure. We made the corrections and we’re looking forward to this weekend. We have a great team coming up in the Raiders. They’re very experienced, a great coaching staff. We’re excited for the opportunity to play again.”
(You played significant snaps in both games. What have you taken and learned from those opportunities?) – “I think I would say it just kind of goes back to your technique and fundamentals. Coach ‘Lem’ (Offensive Line Coach Lemuel Jeanpierre) coaches to me and communicates to me. Being out there, there’s different players. There’s a lot of different guys that end up rotating throughout the game so it’s kind of not specifically thinking about one person’s move but kind of going back to your basics – having good balance, mixing up your hands and staying in front of guys.”
(Having had about a month at right tackle, can you be as comfortable there – are you as comfortable there now as you are at left tackle after spending a college career at left tackle?) – “Yeah, you know I remember when you guys asked me that last time about playing at left. It’s all – I don’t know how to say this. It’s all different now. Even going back to left, it felt different. I’ve been playing a lot of different positions – been playing guard, tackle, flipping sides of the line. It just kind of takes a couple of days to re-adjust to wherever I’m at.”
(Have you had the opportunity to focus on one thing this week?) – “No. I’ve been playing guard and tackle again. They kind of flip me around. We’ve been rotating in. It’s been hot out so we’re kind of rotating guys in and giving guys a blow. It’s just day-by-day, I just kind of do my best to improve at wherever I’m at.”
(You played left tackle against New England and you played right tackle against the Bills. Even if it was one or two snaps, is there any kind of adjustment period that you have to go through when moving from side to side?) – “Yeah, definitely. I would just say it just kind of goes back to balance – flipping sides. Normally when you’re on the left, you want to have more weight on your inside leg and then it’s the same at right. Just those adjustments.”
(C/G Michael Deiter described the O-line room as first a little bit down but then motivated to get better. How can you describe what that room has been like this week?) – “Yeah, I would say this offensive line has a very high care factor. We’re very committed to improving every single day. Coming off that loss to Buffalo, it kind of was one of those instances where you have to look yourself in the mirror and realize that we need to improve. This offense, like it goes how we go. For us, it was a good wake up call. Obviously we didn’t want that to happen but it just exposed what we need to work on. We’ve worked hard this whole week so I’m looking forward to it. But there’s a lot of time left and the Raiders are a great defense.”
(How hard is it – as you flip back and forth – not to keep beating the same horse over again but how hard is it to not let your thinking about your mechanics on each side overcome your responsibility on that play?) – “I think most importantly it just goes back to what I’m doing. You’re kind of flipping the playbook. Depending on if I’m at guard or tackle, it’s different assignments. At first it was difficult but now that I’ve been in this offense for a while and kind of understand everything, it’s a lot easier. But at first when I got flipped to guard, I was like – I’m talking to Jesse Davis and he was like, ‘you’ve got to do this. This is how it works.’ Because he’s played like every position. (laughter) It’s great having those guys who are older and understand everything.”
(What’s your comfort level at left guard now?) – “It’s good. I practiced at it up in the Chicago week and then a couple of weeks before. I’ve played left guard before. It’s just kind of wherever they want me. They’ve been flipping me around the whole week. It’s just kind of how it is.”
(I’m sure you’ve had various ups and downs throughout various levels of playing football – high school, college and so forth – but can you compare what you guys are facing now to anything in your past in terms of that look yourself in the mirror moment?) – “Probably last season when we lost to Clemson. We got blown out. Then every time I’ve been in the playoffs, we got whooped – in college. So it’s just difficult. When we played Clemson when I was in college, it kind of gave me more motivation. I don’t know. For me, the losses hurt worse more than winning, obviously. But at the same time, I’m a guy that understands I need to improve every single day. I think everybody in our offensive line room understands that it’s not about what happened yesterday, it’s about how we can improve today. We try to take the right foot forward. But yeah, I’ve been blown out in college. It happens. Obviously it isn’t something that we want to happen but you have to kind of look at what went wrong and fix it.”
(So the pain of a loss is stronger than the joy from a win?) – “Yeah. I would say it definitely bothers me more. I’m a guy that every single practice, I go in there and I look at what I did wrong. It bothers me because you want to strive for perfection at the end of the day.”
(You went to Notre Dame so I’m sure you’re a fairly smart guy. What are some of the ways in which you can master, as you were saying earlier, all of the guard assignments and the tackle assignments? Do you have a dry erase board in your apartment? How do you – what do you do more to try to master that stuff?) – “I have flash cards kind of broken up for tackle and guard. Then also, I’m not saying this – for me, it’s happened where when I was in college, I played left tackle for the whole time so my brain kind of shut off when the coach is talking to the right guard. But now you have to listen to when he’s talking to tackles and guards. I listen to when he’s talking to the center too because you just never know. It’s a lot of information but if you can kind of understand it from everybody’s perspective, it makes it a lot easier.”
(Do you have a roommate or something? Someone that can…) – “No. No roommate but Rob Jones and I, during camp and stuff, we’d stay here extra and kind of go through all of the information and stuff.”
(Do the flash cards go with you everywhere you go?) – “Yeah, I had them in my backpack. Now they’re just at home, because I was in the hotel then.”
(How many cards are you having to memorize?) – “I mean when we did installs, I would make cards for every install, so it was a good amount. The offense – the playbook – is pretty large. It’s good stuff. It’s got everything in there.”
(Are we talking 20, 50, 100?) – “It just depends. Obviously there are different plays, there are different codenames depending on certain blitzes and stuff like that.”
(Did you utilize the same method for like finance exams in college and things like that?) – “Yeah, I did the same thing. When you have a lot of information, you need to break it down. I don’t think people really understand how much goes into running an offense and understanding everything.”
