Steve Gregory – September 15, 2022
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Thursday, September 15, 2022
Safeties Coach Steve Gregory
(When you reviewed the film of S Brandon Jones, what did you like most about his performance? Obviously we know he can blitz well, but it seemed like he made some plays in coverage as well?) – “Yeah, it’s great to see him go out there and make some plays in a game. It’s a good start to the season. The thing with Brandon is he’s always going to play 100 miles per hour. With him, when he goes out there and he performs like that, it’s a credit to his play style. The way he was flying around was really good to see.”
(I know S Brandon Jones wants to be known as more than just a blitzer but he’s really good at blitzing. I’m curious what you see in his skill set that allows him to make plays like he did against QB Mac Jones the other day in some of the blitzes you guys ran?) – “Just his explosiveness, his agility, his quickness, his physicality. All of those things that can help you as a blitzer. His timing, his understanding of the scheme and how we’re trying to send him and things like that. With all of our guys that we send, those are key points to being an effective and good blitzer.”
(There was a play where S Jevon Holland ended up hitting QB Mac Jones, where you could see the communication where all of a sudden Jevon tells S Brandon Jones to come down on the line and you guys send a blitz there. How have you seen them maybe work together with their communication on plays like that and overall?) – “It’s been a process that’s started since the beginning of the offseason. We pride ourselves on being guys that are going to talk to each other out there. This is football. You’re teammates. You’ve got to communicate and you’ve got to talk with each other. Everything isn’t going to go perfectly. We don’t know what the offense is going to line up in. We don’t know who is going to move when and where. We just have to have a good understanding of conceptually what we’re trying to do defensively. And then when those guys move and they adjust and they shift, we talk to each other and let each other know what’s going on so we can be in the right situation.”
(What’s the NFL skill that you’ve observed in S Verone McKinley III from watching him for five months?) – “He has really good ball skills. I think his angles to the football and his understanding of the game, his smarts, his wisdom as a football player are a little bit beyond his years. I know he studied the game a lot in college. He had a podcast or whatever where he talked a lot about NFL players and things like that. He’s a very knowledgeable player, which allows him to play a step faster than maybe is perceived on paper, physical attributes. So all of those things help him as a football player.”
(I think it was earlier this week, Head Coach Mike McDaniel mentioned that S Eric Rowe was very engaged even though he couldn’t play in the game and was kind of chomping to get out there. I was curious what that veteran presence and the way he is engaged, kind of how that impacts the rest of the room and just gets guys more prepared.) – “Yeah, it’s huge. Eric is a professional football player. He’s a true pro at everything he does on a day-to-day basis. His attention to detail, his support for his teammates. Whether he is playing or not playing, he’s a team guy. So when you have a guy that’s professional, that’s experienced, that loves the game and he loves being a part of a team, I think that helps, especially young guys, seeing how he does it and how he approaches everything from a day-to-day basis.”
(The zero blitz last year against Baltimore was so effective. How much do you guys have to be prepared for the certain adjustments that you know they’re going to be making?) – “We’ll just have to see what they do. Every year is different. Every game is different. Their scheme has a couple of different wrinkles than what they showed last year. They’re going to game plan us just like we’re going to game plan them. You go into these games with a certain game plan. You try to go execute it. That’s why we’re on the sideline after series trying to evaluate what they’re doing. They’re trying to evaluate what we’re doing and we’re trying to make in-game adjustments.”
(To follow up on that, QB Lamar Jackson threw three touchdown pass of 20+ yards on Sunday. How do you balance not letting him get loose on the run but also making sure he doesn’t burn you over the head with a deep throw?) – “It’s extremely challenging. The guy is a heck of a football player. He can throw the ball down the field. He has a strong arm. He has a quick release. And then obviously everybody in the world knows what he can do with his feet. He presents challenges all over the field. We just have to go into the game understanding what those challenges are and how we want to execute our game plan to try to limit the explosive plays that he can create.”
(Did you watch the Thursday night game last year or were you busy with your own coaching responsibilities – the Dolphins/Ravens game? I wondered if you watched it live and if you did, what you thought seeing S Jevon Holland and S Brandon Jones blitz constantly and wreak so much havoc.) – “I did not watch it live. But yeah, it was great. That game in particular – not just those two guys but the defense in general was flying around and playing fast. Regardless of what your scheme is or what defense you call or what play is called on either side of the ball, if guys are playing fast and flying around and it’s a physical football game, then you play well. That’s the bottom line.”
(I don’t want to get too far ahead but you do have QB Josh Allen, who has similar skill sets to QB Lamar Jackson in that he can make plays with his feet. Do having games like that, where it’s back-to-back similar quarterbacks, kind of help you stay in that mindset?) – “I don’t think so. I mean we don’t really look past what we have as the task at hand. Right now, we’re focused on Baltimore. We’re not really focused on Josh Allen. I get the comparison but right now we’re focused on what Baltimore does, the challenges they present and whatever our game plan is to go ahead and try to execute to defeat them. We’ll worry about Josh Allen next week.”
