Tyreek Hill – October 2, 2024
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Wednesday, October 2, 2024
WR Tyreek Hill
(We saw you toward the end of the Monday night game, it seemed like you were shouting at someone. Can you explain just what was going on in that situation?) – “I’m at a good spot in my life, man. I wouldn’t refer to it as shouting, that’s just me just motivating my teammates. I was simply telling 25 (Jaylen Wright) that we need more of that, because he had a great run there toward the end of the game. I was like, ‘I need more of that. I need more of that 25. No. 9, I need more of that. I need more of that 18.’ That’s just me motivating my team. There’s no ill will. Me personally, my teammates know me, I never break down and I never call nobody out in that moment. If I’ve got a problem with somebody, I’ll pull them to the side and tell you what’s going on. That’s the man that parents raised. But I was simply just saying, ’25, I need more of that,’ because dude was balling and he was the spark for the offense.”
(Was that as frustrated as you’ve been on a football field in quite some time?) – “No, it wasn’t frustration. That was just me just motivating my teammates and saying I need more of that.”
(I thought that was a bad camera angle – good meme, bad camera angle?) – “You know what man? We need some professional lip readers in this world because you know what’s crazy is my mom sent me that same video. She was like, ‘Hey, what’s going on?’ I’m like, ‘Um, nothing? You know how I get during football,’ it’s me motivating my teammates, me just showing my passion and me just being a leader because we want to win. If 25 is rolling or whoever is rolling, I’m going to say, ‘Keep that train rolling. Keep that train rolling. Keep feeding him Coach. Let’s go, let’s go.’ See, if you read my lips right there, you’d probably think I said something crazy. Put that on mute. (laughter)”
(Have you talked to Head Coach Mike McDaniel about getting you the ball? In a nice way, I’m not saying yelling, because it seemed like without QB Tua Tagovailoa, the team would rely on you more and that hasn’t happened. So have you talked to Head Coach Mike McDaniel about different ways to get you?) – “No, no, no, not at all. As a leader man, my job is to do whatever is called, whatever play is called. If it’s meant for me to block, I’m going to be a good teammate and block. If it’s meant for me to be a decoy, I’m going to be a decoy. And if it’s meant for me to get the ball, then I’m going to do my job. I feel like if you pressure the head coach and say, ‘Hey man, give me the ball. Give me the ball,’ he’s got 100 plays on the call sheet. They’re going to be thinking about getting you the ball and also situational, it’s like ain’t got time for all that, bro. Coach McDaniel, he’s already great at what he does, ain’t no use in me putting another bug in his saying to get me the ball; he knows who his playmakers are, he knows who he’d want to get the ball to and who he trusts in situation, so that’s how I see it.”
(When you redid your contract most recently, you made the contract you told General Manager Chris Grier “Don’t get me traded.” I don’t know if you’ve been on social media much in the past few days, but there’s speculation that a certain team you used to play for is short on wide receivers and might be in the market for a wide receiver. Putting two and two together, what would you say about any speculation that maybe is interested in you?) – “I’m just focused on right here and right now. We’ve got a beautiful team here and I want to be a part of it. We’ve got a great situation here, my family loves it, I enjoy it, the weather is great, the fans are great. So we’ve got a beautiful situation here. Obviously, my parents always taught me control the controllables, and I only can control so much. So with that being said, we all know the NFL is a business. Whatever happens, happens. Moving forward, I would love to be here. I love being here. I love the guys. I love my locker mate, Jevón Holland, he’s a maniac. He’s the guy. He brings me nice snacks sometimes.”
(What did you see from QB Tyler Huntley on Monday that gives you confidence that for the next two games you’ll be all right?) – “’Snoop’ (Tyler Huntley) is awesome. For him to be here for three weeks and for him to be prepared the way he was prepared for that Monday night game, in my book that’s trending upwards. Because our offense is so complicated and there’s so many motions and words in the play call, and for him to get all that down in a week or so, it’s tremendous. I can tell already by him stepping into the huddle, he’s already confident. He’s reading the play call, not even looking at it, so he’s ready to roll, man.”
(You’re saying there could be a huge difference between Monday night and what we see this coming week?) – “I mean, for sure. It’s like when Denver played that one guy at quarterback during the COVID year – he just came in out of nowhere. But now ‘Snoop’ (Tyler Huntley) has a chance to understand the system, understand how guys play now. He’s now had a chance to see how me and (Jaylen) Waddle move, had a chance to see how (De’Von) Achane move, understand his offensive line, what’s going on up there, you know what I’m saying? It all ties in together, man. Once he had his chance to figure all that out, it’s going to be smooth back there.”
(How close were you guys on that long one?) – “Oh, it was real close, real close. We’re going to do a good job of working on that all week, even if the legs are tired. I know – my parents always taught me, also Mike (McDaniel) preaches this, make it suck during the week. If that means running five deep balls trying to catch them from ‘Snoop’ (Tyler Huntley), I’ll do it. All for the betterment of this team, so that way when it comes Sunday, we can enjoy the touchdowns.”
(Let me ask you a question about Georgia. What’s going on there? Have you had a chance to talk to family or anything like that?) – “Yeah, so recently there was a hurricane in my hometown – power wiped, everything down for two weeks. Hurricane Helene, she doing her thing down there. Unfortunately, there was a moment last week where I didn’t even talk to my grandparents for three days, I was worried. But everything is fine now, the community is doing a great job of leaning on one another, working together, getting generators and water and stuff like that. My only concern right now is what do we do next. Right now me and the Dolphins are in efforts of trying to help the community out, sending all kinds of resources down there, seeing if we can help both communities out. This is Pearson, Georgia, and Douglas, Georgia. Two great mayors, those guys are doing a great job of getting the power back, getting the water back on. I’m just thankful everybody was safe; nobody was really hurt that was recorded – that’s a big positive thing.”
(Did you family have any property damage, any homes lost or anything like that?) – “There were a lot of homes that had trees that fell into them, a lot of homes that got affected by the rain and the wind. My grandad, he actually had two trees fall into his home, so he’s having to deal with that. The crazy part about it is we’re from a small town, and he’s still living in it, even with the tree inside of it. I’m like ‘Bro, what are you doing?’ The beauty about all of it is – I always look at the pros of every situation. This is a chance for our community to lean on one another, work with one another and rebuild the community together. It’s going to suck, but my parents always taught me to never make excuses man. Just rebuild, get back on track. Obviously, I’m going to do my thing to help the community, me and the Dolphins.”
(Sorry if it’s too personal, but how does your family usually feel about asking you for help? Like you said he’s still living in the house even with two trees in it.) – “Depending on what family it is. If it’s like a second cousin, they’re going to ask you regardless of how they feel. Obviously if it’s mom, dad, or grandparents they ain’t going to ask you. As far as sisters and second cousins, they are going to ask you. They are going to text you. You could be in the middle of a game having the worst game of your life, they’re going to text and say, ‘Hey, remember you said you’re going to loan me $500?’ Can you at least say have a great game? (laughter) I do a good job of that. My wife and my mom, they do a good job of telling people no for me. I’m in a great situation. Obviously, a lot of people know my situation. If you’re not in my circle, I’m not going to help you out. I’m not going to cripple you and make it even worse. That’s not teaching people if you’re just giving handouts, because I was never given a handout. I had to work my way up in this league, fifth-round draft pick – a lot of people wrote me off and said I was this, said I was too small, my hands are too small, I couldn’t play the position, but look at me now.”
(So grandpa is too tough to get out of the house, is that what you’re saying?) – “Grandpa ain’t moving. He ain’t moving, he ain’t going nowhere.”
(We heard WR Jaylen Waddle say after the game that playmakers got to do more. Head Coach Mike McDaniel said yesterday that if you’re operating at 90% efficiency when everybody is healthy, when you’ve got a backup in that’s got to go to 95%, 98%. From your perspective, wat does that actually look like for you guys?) – “I think one of our captains said it best, whenever it’s time to make a play, just make a play within a play – don’t go outside the techniques and fundamentals that you’ve already been taught. So that’s what he means by 95%. It doesn’t mean go outside of what you’re doing or run the wrong route, because that throws off a lot of quarterback timing. If you run a slant route, catch the slant route and do a little bit extra, get jiggy with it and take it to the house. That means you got to give a little bit more effort to get open, not just get the catch and just get a first down. How about let’s extend that, take it 70 yards, or take it 50 yards. That’s 95% to me.”
(How hard is it to keep that effort up when you’re having problems consistently keeping first downs?) – ‘It’s hard. It’s definitely hard. We just got to do what we do. We got to continue to play ball no matter what, no matter who is at quarterback.”
(You’ve obviously experienced ups and downs – more ups and downs in your career. Is there a time you can compare this to where you’ve had talent around you and still struggled on offense the way this team is?) – “There was one year when I was with KC, we had a bad year. We were struggling offensively and then we turned it around. I can’t remember what year – I was going to tell the guys about this story later in the week. It’s good that you asked me that because that kind of reminded me to go back and look back at the years. There was one year we had a terrible year – we’ll we didn’t have a terrible year, we had like a terrible stretch of games. We turned it all around whenever guys started to trust the process, trusting what Coach was calling, going the extra mile after practice, getting the extra reps in with the quarterback and stuff like that. A lot of people think it’s the end of the world; it’s really not. It’s still early on in the season, and it’s all about what we do toward the end of the season. It’s either we be a part of the (solution) or we continue to build on the problem. We’ve got a lot of guys on this team that want to be a part of the solution part.”
