How's going.
You probably know and can appreciate Kyle Has a few times this season, said Christian McCaffrey's mentality is out of like a walk on or undrafted guy, like still trying to prove himself and hey, coach, you know, I'm sorry, or head coach, did you see that?
Or you know.
Obviously elite players have special qualities, but that seems.
Pretty rare to not.
Seemingly ever kind of feel like you've arrived or he's up even a little. Is that unique in your experience?
It is unique?
Yeah, he's he's uh, he's a very unique guy. But I say this, it's not He's also very confident, very very confident in his ability and very much has a chip on his shoulder to show everybody that he, you know, how good he is.
But his work ethic is one of it's never good enough. You know. It's really cool.
It's really cool to see a guy that's you know, really shooting for perfection, you know, and he's not afraid to say that he's fallen short. But he's always progressing, always working, you know, So that's it's really really impressive to watch how hard he works, how diligent he is, I mean, there's so many little things that he does
on Deebo. The last screen pass touchdown, it we ran Christian's on the back side and he fakes like a flare screen and that backside linebacker who almost caught deebos Debo's coming up to score. There was a guy that was right there. They had to doubt run. I think he's got run on either way. If if Christian dogs at just a little bit. If Christian doesn't, I mean, how much time was looked in the game, and how
many how many plays had Christian played? He took on there with his hands in the air like he was catching the screen and pulled that linebacker out of there.
That's why we scored.
I mean, the guys did a nice job blocking it, but ultimately the game the play went in because Christian, every little thing he looks at, it is what he can do better.
And that is rare. That's really rare. And that's why he's a great player.
I was talking about, he's the best player he's ever been around without the ball in his hands.
When you think about what he does with the ball in his hands, that's pretty Is that.
Just one example, that's one example exactly one example, there was a day, Uh, it was really funny. Kyle pointed it out, and he does it all over the field.
I don't I don't watch him. Locked him more on the on the guys up front most days. But he was I don't know what the play was.
I can't picture, but he was releasing on the backside to block somebody. Actually it was a it was a run player something that we had a drawer or I don't know what the play was. He didn't block somebody and when he when he was running out to block him, he set up and started to act like he was going to run a route so the guy would look to cover to Matt and then he went and blocked him.
You know, it's just every little thing he can look to gain an advantage or looked what he can do without the ball in his hands.
He does.
It's outstandings kept him pretty quiet.
He's enormously talented. Well, I think the guys did a really good job. I think the game went well for us.
You know, we started off and obviously had a couple of series there that weren't as good. Uh. And Jalen's very very talented and good player, and he did have some good plays in there. You know, our guys just we managed to you know, convert on some third downs, keephim on the field, work our plan and do things we'd talk about doing. And and Aaron did a nice job. And wherever they put him, the guy's really battled in did a good job against them.
A couple of times it popped out that Burford was finishing play way down the field, even on the Devoat touchdown.
Your referred to like on one last block on that is there.
I don't know if it's been something he's been doing all year, or is there a point of emphasis of like a finish more years at an area that he's grown in.
I guess he's grown in that area. I mean he he always did. But there was a.
Yeah, I said it last year. There's always a couple of times that happens with guys. It's like you're getting to the point of contact, you're getting the point of doing your assignment, and you're just not quite finishing. You're just not quite getting on a guy and staying on him.
And I said, you know, truly, an old coach, Dannis Screen of mine, used to say, he said, you know, blocking the guys no more he said, Chris, you can talk all this stuff about being alignment and techniques and all they said, but when the ball carrier gets there, are you on your guy and.
He doesn't make the tackle. That's why I tell my guys.
So I get all this, but guys, your guy made the tackle or your guy got in on the tackle. So that's not good enough. So whatever we have to do to make sure your guy that you were responsible for isn't hitting the guy at the end of the play. And that I think eventually rings true with guys realized, oh, I got to keep doing this blocking him for a little bit, then let him go and let them run a run and.
Maybe he gets in on the tackle later. Isn't acceptable.
And everything we do in our offense comes from Kyle that everybody's expected to finish. Everybody's expected our plays last, because the wide zone it just it's it's longer. You're starting the left hash and the ball goes out to the numbers and then it runs downfield and everybody's got to block their guys all that far and it ends up being just a little bit longer. That we have to maintain our contact and our blocks, and it's the process for young guys coming in to learn that.
This year.
I don't know that's you guys always say, I don't sorry they guys. The guys played okay, they did a good job. I mean, this group of guys, I don't ever want to bat I'm not bad mouthing.
I know you guys know that. I'm I love this group. Man.
They really worked hard, forced every single day. But we're working progress still. There was a lot of good things in that game. We managed the crowd. Uh, we were able to the two tackles, did a really nice shopping those guys, you know, and the interior plays. They had some beasts in there, and and and they were a challenge and uh, you know, Brock did a good job with getting the ball out. Kyle did a good job
getting the play calls. It all works together when we look good nine times out of tennis because everything else around us is going well.
But the guys did. The guys were serious minded. They they wanted to go and do it.
I was I was honest with him, I told him, and I didn't say it when if I look back at that championship game from a year ago, I was nervous.
Weren't gonna block him as well. You know, I didn't know I was gonna play it.
We never got a chance to see because the game went a different direction obviously with the injury to Brock.
But man, I I don't know. And then we went in there and the guys did a good job.
Now that's one game, and if we happened to you know, who knows what happens if we see him againn't see him again.
It's the guys did a nice job. But I wouldn't. I wouldn't. I'm not gonna crown anybody yet.
Was saying that the last time you guys played Seattle Banks, he was really banged up going to that game, played through it. He felt like it was a really kind of a turning point game for Aaron because he was able to tough it out and still perform. Just in what ways have you seen him him grow in terms of, you know, putting.
It on the line and in those times Aaron last year did agree. I mean, he came through everything last year and had a really nice season last year and came out as one of our better linemen. And the energy that he plays with one game day, the enthusiasm, the effort he plays with outstanding and he continues to work on his craft to get better at it.
That was big for him because you.
Know a lot of times guys get there's a there's injury and hurt right, and then I'll just file flat tell you the story. He and I are talking about when he's coming out of getting ready to play the game and he's like, we went out, we were working during the week and I'm like, he goes, you know, I don't he did up.
We were in the stadium, it was a short week, and we had.
A guy's a couple of guys stay out and push on him to see how if he was ready, if his toe was able to if he was able to anchor, and he goes. He calls me that night and he goes, yeah, I just don't think I can play. I can't anchor,
you know. And I said, okay, let's talk about how many times in a game you're going to be one on one by yourself needing to anchor where Jake won't be there, Trent won't be there, or we're running the ball where the anchor really doesn't matter, and all these things that I said, we're talking about five to ten percent of the game.
So I'm not telling you to play hurt, which I wasn't, I said.
But and that's a point where, like Trent said, I can play at seventy five or eight percent, Well for Aaron, that's like ninety or ninety five percent because there's five or ten percent of that game that he might struggle with. But it was good to get out there and start playing and get over that hump. And that's part of a process for young guy. The dish for the injury and hurt is two different things that nobody's asking. I said, Aaron,
I'm not asking you. If you don't feel comfortable play again, don't play this game. And at the trains, but he'd been cleared medically, but there were some parts of his game that weren't quite he didn't feel comfortable with. But that's part of the process you learned and say I can play this way. I've told you guys story before about Jonathan Ogden. He's like, this guy can play at
this percentage, this guy I can't. And Trent, to his credit, Trent in the Cleveland game, he was that whatever percentage he was. If it wasn't Miles Garrett, he probably would have looked a lot, but he went out there and really didn't look great for the majority of the game, but knew he had to tough it out in those instances. Well, that's a guy that's done this enough to say he's not putting himself at risk. He's not gonna hurt himself anymore, knowing he's not one hundred percent, but he can do
most things well enough that we could have success. And then then it's my job. Trent in the championship game a couple of years ago against the Rams, probably shouldn't have been out there, and it was his first championship game. It was really hard for me to say, Trent, you know, and everybody was like, but we gotta let the guy. He's a warrior, let's art up, toughen out. He's done it before. But he really couldn't perform at a level that was acceptable. And he's even set a cult and
probably should have played more in that game. And that's the that's every that's a that's a trade off, And it's not, like I said, none of us are trying to It's a long answer, but I want to make sure it's very clear none of us are asking how to play hurt. None of us are, but the one hundred percent this league is everybody gets hurt, and everybody has to play through bumps and bruises and you have to figure that out. And that's what's happened with Aaron.
That's part of one of the many things that he's grown in that process.
Thanks, guys, appreciate it.