News up here.
Uh, maybe a couple of weeks ago about McCaffrey and the patient hitting holes, and I think you talked about, you know, there are some runs in which there might.
Be a hole, but you need to wait and not hit the hole because there are things that are developing. And I took it to me maybe downfield blockers, my proceivers or whatever.
Is that what you're referencing in regard to like what McCaffrey maybe.
Last year, like, hey, you see all run through the hole, right, but like he was being taught for the first time, like maybe not in display you need to actually wait, wait, wait, and then sure, yeah, because you might have downfield blocking, which anyway I just want to Yeah.
I'd say very few times this year has he been impatient and say this year that that's not happened now? Is that why there's more yards? Is that why he's having the year he's had up to, you know, through four games. I don't know that that's exactly, but I would say that there's there's fewer misses and his perspective, there's better understanding of every plays we put it in every week. He's got a much better feel for what we're doing. Through training camp, offseason and everything. So yeah,
I would say that's probably a part of it. I don't think he's missed anything this year. I think he's been on point with all the runs. In fact, when this past week a couple of plays were supposed to do something and it wasn't there, and he took what was available and scored. So I mean, he did a great job this week.
What is that my concept of Like, I'm sure a lot of running backs in the NFL like run through the open hole, and you know, you don't wait to run through the open hole because what you guys teaching like UNI different.
No, it's just a it's certain styles of plays. You know, there's there's uh, there's a thing called with running backs. It's called U. I mean every in zone running, I can say this, in zone running, inside and outside zone running, there's a big coaching point to press the line of scrimmage, to press the landmark. So if your landmark is the outside leg of the tight end, if your landmarks the inside leg of the guard, you want to get as close to the line of scrimmage to set the zone
blocks before you make your break. So there might be a big hole that expresses itself really early in the play. But your three yards deep in the backfield, that hole looks like it's there. But if you cut back to that hole, not everybody's been able to set their blocks because it's not like everybody's going to block man man, man, man man. We're zoning, and he needs to draw defenders to the zone block and then he can then whatever holes there will beyond people. But if he does it
too soon, Let's say I'm going to block. I'm double teaming someone here and I'm getting ready to come off and block you, but the ball isn't here and you're not there, and so if he cuts back, you just go over there, and I'm stuck over here. I can't block you. But if we saw a microphone, but if he keeps coming, you come to me. He draws the blockers to me. That's what zone running is, and that's that patient piece that sometimes you go, holy cow, there
it is. But when you hit it, we don't have half the guy's block because you didn't draw the It's his job in zone running to bring the blockers. Just now, when everybody's man blocking, bang bang bang bang bang, everybody's on a man whatever hole shows you hit that hole and Frank Gore. I always say Frank Gore is a great gap scheme, runner and man scheme because what hole was there was what you hit and Frank could get
through a slither that was that big. But if he saw it and he knew what he knew the play, it's like, I'm going to hit that hole and eventually that hole may get a little bit bigger because I know the concept of play. But it's not so much drawing what zone blocking is, which is you need to press to draw the blocker the defenders to the blockers. Does that make sense? Yeah? Is he reading the hole or read the landmark? He presses the landmark and he reads it. How we do it is he reads like
the like a gap. He just reads it what starts to come op. So, for example, if you're gonna run it at the outside leg of the tight end, if there's no defender there, he's just gonna run there and just keep running. But all of a sudden the defender's there and we're blocking him out there, then he's going to kind of start to work back and then one gap at a time, there'll eventually we hope there's a hole if there's not, then you just run and fall down and get three yards. You know you're set off.
And with the way to to attack Parsons is to run right at him. I assume that's easier said than done.
Yeah, who said that? Somebody? People people analysts have said that, Okay, yeah, well yeah, I mean they can. Yeah, you can run at him. He's a good player. We tried to run at him, and he beats blockers and make tackles, so you can run away from He's gonna run really really fast and catch up to you when you're run away from him. There's a lot of different things you get. You just have to make sure you account for him, like we have every other good player we play against,
and he's a great player. These other great players just to have to have a plan as to how you're gonna deal with them, right. You can't. You can't say every single player you run away, every single player you run at him. That wears itself out as well. There has to be a balance that you have to decide what kind of plays you run at him, what kind of plays you don't run at him, and what how he defends things, what position they move them all over
the place, so the position matters too. You think, oh, we're gonna run this play at Micael Parsons take advantage of X Y Z, and oh crap, he's lined up at the three technique or he's lined up over the center and you're like, oh, well, that's so much for that plan. So you just have to have a well balanced plan to take care of a great player, and that's what we'll hope to hope to try to do it. It's really really hard because he's a great one.
Chris, how would you evaluate Colvi? The numbers seem to indicate that he struggled a little bit as a pass protector, but it also shows that you guys are averaging like force having to carry running behind him.
How would you a film show? No, he's doing a good job. He's had he's had the bad play, he's had the you know, the Pittsburgh game is was a was an outlier. We you know, we we left him, We left him alone, and he he fought the best fight he could and he lost some battles and obviously the guy had a good day and he got beat once on Sunday, and you know the rest of the day, he had a really good day against the same players and so whatever. I don't know the evaluation process and
how it goes. He's not great, any better or any worse runner pass Obviously you'd like to not have the sack he gave up. But he did a bunch of really good things in the game as well. Everybody's got room to improve. Our whole group up front. Man, we got room to improve it. Obviously Sunday there were some nice things in the protection game. We had a good game, and so on and so forth. But there's just still we got so much work to do to improve. And
Colton's part of that process. He's got to get better. Jake, all of them do. They all got work to do, Trent, all of us. We just it's the season. It's just different. I don't know why. I don't know how to describe it. But as well as we may or may not be playing that our records good, we can play better. And I think it's just the off season training camp. You play your way into the year to see what you are. The good thing is, you know, I had a very
high expectation. I was really hard on him in training camp. I was I feel we should have hit this ground running this year. But you got to play in the games. You got to get back in the game condition. You gotta gotta we gotta get a feel for how things are going this year. The defense is how they're defending us differently based on what we did a year ago. And it's just a process. And the good thing is that I think that our jump off spot different than
a year ago is higher. You know where Colton is, where the inside tier three players are, we jump off at a higher spot. So as we go through the season four games in now, we keep progressing. I think it gets better and better. So I'm not down on Colton in any stretch of the imagination, pass protection, run game wise, He's just got he's got some work.
To do, Frank or he could have had affinity for not running right into defenders. He didn't take the big hits. And is that something that it's a running back quality or a tendency And does Christian have that same type of maybe a tendency did not go straight onto.
A guy and he saw two plays. Okay, yeah, he a Christian's not afraid to take a guy on. But Christian also knows how to you know, to take a hit as as you're kind of alluding to or not make a guy and his ability to make a guy miss, I mean, unbelievable. We ran the play where Trent was leading, We kind of ran a counterplay in Trent and he were going through the whole in the first second quarter
of the game. I don't remember where it was, and there was a backside safety that came down later and was free, and he kind of just jumped over him, kind of like he jumped over the guy on the swing screen we threw to him that he scored the touchdown on. There was a free guy that over at his leg and he just naturally picks his leg up and makes him miss and goes on the next guy. That's the uncoachable trait. That's the trait of Holy Ca.
I mean, you don't. We don't stand out there and throw bags at him and make him jump over him. I mean a heck. He has that trait, and that's what he's great. You see that on tape, You see that as you evaluate the kid. He's just got a tremendous ability to make people miss. And obviously they all do. You have to be able to avoid the big hit and no when to fight the good fight and when when the fight's over you I think.
You have one target to George and Debos and targeted in passing him. Obviously it's coming back from injury a little bit. This is an offense where you have so many weapons. What do you make of that when you when you have a game where one of them is almost not involved at all, and are guys okay with that? Knowing that in the grand scheme the offense is executed.
Very dog has his day. I think in our offense, I think there are days that all of a sudden, Deebo comes out. He didn't think You didn't think you could a couple of weeks ago, comes back from injury. You didn't expect that day. They just sometimes they just happen. Sometimes it's where the defense plays. Sometimes it's a play called at just the right time.
You know.
Other times you have the play design for George and you call four of them and you catch the wrong defense. Or you know, you have the play design for Deebo last week and oh darn you catch it just wasn't right, and then all of a sudden, everyone you called fryu thingo. We had the right we hit the right coverage and the right play. So it's not like the plays aren't designed to get to everybody. And that's what the players understand.
We put this play in for this coverage, we put this play in for this defense, and oh here we call it and guess what, it's not there or guess what, You're wide open for a touchdown and the right tackle isn't good enough for the running back, or the quarterback misses the throw or X, Y or Z happens. The next thing you know, it isn't there. So it's not it's not well, I don't know what I've never played the Madden gamer in that stuff. I don't know what they are. But you can say I'm throwing it to
George and you get to throw it to George. You know, it just doesn't It doesn't work like that. There is a coverage. You read it and you do the best you can, and some of them you can design. That's why sometimes not not forcing. But you can always say, Okay, I'm gonna throw a screen to Debo, right, I can hand Deebo the ball. You can always, but it's a little bit harder to do that with George. A little bit hard to do though with BA and and with
Christians the same thing. You can. You can throw them a screen, you can throw them a check down, you can hand them the football. You can guarantee his touches. With the other guys, it sometimes gets harder, but they know their day's coming. And next thing, you know, George, one of these days will have a breakout day, and and some will be by design and some will just because that's the way the play played out.
Well short of a time Rocks been a starting quarterback in the NFL. Is his processing to go through what you just talked about pretty rumble?
Yeah, I mean he's he just the guy plays the position really well. I mean that's all I can say that. He's just a quarterback. I mean from the time whenever he started playing it, he just sees the field, his ability to nowhere to go with the football. I don't know what that's a product of. I don't know if it's his previous coaching, don't know if it's his coaching now.
It's probably a culmination of everything together. I always think some of it is when you look at a guy's physical abilities, you look at his height, weight, you look at his speed, you look at you you realize it as a shorter it's a little bit shorter guy. You know, certain things you have to be pretty quick to do because as that pocket, you're not six ' for Tom Brady, they can stand there like a statue as the world's coming at you and still deliver the ball. You have
to make quick. I don't know that that's it. I really don't, but I'm saying there's Sometimes it's a byproduct of a your coaching is growing up you as a kid, and just how you survive and play the position, and you learn to play the position. You learn I need to get through my progression properly. If I'm going to have the space and in the pocket, I need to deliver the football. And now he's taking a step to this level where now the defenders are bigger, the rush
is more intense. This week, you know, he'll know he did play against these guys last year. It's gonna be very intense. And being able to make decisions and deliver the ball accurately. It's just something that he's learned to do over time. And it is remarkable because you know, some guys never learn it. Some guys are always late to throw the ball. They're just gonna rely more on
arm talent. They're gonna wait for a guy to get out before the throat and still get away with it, or they're gonna li on their feet and say, I don't care if the pocket's coming in around me, I'm gonna make a play. That was manning. I mean, when I was with Peyton, sometimes you would say he didn't even let the play developed develop. He'd say, well, it's
cover too, this ball's going to the checkdown. Well, yeah, going to checkout of cover two plays out like cover two and literally they get back there and they stop this, So then you're gonna go to the checkdown. Peyton would sometimes say, because he'd say, if this rush it was a really big rush team, I'm not gonna be able to lose this rush. So I have to make the decision now. So it's covered two, bang bang bang, that ball's going to checkdown. It's single high. This is where
the ball should go. I'm gonna believe what I see. I'm letting the ball rip on single high. Can wait. Because of his who he was right, he wasn't gonna be able to extend plays like a Mahomes or or guys. See what I'm saying, So there's there's all those physical limitations with a guy that then tie into how they have to play the position, understanding everything that goes into it. So sometimes that you know, you get what I'm saying.
So you could leave the you could leave the tight end in the block. You could use your backs to block you. Guys looking at the numbers in the first month have allowed the offensive line to be on an island largely. When you're getting five out in the pattern, you're making them defend the entire field and brocks getting rid of it quick. Why is that the plan? Why is that the preferred plan? Do you think?
I think there's a lot of different reasons to do something. Again, Coule's got a lot of different reasons for doing it. One thing is, you know when you're not certain to me, this is me talking when you're not certain what they're going to be in. If I know they're going to be in single high and I know I I can probably get fewer guy. When I don't know if I may get a three man rush, a four man rush, I may get covered two. I mean, I need all my eyes out so I can progress and have someone
to go to. I leave a tight end in all of a sudden, it's not the right coverage, and I want to throw the ball to Iu, but now I don't have the flare control underneath it. I can't. I'm holding the ball because this guy's blocking. I may have ten days to throw the ball, but there's nobody open. So maybe it's And I can't answer that question as to why we decide to do that more I'm assuming it is for some of those reasons, because maybe you don't know exactly what they're gonna be and you're trying
to give your quarterback the most options. Maybe it's the way Kyle feels best about attacking a defense. Maybe it's the way we feel Brock. Those are good plays for Brock and getting the guys out with the options. And then sometimes you know it's the it's there's so many variables that go into it, but that's a good observation and usually what it is. And I think that led a little bit to the Pittsburgh game where there was
a little bit uncertainly. All of a sudden, boy, they're not playing like we thought they were going to play. We need to get these guys out to be sure, and all of a sudden. Now you're leaving Colt maybe in some more one on ones that we hadn't planned on doing. But boy, if we leave the chippern there, sure TJ Watt, but then there's nowhere to go with the ball. You're holding the ball longer and then the other guys start showing up and then it's like, well,
you took care of TJ. But the quarterback they want to throw the ball. So that's that constant trade off, and it's that cat and mouse game of what are they in? What do we have called? How do we get to the right place. It's not like we come to line scrimmage every play and we aren't Payton manning it right. We're not omaha omaha, checking some other play and then throwing the ball. You know, we know what they're in, or we're able to see what they're in.
We're calling it and he's executing it, and that's why we end up. So thank you