CB Janoris "Jackrabbit" Jenkins -- July 26, 2019
Q: So how’s this mentoring of the young flock you have? How’s it going?
A: It’s going good so far. They’re paying attention to details, they’re taking the notes down, and they’re just ready to play.
Q: Are you enjoying it? Do you have to be on your Ps and Qs even more to make sure you know what to tell them?
A: I just go out and ball. I let them pick my brain when they want to, and if I see them messing up, I pick them up a little bit. Other than that, they seem like they’re ready to me, and I can just lead by example.
Q: Do you feel like with all these young guys around that you need to maybe assert yourself a little bit more, rather than them just ask you?
A: Of course, you have to assert yourself more. You never know what they’re thinking, these are young guys. So, the more you can talk with them and conversate with them, just about football, and not only football, life, on and off the field – just show them how to be a pro, and they’re going to be pretty good.
Q: Are you embracing that? What part of that do you enjoy doing?
A: Just being around them, just having them come up to me and have conversations about football. I tell them every day, just pay attention to details, make sure you take the right notes, and just stay focused.
Q: Have you ever been asked to be in a role like this?
A: I’ve never been asked, but I always played this role when I was at Florida – had that one national championship. When I got to North Alabama, I did the same thing. So, it’s nothing new, it’s just – I’m not the guy that likes to talk, I like to play football. If you can’t follow a leader that likes to play football, then you have a problem.
Q: What has (DeAndre) Baker shown you so far on the field? What is it you see from him as a player?
A: As a player, I can tell that he’s smart, I can tell that he’s been studying film, I can tell that he’s taken leadership, taken mentorship roles just looking up to guys like myself. He’s in the film room every day studying, he’s always on time, and we always say in the DB room that there is no such thing as a dumb question. You can always ask a question, whether it’s the smallest question—it might be a dumb question—but like we say, no question is a dumb question, and I think that’s going to help him along the way.
Q: Did Sterling (Shepard) get hurt on that play yesterday where you guys went for the ball together? There was a play where you guys kind of banged into each other.
A: I don’t know, I just know that after that play I didn’t see him anymore. So, when I saw him in the locker room I asked him what happened, and he explained it to me. Sterling – stay strong bro.
Q: Would you say he hit his thumb on the ground as you were going down?
A: He was catching the ball, but it kind of hit the ground, and I guess it got on the ground, and he got up and went and told coach I guess.
Q: When you look at Baker, He’s very physical. Is there a fine line between being physical in college and the NFL?
A: Yeah, I told him you could be physical but you got a certain level to be physical because you don’t want to get up there and be too physical and have guys push you off and throw you by and stuff like that. So we getting that under control right now.
Q: We have been asking about Baker, but what about Julian Love what do you see from him so far?
A: A guy that can play multiple positions, very smart, got a knack for the ball and just likes to study.
Q: Coaches can challenge pass interference now, what do you think of that?
A: I think it’s awesome, it gives us the opportunity to challenge the play, whether it’s a good play or a bad play because in the NFL every game is won by 3-7 points at the most, so I think it’s great.
Q: You think it’s great if your coaches can challenge it to get it flipped if you get called for it. But, what if you don’t get called for one on the field and a coach challenges it and then you get a flag for pass interference.
A: I’ve got to live with it, that’s something I got to live with.
Q: There’s a chance that you’ll be the only starter in the secondary who finished the year back there last year. How hard is it to get so many moving parts together and on the same page?
A: It’s tough but you got older guys like (Antoine) Bethea, you know he’s been in the system already, (Jabrill) Peppers, he understands football and he’s been around a long time so for guys like that it just helps us even more because everybody played a lot of ball and we just got to teach the young fellows.
Q: Have you seen (Antoine) Bethea, like you talk about him knowing the system and he’s played for (James) Bettcher before. Have you seen him during the spring and summer even with you, helping you kind of understand parts of the scheme more or kind of taking on that player/coach role and all?
A: Yeah, He knows the nicks and knacks of the defense, something I didn’t know when Coach (James) Bettcher got here. You know I just knew the defense. But now I know the ins and outs and just those small pieces I can get away with and can’t get away with.
Q: What are your conversations like with Corey Ballentine, obviously he comes here as a rookie with a very unusual situation with the tragedy that happened, so what discussions do you have with him along those lines?
A: Man, you’re here to play football, you can’t worry about any outside distractions. Your main focus should be football and football only, it’s just when you show up to work make sure you focus on football. He understands that, he understands what happened. He can’t take it back so just come here every day and work.
Q: That’s a pretty hard thing to go through what he went through, having one of his best friends killed like that. Did you talk to him about just getting through that or anything?
A: Yeah, I mean you got to understand things happen in life. Somethings you can’t control, somethings you can and what I told him is “I feel sorry for you, you should feel bad as well but you weren’t in a position to handle that situation or help him out because you had to come up here and play football so just come in and focus.”
Q: You had a similar tragedy happen in your life last year did you draw on that experience when you were talking to him?
A: I mean I shared it with him, but you know I try to stay away from it because I don’t want any distractions between him and I or anyone else on the team, so I just talked to him about that.
Q: What do you think about him as a player?
A: As a player oh, he can play. He has a nose for the ball. You can tell he’s been coached very well by a very good coach, whoever that may be because he’s technically sound and he’s aggressive.
