Defensive Backs Coach Everett Withers -- November 8, 2019
Q: Where do you feel like DeAndre Baker is in his development?
A: He’s coming along. Coming along. Guys progress as they progress and they work as they work. I think early, he didn’t quite understand the sense of urgency and detail in the things that you have to do. Sometimes when you’re in college, you go play corner on one side and that’s all you do. You just go play that one guy. So, he had a lot of details he had to work on.
Q: How much do you expect (Sam) Beal to be on the field this week?
A: We’ll see. We’ll see. Don’t know.
Q: What have you seen from him?
A: He has, obviously, a little bit more confidence now. He’s been healthy, and I think that’s the biggest thing, is being healthy. You have to kind of get through that barrier before you can do anything else. Now he’s healthy, now he’s more into what we’re doing schematically.
Q: What does he bring as a player though? No one’s really seen him much.
A: Yeah. Big, long guy that can run. That’s what you need on the outside part of the field. That’s what he brings.
Q: So, he’s an outside guy, though? That’s where you guys are looking at him?
A: Yes. Yes.
Q: What did you think of Corey Ballentine logging a ton of snaps in the slot?
A: I thought Corey did a nice job. I thought he did a nice job. Obviously, there are some things to clean up before a guy coming off of concussion protocol, a couple weeks in it and now playing in a ball game. I thought he tried to handle it, the details, and tried to handle just the speed of the game.
Q: How hard was that, though, to get him up to speed in that regard, because he was a guy who’s played mostly on the outside? He spent most of the summer and spring here on the outside. What was that like, and how long a process was that?
A: it was a pretty tedious process, but I think he engaged it and encouraged it and embraced it. I thought Henry Baker did a nice job with him just with the little details. As you put in scheme, more of scheme, he did a nice job. Henry did a nice job with just the little details.
Q: This was a multi-week project, I assume, to get him ready to go play in the slot?
A: Yeah. And again, it doesn’t work unless you embrace it and want it, and I think he wanted it.
Q: DeAndre Baker said after the game that he still needs to work on knowing where he’s going to be, knowing his assignments. How can he get better at that? I mean, we’re pretty deep into the season here.
A: Yeah. As a first-year player, to me, it’s a season-long deal anyway. I think he just needs to continue to grow and understand concepts more than anything else. You know, in college, it’s like memorization. You learn this and I do this. Here, it’s you have 18 things that affect that one thing you just learned. So, he has to learn the concepts, and he’s getting better at it. He’s working at it.
Q: Is that kind of what you were referring to when you were talking about his sense of urgency earlier?
A: Yeah. Just understanding the concepts that go with that particular coverage, technique, whatever it is that go with it, because there are 18 things that other teams can do to that coverage and you have to be able to match that. So again, I think it’s a season-long process. Obviously, there’s a sense of urgency for him to get it as fast as he can. I think he’s working at it.
Q: Does that urgency almost go back to the summer when he’s first getting here because I guess you probably don’t realize you need that level of urgency until the season gets going and now teams are taking advantage of things that maybe you didn’t work on in August, and now you’re in Week 4 and you’re like, ‘Well, how am I going to catch up now?’ Is it a year-long, almost catchup game that he has to play?
A: I think for any first-year guy, it’s that way. They don’t ever know the speed of the game until they get into the game. They don’t ever really know what they know until they don’t know. You know? That’s usually how it works.
Q: What did you think of Janoris’ (Jenkins) effort on that Jarwin (Blake Jarwin) touchdown? The long touchdown?
A: I thought he tried to get himself in position to make the tackle. He just didn’t make the tackle.
Q: So there was no issue with the fact that he…
A: No. Obviously, I want them all to go 110 miles per hour.
Q: When you go and look at that, what does he need to do differently?
A: Keep his head up and run through the tackle.
Q: Do you need more from both safeties?
A: I’m always looking for more for all the guys back there.