San Francisco 49ers defensive coordinator Nick Sorensen, offensive line/run game coordinator Chris Foerster, and quarterback Brock Purdy spoke to reporters after Thursday's practice as the team prepares for its Week 4 matchup against the New England Patriots. Here's everything they shared.
Transcripts provided by the San Francisco 49ers Communications staff.
Defensive Coordinator Nick Sorensen
When you come out of this game against the Rams and move forward to the Patriots, is there one particular episode of that game or situation or just overall umbrella of something that went wrong that you really have put the focus in on correcting?
"Yeah, I think it was situations more than one thing. I think it's a culmination. It hasn't really ever been one thing or one coverage. It's kind of been a culmination of things and it just hasn't been good enough overall. It's not one person or one coverage, like I said, it's just kind of been, we would be a little better here, a little better there. As always, I look at myself first. And I should, it's my defense, I'm the coordinator, But I take responsibility of that. I think we just all feel that way. That's a cool thing. All us coaches, we've got to coach better and players feel that challenge as well for themselves."
Any update on LB Curtis Robinson?
"Oh, I don't know."
What does the loss of DL Javon Hargrave do to your defensive line?
"One, he is a great player, but he's had an awesome camp and an awesome offseason and really that game he was playing really, really good too. So it's tough because he's such a good player. This is a time when guys have to step up. I know it's cliche, but the league is littered with guys that have been backups and get their chance and play really well. It's just understanding who we're losing. It's going to be tough shoes to fill, but guys have to step up."
Going back and talking about, not one thing, not one player, not one situation. Is it difficult to make all the pieces fit together when there are so many new faces on that defense, a lot of new personnel?
"No, I think it's a challenge. We're close. I think we feel it. You could be frustrated at times, but we've got to fix it and we will."
You talk about replacing Hargrave, are you looking at just one person or do you envision that having to be kind of multiple guys?
"Yeah, I think we're looking at a bunch of guys. [DL] Jordan Elliot's been rotating in. So does [DL] Kevin [Givens]. So those guys in particular, you think of to step up and then it goes from there. We've got guys on practice squad. So, I think it's just a matter of getting guys trained and that's why you have practice squads, so that they're trained up and see who could step in and make plays for us."
Could that be more DL Yetur Gross-Matos moving inside too or do you maybe not have enough edge depth?
"He's done that. Certain situations in his history, which we've talked about."
With the third-down defense in particular, why do you feel that's been an issue with just getting off the field?
"Like I said, it's not one thing. It's been tough. It is frustrating at times because sometimes it's really good. I think stuff's been kind of inconsistent all around. Sometime the run game, we hit it up really good or we get pressure. I think overall, we have high expectations. We all do. The players, the coaches, myself, we all understand how it's supposed to look here. And I think it's not one thing, we've just consistently got to get better."
DL Nick Bosa didn't come off the field, which I think it's only happened one other time in his career. Is that a reflection of the edge depth?
"No, I don't think it's a reflection of the edge depth. I think, in talking to Nick, we'd like to spell him more. If you really look at the first three games, we really didn't have a lot of plays and I think he was kind of into the game and felt good because [defensive line coach Kris] Kocurek has always connected with them, and he likes to rotate the guys and take care of Nick. There just haven't been as many defensive plays, I think, so far in the first few games. And Nick was into it, and I think we've just got to protect him and be smart about it so that we keep him as fresh as possible for the longest period of time. But I think he just felt like he was good. If Nick's good, then he's going to get a lot of reps."
When you watch the Patriots offense on film, what stands out to you about them?
"Well, they can really run the ball. They're aggressive, they're physical. They have a very good plan. They're very well coached. Two really good running backs. A line that knows how to block. They have good scheme. And then [New England Patriots QB Jacoby] Brissett really is a good fit in that system in how he performs and how he plays. And he sees the game right. He protects the ball. He can make the throws that he needs to make, and he can move really well. I think they're just a tough team, reflection of the coach and the coaching. Respect for those guys. They're really big backs that can cut, they can run. It's just an overall physical team."
When you get a rough patch like this, do you do you sit back and think, "man, we've got to try some new things and shake things up?" Or you have to guard against that and say, "let's just do what we do and do it better?"
"I think it just depends. It depends on what you're doing good. You've got to look at yourself. And then also it's that week who you're playing. So you've got to evaluate, what are we doing? What can we be better at? A lot of times you can pinpoint that. You don't want to just go off the reservation because you know who you are, you know what you want this defense to be. But then also how does that tie into who we're playing? The most important thing is how do we win this game? So it's not so much you're looking at what you've done and what needs to be better and you identify it. I think we talk about it, we identify it, and then, alright, 'how much does that affect this game? What do we need to do specifically to win this game and beat this team?"
How much New England Patriots QB Drake Maye do you watch just in case they decide to make a quarterback switch?
"Yeah, you watch them both. We've seen a lot of tape. There's only been a few games and those guys did play in the preseason. So, you look at the scheme of what they've done in the past, but he's a talented quarterback too."
Can you talk about the process of calling defenses in a game when you're doing it for the first time and how you prepare to do that and the differences? Is it faster?
"I think a lot of the preparation is done now. It's done during the week. And you kind of prepare for the situations. There are tweaks that you do have to, sometimes you can pre-think, okay, 'if this happens, we're ready to go to this' then you might have some tweaks in-game. That's why you always hear people talk about halftime adjustments. Sometimes you have those, sometimes you don't. Sometimes you don't need them necessarily or you decide that you don't need to have something called that you have on the sheet based on what they're deciding to do and you're just kind of figuring each other out and seeing how it's working within the game. But I think primarily most of the work is done throughout the week."
Anything that replicates it? Before you get into a game, is there anything that replicates the fury?
"Oh, not really. Preseason games are cool. And then me personally not having done it, my favorite part of training camp was the unscripted move-the-ball periods. I think those are invaluable for someone who hadn't done it before."
Run Game Coordinator/Offensive Line Chris Foerster
You'd said in the summer that OL Jaylon Moore was pretty much exclusively a left tackle out of necessity. Has he been able to get more?
"He gets a little work the right side. He's been getting work since the start of the season. Wednesdays, [T] Trent [Williams] is usually off, and then Thursdays he's back at practice, so he's able to get a little bit more work at both tackles. As is, we're working [OL] Spencer Burford to tackle as well."
When you look at New England's front, what does it look like to you? They have New England Patriots DL Keion White who is big and fast and athletic.
"They're good. Man, 99 and [New England Patriots LB Joshua Uche] 55 are their two best rushers. The rest of the guys are really good rushers as well. Those are the guys that stand out the most as their most productive sackers and things like that. They push the pocket real well. They're an excellent, they're a well-coached defense, very good fundamentals, very good schemes. Over the course of all the time that they've been there, they've established a way to attack everything that every team does in league. If you look at enough film, you're like, they have a way. If they know what you're doing, they're going to take advantage of it. They do a really nice job. They're very well-coached, very good fundamentals, and they have good, talented players on defense."
I think you said the game against Minnesota, you felt better about the way your line played as opposed to the first week? How was last week's game against the Rams?
"There's a lot of good things because you don't, the way we're moving the ball and then the way that we score points, [QB] Brock's [Purdy] production. You still have to, even though we weren't as good, to be honest. But yet, there's the pros and the cons. We weren't good enough, period. We weren't as good as we were the previous two weeks, at all, in pass protection. Run-game wise, it was a productive day. For whatever reasons, the way the game played out and our scoring drives, whatever. I don't, you can't get into all that. But the bottom line is, it wasn't as good of a productive day for us in pass pro."
Is that physical one-on-one guys?
"It was physical. It was physical, yes."
I think you guys, for the first three weeks, have almost double the amount of three-man rushes that you're seeing, at least that Brock's facing, in terms of pass attempts. Anything you can put your finger on as to maybe why teams are doing that to you guys more than others?
"I'd like to say it's because we pass block so well. So they don't want to rush, they drop, right? But that would be a heresy to say that. Everybody has their own reasons for doing things. Whatever the situations are, maybe they think what we're trying to get done, maybe we have formation things that they've thought that, 'Hey, this is one where they're leaving people.' There are so many different reasons. Again, when [Miami Dolphins defensive coordinator] Vic Fangio was the defensive coordinator in Houston, and I was in Baltimore at the time, it was as simple for him as if [former NFL TE] Todd Heap was on the ball, he knew we were releasing, and we were going to have a five-man protection, he rushed six. The second Todd Heap was off the ball, we're usually in a six or seven-man protection, he dropped eight and rushed three. So just by Heap being on or off the ball, he set a whole game plan up rushing three or rushing more than three for the whole game. And that was his tell, whatever the percentages we did it, he decided to go with it. So I tell that story to relate that whatever it could be a laundry list of things that the defensive coordinator looks at [former NFL head coach Don] Shula and says, 'Hey, this is why we're going to rush three in these situations. This is what they do. This is our best chance to get them stopped.' Or just change of pace. Sometimes, we say it's like a rolodex. They're just a rolodex defense. They're just, 'Okay, here's the next one.' And they just roll it and just to keep you off balance. It just depends."
It would seem like that would maybe put more pressure on the line to protect longer, just because maybe things are taking a little longer to open up with eight dropping back in coverage. Is that a fair assessment and what is kind of the challenge of keeping those things locked up?
"You saw the plays. I mean Brock's back there, everybody gets nervous. You like, the timing of the, the timing of an NFL pocket, we all know, we talked about it a little bit with earlier in this, two weeks ago in Minnesota. We weren't quite synced. It was a little bit of everybody, right? And so, the ball wasn't coming out. You get one hitch, maybe two hitches. Three-man rush, it's like, 'Okay, I've taken two, I've taken three hitches.' And you get, you see him, he's like, 'where do I go?' Because you're not used to just realizing it's just a three-man rush. And then with us, it's the same thing. You block, you're like, 'Okay, there's one hitch.' You can't see it, but you feel the timing in your head. There's two and then the ball should be gone. You're like, 'Oh, I didn't know it was a three-man rush.' And then all of a sudden, Brock's still standing back there and guys are working to get open and it's just different. And you can't do it out here. You just, you get used to it. You're like, 'Oh.' And that's why you see, I remind them they're mixing in the three-man rush. So if it feels like the play is still going when it shouldn't be going, it's because it is. Because most times it's pass block, the ball's thrown, the D-Linemen take off. Well now you're here, and they're like, they're not taking off, but yet they should be, there's just that whole, and for us, you, me watching a game, we're like, 'Yeah, it's three-man rush. It's going to take some time.' Them, 'I can't see anything. I'm blocking this number eight over me. And all of a sudden it's like, why is he still rushing and why is the ball not thrown?' That's what happens."
RB Jordan Mason, he could be your number one back for a while. I guess no one really knows. Do you have to guard against giving him too much work? He didn't get a crazy amount of caries against the Rams. But just in general, philosophically, just guard against him wearing down?
"You always have to keep it in mind. You really do. You get to a point where you just have to keep an eye on a guy, right? Like I said, the guy doesn't have a lot of tread on the tire. He has a lot of tread left on a tire, because he hasn't run a lot in his career. So the guy's a fairly young, fresh, good player. Ran a lot in college, but again, he was behind a guy that was the guy that, I think it's [Detroit Lions RB Jahmyr] Gibbs, that's in Detroit. So he didn't get the carries there either. So he's not a worn down guy. So he probably can take more. You just have to keep an eye on it. If you see him starting to tire, if you see cuts that don't look as crisp as they used to look, you see him missing some things. You don't see it at all right now, and it takes a long time. You saw [RB] Christian was, and you never really saw it. You see, every now and then you say, yeah, I think I saw it in the Washington game. I'm like, 'You know, we probably, he's getting ground down a little bit and we need to get him rotated something.' I think that was last year or somewhere, I felt it. But I don't remember exactly. But the point of it is, you just have to keep an eye on it. Every player you do."
You talked about rolodex defense. Some coordinators have that ability. Former NFL head coach Bill Belichick, obviously, had that ability. Is New England Patriots head coach Jerod Mayo, borrowing Belichick's concepts already? Is he changing things up? He played for him, obviously.
"Yeah, it hasn't changed much from last year. Actually, it's pretty much the same. The word is that he's tried to make it, I've heard it through the media, I don't know this to be a fact, but they're trying to make it a little simpler. They felt with Bill, it was always, there was always pushing. And I don't know this, it sounded like they're pushing the envelope. And so, anybody even - here it is with coach Belichick, right? The next guy takes over. Well there's, we're always going to make it better than it was. If somebody takes over for somebody takes over here, for [Los Angeles Chargers head coach Jim] Harbaugh, somebody takes over here for, then you're, 'Oh yeah, well we're going to do it this way and they did it that way.' There's always that give and take of that. But at its core, it's the same thing. Same coaches, same guys. It's going to be their spin on it, because obviously coach isn't there to still run the show. I can't call him Bill, I don't know."
For years, this franchise had former New England Patriots coach Dante Scarnecchia is our neck, he as the O-Line coach. I know he's not there, but do you have a relationship with Dante? And some people credit him with a big part of that dynasty, do you credit him with that?
"Yeah, Dante was, as much as an O-Line coach can have an influence, it's still [former NFL QB] Tom Brady and it's still the head coach and still everybody else. But Dante was a, Dante was old school man. Dante was tough, Dante was hard-nosed. They did what they did, sometimes to a fault. Sometimes we're, I hear [former NFL head coach] Josh [McDaniels] say, 'I can't get anything past the old man to run a new play or a new concept.' But what they did was very, very good. They were very sound fundamentally, and there was no BS. Now that's kind of how that organization was run from top to bottom. But he was at the heart of it, and he was a big part of it on offense, to make sure that everything was held together and tight. And he did a great job. I knew Dante way back when. I don't have a very close, personal relationship with Dante. But Dante is really good. I went through some hard times and there's a lot of people that, there's some people that haven't reconnected with me. Dante was a guy that very early in all that, reached out to me. Dante's a guy that afterwards was very open. When Dante retired for a brief time, he said, 'Hey, if you ever have time to come by and visit me, I'd love to see you. We could sit and talk some ball. I want to do it in retirement.' Then he came back to coach the next year or two after that. But Dante is just a really quality man, a hardworking guy, and I really respected what he did. We didn't do things the same way, but I respected, [former NFL offensive line coach] Howard Mudd was another guy like that I respected so much of what he did. I wouldn't, I didn't do a lot of it the same way, but I really respected what they did."
What did you make of RB Isaac Guerendo's performance?
"Loved him. Loved him. We had, oh man, if you guys watched the all 22, if you saw the play, [OL Aaron] Banks went up to get a linebacker and kind of didn't go right at him, he kind of slipped and fell on his butt and, but it was right about on the 50. That's a good feeling, right on the emblem. He fell backwards and missed the linebacker on that play. If he'd have got on that guy, there was a crease that he, I would've loved to see if he would've hit it. If he just could have, I thought he might have split the safety. He reminds me of another 31 [Miami Dolphins RB Raheem Mostert] we had here in his running style. He's got that upright, good-speed running style. And I'm not putting him in that category yet, but he really does. I want to see him get a chance to get, we just haven't gotten him the space yet. I like him. He's got a ways to go, obviously. He's got a lot of developing to do. And that position is a hard, tough position. But he's nothing but a positive upside. He really looks to be that, I won't say change of pace. Shoot, he could be your lead dog, but he's got that little, that extra gear we've been looking for in a change between, Christian's playing fast, JP's playing fast, but he's got a little bit something different from those guys."
When you say upright, and I realize it worked for Raheem Mostert, but usually you hear or us like, "Oh, upright is not good, you're going to get smashed around in the NFL." Can that be okay for certain guys?
"It can be, yeah. I mean, you're going to get hit. You've seen Raheem. I might say the name 31 was Raheem, right? Raheem was the track guy. He's an upright runner. You saw it, right? He'd run and he'd be gone. He's learned to play with pad level when he needed to. But it does, you play with the lower center of gravity, you play lower to the ground, you're not going to be as fast. That's why sprinters don't run hunched over. These guys are sprinters. They're straight upright, and they're running their butt off. And so that's Isaac. I really like the way he runs and he's learning to get his pads down so it's not always great, but it hasn't slowed him down yet."
QB Brock Purdy
Were you able to pinpoint when you hurt your back? Was it one play or just cumulative?
"No, it was probably cumulative. Just in terms of the whole game, all the stuff that sort of went on as a physical game. So, sort of after the game is when I started feeling some stuff and whatnot. But the last couple days have been good, just getting some rest and obviously treatment and stuff. So, I feel good now."
WR Ronnie Bell had a tough drop and you talked to him after the game. What did you say to try to lift up a teammate in that spot?
"Yeah, I told him this is a team sport dude, so for you to hang your hat on, it was all my fault kind of thing. I just sat down next to him, I'm like, 'bro, it takes everybody for four quarters. Everybody has their moments and plays and that's why it's a team sport, man. You've got 10 other guys on the field with you.' And more than anything, he is a brother of all of ours and we've got his back. We go through some stuff like this and it's a long season. So, you're going to need everybody. It takes everybody. So, keep your head up, learn from it. I'm not saying that's okay. Like, we have a standard here to be great and excellent, and that goes for myself. So, learn from it. We've got your back and keep your head up. It's a long season. He's a good kid. We love going to war with him and he's going to be just fine."
Usually when a quarterback is having rough times, a lot of times it's because teams are bringing so much pressure at him, he doesn't have time to throw. The Rams game it seemed like there was a handful of times where they only sent three and you had a lot of time. What is that like? I know it's fairly unusual, right, to have that much time to throw and to be able to pick one guy out. What are the challenges of that?
"Yeah, throughout the week when we're game planning and stuff, we're going through our progressions, per coverage, this is our answer and this is how we have to get to it. And then there's times where we're like in this situation they might drop eight and only blitz three and then in one case they only blitz two. So those are the kinds of cases that we're talking. We're like, if that kind of stuff happens, then go through your progression, but be ready to go off-schedule. So my antenna's up once I feel that kind of stuff happening. And knowing that I'm probably going to have to move around here and find some open space, either use my legs or hit someone off-schedule. So, it's something that we talk about, and we've seen it from time to time here and there. I've just got to be ready in those moments to use my legs."
I think you've seen three or fewer rushers almost twice as many drop backs as the next quarterback. Any reason that you think that teams might be doing that to you guys?
"I'm not really sure. I guess you could say because of the amount of playmakers that we have when you're rushing four, to five, to six, and you're blitzing and if we complete a pass, it's one or two broken tackles away from a really big gain. So when you have playmakers like we do, that's the chance that you take as a defensive coordinator of calling those kinds of blitzes and stuff. But at the same time you have to be on top of it. I mean, that could be a reason. Outside of that, maybe it's just trying to make me play quarterback and go through reads and progressions because when you're only rushing three, then you can drop a lot of guys in different directions and coverages. So, I'm not really sure why, but it's something that's popped up for sure time and time again the last couple games game."
In the game the Rams busted a coverage and WR Brandon Aiyuk was open deep. You looked at him and didn't throw it. When you watched the film, what do you assess? What do you see on that play?
"I'm going through my read. Obviously, there was a route that I thought he was going to run but he felt grass and went and took it. And when we're watching it after, it's like, yes, that's the right thing to do in that moment. For me, I'm going through my read and progression, and I'm concerned about a safety and then I see him go deep and I feel like he's open and I'm like something's not right in my mind per what we had drawn up. That's something that we both have to be on the same page moving forward with. If he has stuff like that, that happens and it's not being dumb and just running deep every time, but actually there's a reason for why you're going deep. There's some communication stuff that we've talked about where we can take that opportunity. He did the right thing. I have to pull the trigger in that moment and be ready for it. Something that we had to learn. In the heat of the moment, that time of the game, situational football, I'm trying to protect the ball, be smart with it, but also be aggressive. And then that happens and it's like I don't know exactly where the safety's at. So, all of those put together, that's what happened in the moment."
Communication, being on the same page, is that something that's lost a little bit when the offseason isn't there?
"No, that's not what I mean. If that was [WR] Jauan Jennings and that would've happened, I don't know if I'm throwing that ball either. I'm just saying like in the heat of the moment when you have a route on, you end up taking some grass and going deep for the right reasons, how are we on the same page so that I can let that go? That was a new situation for myself and all the receivers and everybody in the room."
Speaking of Jauan, what goes through your mind when you see him with a 50/50 ball, you put it up and you see him go over a DB and make that kind of catch?
"Yeah, he's a playmaker. He's obviously got the big frame and really good hands. So for me in that kind of situation, the last thing that I think is I just need to give him a shot and give him a chance and then he can bring it down. And he's shown that time and time again the last couple seasons. For me in that moment, it was obviously the trust factor of trying to give it over the defender and give my receiver a chance, but also knowing that Jauan is a baller and he's going to do what it takes. And so, hopefully down the road we can get some more shots and opportunities with him down the field. It's nice as a quarterback knowing that with his size and his mentality that he's going to do what it takes. He's shown that time and time again."
There were three throws to Brandon. There was a slant that was a little behind in first quarter and then there were two short sideline throws where I don't know what happened, just looked off and they were completions. Is that because you didn't have training camp or is it just kind of a fluke and happened to be thrown to him each time?
"I would say more like the fluke side of things. I think that slant, I should have been more aggressive and just led him. I think it was just a bad ball. It was behind him. And then there was another short game one, I didn't see the safety rotation and I'm trying to force it outside and I should have progressed to [FB Kyle Juszczyk] Juice. So, in those two scenarios that I can think of, that's on me. That has nothing to do with Brandon or our timing or anything like that. Obviously we're still continuing to build that kind of thing. And I am with all my receivers, it's not just him. Those couple examples right there, those are areas for me to grow and be better. And so it just happened to be Brandon in the situation."
With your conversation with Ronnie, is that something that you do frequently with guys especially on offense that you think maybe need a little extra talking up, etcetera? Did you do one-on-ones with him?
"Yeah, I just think when it's the right time and the right moment with whoever, especially young players, just because I know how it felt and how they feel because I still go through stuff right now like when I don't play my best or I could have done better or I missed a couple plays and you're just you just wanting it back. And it's nice having a guy come up to you and a teammate that goes to war with you being able to say, 'Hey man, it's okay. Let's learn from it, but I've got your back, bro. It takes so much to win in this league and it takes everybody.' And so, when I was a rookie it was really nice having [LB] Fred [Warner] or [DL Nick] Bosa or [LB] Dre Greenlaw, like these guys that come up to me and just tell me that they've got my back and I'm like, dang. It just gives you a perspective of I don't have to go out there and do it all on my own. I've got other guys around me and I've got a team around me to help be successful. So it's just sort of reinforcing that time and time again when I see it with some guys."
What is the challenge this week with the Patriots defense? A pretty sound defense, but what does it look like on film? What do you notice?
"Exactly that. They're sound in what they do. I think they've been running this type of defense for a long time, obviously going back to like [former NFL head coach Bill] Belichick and everything. And so, these guys know the scheme really well and just their leverages and forcing the ball to go in certain spots. I don't think it's easy as a quarterback when you drop back and they can do a lot of different things too. But they make you be smart as a quarterback, go through your progressions and be accurate. It's that kind of game. And so, the guys up front are going to bring it and then the guys in the secondary are all tied together and they play tight, really good coverage if you ask me. And it's sound. That's the challenge this week. But more than anything, we've just got to focus on what our scheme is and what we're trying to do and take what the defense gives us."
In today's practice and you're seeing teammates carted off, what emotions course through you and the team with that reality?
"Yeah, it sucks anytime you see a teammate go down or anything like that. I'm just trying to practice, get ready for this game and everything, and then you look over and you see like a cart on the field. So it's like, 'alright, dang it, who is that? What happened?' And then we've got to keep going and finish practice. But it sucks because these are the brothers that you come to work with every single day, you're going to war with every Sunday and just going through all of this together. So when you see a guy go down, obviously it sucks and you want nothing but the best for that person. We've got to have the perspective of you've got to be grateful for when you're healthy and take advantage of your opportunity. But more than anything, the culture that we have here, whoever goes down, we've always got their back and we will be there for them and continue to build them up and try to get them back as fast as possible."
You lost three in a row last year, had a Bye week, righted the ship, got it turned around. It's way earlier this time, but how would you describe the feeling when you guys aren't performing to your own standards? Not necessarily what people on the outside think, but what you guys think?
"Honestly, there's been games like that even when we win. There are games where we haven't played our best and we come in here with the chip on our shoulder again. Like, yeah, we might've won that game, but we know we need to play at this level. And so obviously, it gets more brought to light when you lose, because then you're real with yourself and you're like, 'Man, that's the reason why we lost or whatever, and we need to be better.' But more than anything, I think it just gives us a reality check of every game matters, every play matters, every drive matters. And you can't take it for granted because especially at the end, trying to get into the playoffs and everything you wish you could have had those couple plays back to win that game, to then have that game towards the end. All of it matters and it ties together. But more than anything, we have a standard here and that's what we're focused on every single day. We hold each other to that standard and we're hard on ourselves, but that's, I think, why this is a successful organization."
You never played without RB Christian McCaffrey and WR Deebo Samuel Sr. and TE George Kittle at once. I'm sure you're not freaking out like, 'Oh my gosh, what am I going to do?' But was there an element of just curiosity of how this might, how might this offense look different or do you have any thoughts like that going into that game without that much talent?
"Sometimes there's some plays where we're trying to draw stuff up for Christian out of the backfield or George to get a certain matchup. Same with Deebo. And so, when you have those guys out, I think we go back to who we are as an offense, what are our base plays and what we're really good at and let's run those plays. We have good guys to step up in those moments and execute well. Use [RB] Jordan Mason, use Jauan, obviously B.A. So we have guys that are dogs and are willing to step up in those spots and perform really well. So, it was a question for me, like, 'Alright, what's our game plan going to look like?' Because every week it's a little different. Try to get Deebo the ball a little bit more here because of this matchup, try to get Christian the ball here. So last week, not having three of those guys that you listed, it's sort of just kept things a little bit more simple game-plan wise, but we're still going to get the ball to our playmakers, J.J., B.A., Jordan Mason, and go about it that way. That's how I looked at it and thought about it."