Kyle Shanahan says great defenses shouldn't have to trick their opponents “Coverages are coverages. Fronts are fronts. It’s very rare that a team just does something nobody else does. They just do it better.” “You try to find ways to attack it, and you can always come up with some new ways in the offseason, but usually a new way has to do with putting a different player in a different spot and finding a better matchup.” “Seattle is pretty much the same scheme with a lot of the same players, especially at the pivotal spots. They’re into what they do. There’s no reason for them to change.” “They don’t have to trick too many people. They’re very sound at what they do, and they’re very good at what they do. They make you line up and play.” “It’s similar to how we were in 2019. Everybody knew what we were doing, but we were really good at it, we had really good players doing it, and we did it over and over again.” “That’s the best way to build a defense. You don’t have to get lucky with calls or put guys in risky positions.”

Tyrann Mathieu says Patrick Peterson helped him pay his rent one month while in college together at LSU, but with a condition, he would work so hard he would never have to ask for help again “I remember I called you. It was like a month before we went to camp. I said, ‘Big bro, I don’t know how I’m going to pay the rent this year.’ “That’s a common story with young players. They think they’ve got money that they don’t necessarily have, so they spend a certain way. It was just a hard lesson. “I remember you came down, you had the Chase envelope in your hand, and you gave me more than what I needed. But I remember what you told me before you walked back inside. You looked me in my eye and said, ‘Bro, this is the last time.’ “That stuck with me like 12 years later. Even though you were hard on me, you made me accountable. You knew what I needed.” Patrick Peterson: “And I’m hard on you, right? But I wanted so much of you, and I knew what it was going to take to get that out of you so you could see it. Because I used to tell you this, when I was growing up, I saw so many guys with crazy athletic ability, but they wasted it. “I didn’t want you to waste what you got. You were special. So therefore, I’m going to give you everything that I can to make you the best player and person that you are. “Going back to when you say I was hard on you, to this day, that’s what my girls tell me. ‘Daddy, you’re so hard on us.’ But then when we have Thanksgiving or Father’s Day, they appreciate it. “That’s my job. I know it may be mundane or you don’t feel like listening to it right now, but that’s my job, to see around the corner before you get there. To guide you through certain things, help you make better decisions, or help you maybe think differently. That’s my job.”

Clinton Portis reveals that before he committed to Miami he asked Edgerrin James if he was leaving for the NFL, and says that’s when Edge taught him to seek competition instead of opportunity “When I committed to the U, it was from a piece of advice that Edge gave me. We were standing on the field, and I said, ‘You leaving? Are you leaving if I come?’ He said, ‘Man, it shouldn’t matter whether I leave or if I stay.’” “‘You should want the competition. You don’t want anything given to you.’ And that advice has taken me so far because of the running back rooms I’ve been in. You talk about Willis, Frankie G, Najeh Davenport, James Jackson, and then when I got to Denver, you’ve got Terrell Davis, Mike Anderson, Olandis Gary.” “I never sat in a room like, ‘Oh shit, this dude is going to beat me out.’ Homeboy, you go out there and practice and show them what you’re capable of. On Sunday, when I go out there and bust his lunch pail, that’s going to change all of that.” “I remember my first practice in Denver. Terrell was there, and they said, ‘First team, ones come up.’ We had 12 people in the huddle and everybody, Rod Smith, Shannon Sharpe, they’re laughing, ‘Bro, get out of here. Get out of this huddle.’” “I said, ‘Man, they said ones. They said ones come up.’ There ain’t no two or no three. I’m a one. That was the confidence. There was no beef with Terrell. The competition is what made me thrive.”