LB Anthony Walker Jr. (10.11.23)

 

Of all the things of the 49ers offense, what jumps out to you?

“Just complete team ball. A lot of guys touch the rock. A lot of guys are selfless. They do all the dirty work. All the receivers block, running backs block. Everybody catches the ball. Everybody runs the ball. So just even spread, even kill.”

 

You see what they did to Dallas. Dallas had 10 points a game, and then they got 42. Just what goes through your head when you see that? 

“We got to be fundamentally sound and we got to execute our stuff. At the end of the day, they’re attacking us, so we got to attack them, and we got to be sound with what we do.”

 

Your impressions of (Brock) Purdy. He doesn’t look like a young quarterback necessarily. 

“Yeah, no, just clean. Clean in the pocket, quick on his reads, getting the ball out of his hands, getting the ball to your playmakers. That’s all you want to do as a quarterback. I don’t care if you’re young [or] old. The key to the game is getting the ball in the hands of your playmakers and allowing them to make you look good.”

 

“When they have different options, like, obviously (Christian) McCaffery and (George) Kittle, how do you mentally approach that?

“Fundamentally sound. Tackle being in your spot. Everybody running to the ball. And like I said, we just got to be fundamentally sound at everything that we do.”

 

Along those lines. They line up Deebo (Samuel) everywhere. They line up (Christian) McCaffrey everywhere. When they have versatility like that, what does that do to you guys as a defense? How does that stress you? 

“Heightens our fundamentals. Like I said, we got to be fundamentally sound. Everything that we do. Again, guys line up everywhere. We can’t let that distract us. They motion a lot, all that stuff. We can’t let that distract us. We got to be on our P’s and Q’s, and we’ll be fine.”

 

You guys have to live by next man up. When there’s uncertainty about the starting quarterback, how do you make sure that doesn’t bleed down and become deflating to the whole team? 

“Yeah, that’s not my job to worry about who’s playing. Obviously, that’s Kevin (Stefanski). That’s AB (Andrew Berry). Those guys handle injuries. We got to be ready to go defensively no matter who is at quarterback. And, yeah, we’ll be fine. We can’t worry about that. We know that whoever’s out there, we believe in them. They got our support, but we got to worry about what we have to do on defense first.”

 

What makes (Christian) McCaffery special?

“Yeah, just the versatility. Being able to catch the ball like a receiver, run the ball like a running back. He can even throws it like Boobie Miles. Yeah, he’s all around, man. He does everything very, very well. Ton of respect for him. Obviously played against him at Stanford. Really good back. So, yeah, we got our hands full.”

 

What do you think about that quarterback? 

“Get out of here [laughs].”

 

The quarterbacks come out of nowhere for them. What do see when you look at Brock Purdy?

“Like I said, as a quarterback, I don’t care. The great ones know that I get the ball out of my hand, I get it to my playmakers, they’re going to make me look good. And he’s done that. He’s done a great job. I mean, obviously great ball placement, great reads, quick reads. He’s never rushed. He has great poise, obviously, to be a year two quarterback. But like I said, just getting the ball to his playmakers and he’s able to do that very efficiently.”

 

As long as you’ve been in this league, would you say that they’re the best offense you’ve seen? Anything come to mind? 

“I’m biased. I think the Browns are the best offense I’ve seen. But no, they’re great, man. They do a lot of things that really try to change the picture for the defense. Like I said, it makes your fundamentals have to go up, especially as linebackers. It’s a huge task on us this week to just control that middle of the field, keep everybody calm when they’re doing all the shifts and motions. And like I said, it’s a huge job for us, and I think we’re up for the challenge.”

 

It seems like (Kyle) Shanahan likes to attack the middle of the field?

“Yeah, no doubt. Yeah. You move guys. You do a lot of motions and stuff, and you get guys to jump out of place. Like I said, it just goes back to our fundamentals, our technique, us being in the right spot. Don’t let all that get you out of your zone, out of your spot, whatever we’re doing. So, we just got to be clean.”

 

When you look over at Fred Warner and Dre Greenlaw, and Warner’s put together an incredible year. People are talking about him as a defensive player of the year category. What do you see out of him? And what do you model your own game after?

“Much respect for that whole linebacker crew. Obviously, Fred being a Mike, I play Mike. He does everything well. He’s able to be efficient in coverage. They put a lot on him to cover, make sure the middle of the field is taken care of, and he does that job. Probably one of the best in the NFL, if not the best. Dre Greenlaw, obviously being able to run a hit, control his area as well. They have a great core. We understand that. We respect it. But at the end of the day, we play against their offense, not their defense. So that’s what we got to stay focused on.”

 

You talked about (Kyle) Shanahan a little bit, using the middle of the field, but does he really stand out as a play caller? When you watch it looks like he’s able to get guys running open. 

“Yeah, and that’s just a testament to him, a testament to the scheme and a testament to those guys being able to be like you said, versatile, line up anywhere and make plays. You got Juice (Kyle Juszczyk) lining up at slot, running a slant, catching it. You got Deebo (Samuel) lined up in the backfield, running like a running back. Like I said, just a lot of interchangeable guys, and they execute really well.”

 

You talk about that motion, I can’t stand your pump. I’m sure a lot of other teams have said that too. Why are they able to kind of still use that and kind of get teams to get out of there? What makes them so good at that?

“They execute really well. The way they do it, I guess you would say – I’m not going to speak on any other defense. I just say that for us, we got to be fundamentally sound and I think we’ll be ready. I think we’ll be fundamentally sound as well.”

 

Outside of being fundamentally sound is there anything else?

“Win, whatever it takes to win.”

 

I know you answered this already, but that Baltimore game, you guys probably weren’t happy with your tackling. Was it something that Baltimore might have seen from those first games or was it just not your guys best day? 

“Yeah, us not executing. They played well, they made plays. Obviously, it’s the NFL. We understand that’s going to happen, but we didn’t play the game that we normally play and we got to be better.”

 

So, it wasn’t something that they saw that the 49ers could catch?

“I’m not in their meeting room, but I know that we didn’t play well. So that’s all I can speak on and we got to play better and especially this week.”

 

Anthony, what makes Christian McCaffery so powerful? Seems like he runs through defenders on a weekly basis.

“Yeah, I think he squats a lot. I think he works out well in the offseason. We all see the videos. He’s just an explosive athlete. We just want to take all eleven of us to get him down. We understand that we got to have all eleven guys running to the ball.”

 

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